Off-Broadway Crowds Still Off

NEW YORK —  While Broadway theaters seem to be bouncing back from the severe drop in business after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, many smaller off-Broadway venues continue to scramble to lure back audiences.

Earlier this month, Broadway theaters reported that they were setting box-office records, with revenue and attendance up compared with last year, according to the League of American Theaters and Producers, a commercial trade organization for Broadway.

However, the hundreds of off-Broadway theaters, many located in the devastated downtown area near the World Trade Center--parts of which were closed for nearly two weeks after the attacks--are finding that too many seats remain empty.

In an effort to turn that around, many off- and off-off-Broadway theaters have banded together to help one another recover emotionally and financially. They also are relying on emergency funding made available after Sept. 11 to prop up New York City’s arts world.

“We have been roiled by the financial impact of the attacks,” David Aukin, artistic director for the Soho Rep, says in a report about the economic effects of Sept. 11 on small theaters. “At the best of times, we operate without much of a safety net. These are not the best of times.”

Many off-Broadway theaters, for which a few weeks of lost ticket sales can be financially devastating, are looking for creative ways to assure their audiences that they are still alive.

Take, for example, Repertorio Espanol, a downtown theater that performs only in Spanish. The 34-year-old theater company, winner of four Obies--the off-Broadway equivalent of the Tony--was shut down in the first few weeks after the attacks. But even when the downtown area opened again, ticket sales were down by half. Traveling in the city was a logistical nightmare. Actors flying in from Colombia, Argentina and other Latin American countries, afraid to come to New York, canceled their engagements.

And, most importantly, the school groups, which make up about one-third of their matinee audiences, stopped coming altogether because many school districts in New York and the surrounding states banned school travel after Sept. 11.

“We basically went from our best year to our worst year on Sept. 11,” says Robert Frederico, artistic associate producer for the Repertorio Espanol.

So, the company decided to change the way it operates. If the schools wouldn’t come to them, they would go to the schools. “We set up ‘Repertorio on the Go,’” Frederico says. “We took our boombox and went anywhere within 90 miles of the city. There’s no lighting, no sound equipment--we’ll perform under any conditions just so students can enjoy live performances. We didn’t want them to get in the habit of not including live theater in their curriculum.”

Other off-Broadway theater companies formed Downtown NYC!, a coalition of downtown theaters, dance companies, art galleries and other small business.

“Initially it was set up for a bit of therapy,” Scott Morfee, producer of the comedy/drama “Underneath the Lintel” at the Soho Playhouse, says of Downtown NYC! “But it’s also to boost business and spirits.”

The group organized a December sing-along in Washington Square Park with singer Petula Clark and “about 85% of the casts from theaters south of 28th Street,” says Morfee, who helped found the coalition.

Downtown NYC! recently completed a “snapshot survey” of 45 downtown businesses and found that 21 of the 45 businesses were forced to lay off people after Sept. 11; 95% reported a loss of business. The coalition plans additional surveys to more accurately ascertain the economic and job losses to the downtown community, as well as to attempt to separate the effect of the attacks from the impact of the general economic downturn.

According to a report issued by the Alliance of Resident Theaters, which represents about 400 not-for-profit theaters in New York, the projected loss of income in 2002 to its members--which include theaters ranging from Lincoln Center and the Roundabout Theater Company to smaller ones like the Bat and the Labyrinth Theater Companies--will come to $16.3 million.

Collectively, theaters lost $5 million in the first month after the attacks, the report states. “In an industry generating $140 million annually, $5 million may not at first seem terribly significant,” the report says, “but for theaters operating on very tight margins, without the safety net of cash reserves and endowments, two days to two weeks’ lost income can make the paying of staff and rent difficult. Indeed, the survival of several smaller downtown theaters, which were disproportionately affected by the disaster, is in doubt.”

Virginia Louloudes, executive director of the Alliance of Resident Theaters, acknowledges it is difficult to attribute the difficulties small theaters are facing solely to Sept. 11.

“No doubt we were heading into a recession before 9/11,” she says. But, she notes, there’s also no question that the terrorist attacks and their aftermath--including anthrax scares and security alerts, which made people hesitant to travel into Manhattan--exacerbated the economic downturn.

Louloudes’ organization was charged with distributing $2.65 million donated by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to help not-for-profit theaters recover from Sept. 11. Similar grants were made to arts and music organizations.

On March 8, the alliance announced that 111 theaters had received $2 million in awards from the Mellon money. The remaining funds will be distributed next month. A common thread among those applying for aid, Louloudes says, was “a tremendous drop in subscription revenues.”

In addition, many theaters put off their fund-raising promotions out of concern that asking for money for entertainment after the attacks would look crass, Louloudes says. “We had to do a workshop in October called ‘What Do You Mean You’re Not Fund-raising?’” she says. “We told them they shouldn’t be ashamed to ask for money.”

Morfee’s play, “Underneath the Lintel,” was initially scheduled to open Sept. 18. Instead, it opened for one week on Sept. 19 offering audiences--primarily locals--free or “pay what you can” tickets.

“We did it for ourselves and for people in the neighborhood who are always supportive of us, but there was no way to sustain an audience,” Morfee says. So he closed the play, officially reopened it on Oct. 23 and laboriously rebuilt attendance.

Ticket sales are now going well, he says, but more people than usual are buying tickets on the spot rather than weeks in advance. “That’s not typical at all,” he says, noting that after Sept. 11, people seem much more hesitant to plan ahead.

Even Broadway theatergoers are avoiding buying far ahead of time, says Armetta Haubner, communications director for the League of American Theaters and Producers.

“The whole way people buy tickets has changed since Sept. 11,” Haubner says. Before the attacks, she says, most people bought at least six weeks in advance. But a survey completed in December found that more than 50% of tickets were purchased one to three days before the play.

One off-Broadway commercial theater, the Flea--located in the badly damaged southern tip of Manhattan--had its best week ever right before Sept. 11. After the attacks, the theater closed for a month and then reopened at 5% capacity, says associate producer Erik Sniedze.

Now it’s doing booming business. The theater, which has one 80-seat and one 40-seat auditorium, showed “The Guys,” the first play to directly address the terrorist attacks. The play sold out, due not in small part to the celebrity two-member cast. Sigourney Weaver, whose husband, Jim Simpson, owns the Flea, first starred in the production with Bill Murray; Susan Sarandon and Anthony LaPaglia later took over the roles.

The Flea’s next play will have nothing to do with Sept. 11, Sniedze says. And he says that although he greatly appreciates efforts to boost the downtown theaters’ morale and finances, “it’s time to focus back on individual institutions. That helps us more than a collective effort and constantly going to meetings.”

Even the more established plays in smaller downtown theaters, such as “Stomp” at the Orpheum, which has been playing for nine years, have experienced an audience downturn.

“We saw a fall-off of 70% in the first six weeks after the attacks,” says producer Marc Roth. Roth, who is also president of the League of Off-Broadway Theaters and Producers, says sales for “Stomp” are up from a few months ago but still 10% to 15% off projections from last year.

For off-Broadway theaters, the focus is now on the future: on fund-raising drives and on efforts to have a say in the role theater will play in a new downtown Manhattan.

Louloudes sits on a subcommittee of the Lower Manhattan Development Corp., which was set up by New York Gov. George Pataki after the attacks. One of her goals is to ensure that any construction in Lower Manhattan includes performance space and subsidies for not-for-profit theaters.

It is important, Morfee says, that people realize the survival of small theaters can mean the survival of many other businesses in the area.

Since off-Broadway theaters tend to be scattered in differ- ent neighborhoods--rather than clumped together as on Broadway--the success or failure of a show can mean the success or failure of surrounding restaurants and shops.

“Theaters are good anchors in neighborhoods,” he says. “One little theater has so much impact on a street.”