The current model for streaming shows doesn’t generate anywhere near the amount that comes in when each person in a theater audience has purchased an individual ticket to get in.īut what limits might the city set when it allows theaters to reopen? Will audiences return? Looking forward, Dray said that DHT “is closely reviewing its plans for programming on every level” while the city’s policies on public gatherings and social distancing remain in flux.Ī long-term challenge for all community theater groups is revenue. #KAILUA ONSTAGE ARTS SERIES#So popular in fact that remaining shows in the series are sold out. “(The series) has been wildly popular, so we are happy to be able to offer at least a sliver of live entertainment, even if it is from a stage high above the DHT parking lot!” DHT Executive Director Deena Dray spoke from personal experience when she described the sound quality as “like being in the theater.” The concert sound is heard through the car radio. Well-known DHT stage veterans - Laurence Paxton, Aiko Schick, Drew Niles, Mary Chesnut Hicks, Andrew Sakaguchi and Lindsay Rabe, among them - perform on the elevated balcony at the back of the theater to an audience watching and listening in the comfort of their cars in the DHT parking lot. I believe online, live performances will continue to evolve, even after things return to normal - whatever and whenever that is.”ĭiamond Head Theatre introduced another way to comply with the city’s fluid social distancing policies while also accommodating well-founded public concerns when its Sunset Serenade Fall Drive-In Concert Series began in August. “We were able to include actors we normally wouldn’t have had the opportunity to work with, we were able to share our work with audience members around the globe - with viewers from five continents - and we were able to participate in what is emerging as a new medium. Pisculli said that going virtual this year gave Hawaii Shakespeare Festival new options and broader exposure. We have ramped up our donation and sponsor drives, as well as grant applications to offset the income loss.” “Also, our ticket prices are lower (this year), and if you stream onto your TV, an entire household can watch for the price of one ticket. “We know it’s a big pivot for people to accept an online version of live theater as the theater they know and love, but we think our viewers will be amazed at what we are able to offer digital payers,” she said. “After that, we will keep an eye on the situation and adjust accordingly, (but) we are prepared to offer our entire season online, if necessary.” “We are definitely going to stream the first two shows of our season,” Kumu Kahua Managing Director Donna Blanchard said via email on opening night. Kumu Kahua Theatre went virtual Thursday when it opened its 50th season with the world premiere of “Lovey Lee,” a locally written drama about the experiences of a gay prostitute in Hawaii and San Francisco in the 1970s. Cast members - most of them in Hawaii, some in other parts of the country - performed in individual isolation for audiences that were potentially worldwide. Hawaii Shakespeare Festival Founder/Director Tony Pisculli presented all three of this year’s plays as live virtual productions. Cast members remained 6 feet apart while performing ticket buyers were asked to bring their own chairs, remain in their assigned seating area with each group 6 feet apart, and to wear masks. Kevin Keaveney and Kailua Onstage Arts presented a staged reading of a long-lost Marx Brothers radio show, “Flywheel, Shyster & Flywheel,” under a canopy in a Kailua parking lot in July. Oahu’s major community theater groups are coping with a new normal that makes traditional “butts in seats” theater impossible. When the 2019-20 season ended it was with the expectation that everything would be back to normal in time for the 2020-21 season to start on schedule in late July. By the end of the month, Hawaii’s vibrant theater groups were all on lockdown. Concerns about COVID-19 reached Hawaii in March.
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