TRU, or Theater Resources Unlimited, was formed to promote a spirit of cooperation and support within the general theatre community by providing information and a variety of entertainment-related services and resources that strengthen the capacity of producing organizations, individuals producers, self-producing artists and other theater professionals.
3.18 You've Never Heard Anything Like It: The Developmental Journey of Islander
In the room: producer James Simon (Islander, Pippin revival, Roof of the World, The Velocity of Autumn, Bells Are Ringing revival; limited partner in Rent, Vanya & Sonya & Masha & Spike, Little Women); Molly Morris, producer (Islander, Come from Away, Diana, My Life Is a Musical); producer-general manager Martin Platt of Pemberley Perry www.pemberleyperry.com (Woman in Black, Islander, The Last Ship, Everybody's Talking about Jamie, Vanya Sonia Masha and Spike, Dames at Sea, Sarafina!). Learn how a small two-person musical took on technology to create a soundscape like no other, and was named Edinburgh Fringe's Best Musical by Musical Theater Review. Just before COVID hit. So the journey to off-Broadway, never an easy one, was complicated by shutdown. How did it finally find its way to a newly renovated theater on 46th Street? Why was that space the best choice for this show, and what were the pluses and minuses of being the first show there? In what ways, if any, was this small Edinburgh show rethought for New York?
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9 Mar 2023
3.12 Success by Association: The Advantages of APAP for Getting Seen and Getting Booked
Friday 4/1 - Success by Association: The Advantages of APAP for Getting Seen and Getting Booked. In the room: Sue Noseworthy, Director of Membership of Association of Performing Arts Professionals (APAP), and Mister Mojo of Mojo and the Bayou Gypsies. First, a basic overview of APAP as an association, and how they serve members with a specific focus on the APAP/NYC conference’s showcases and EXPO hall, plus their new colleagues program and information about joining. Then Mister Mojo will speak about smart ways to use this annual conference for extending your artistic reach, his personal experience as an artist member of APAP, and advice for others who are looking to join APAP and get on the radar of bookers around the country.
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6 Feb 2023
3.21 NFT (Non-Fungible Tokens): The Newest Revenue Stream for Theater
In the room: Eric Neal, founder of Third Act, the first-of-its-kind NFT marketplace for the theater community. Through NFT creation and issuance using year's the Hedera Token Service, productions can offer theatre-goers the next generation of authentic digital merchandise. Learn what NFT is, how it can range from one-of-a-kind collectibles to limited editions; what NFTs can offer a show in terms of marketing and community engagement; and how technology tracks the provenance of each item to assure authenticity. Though it sounds like an abstract concept, it actually has very practical applications.
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21 Jan 2023
3.20 Will Streaming Continue to be a Part of the "Normal" Theater Experience?
In the room: producer/videographer Jeremy Handelman of Off the Leash Productions; commercial producer Cody Lassen (How I Learned to Drive revival, Thoughts of a Colored Man, Tootsie, What the Constitution Means to Me,Indecent, Significant Other, Spring Awakening revival); and Gio Messale, head of content and producer specializing in Production, Acquisitions and Programming at BroadwayHD theatrical streaming platform. We'll look at using technology in creative ways to shake up "business as usual" in theater and better serve audiences; and consider current tastes and trends in the entertainment industry and how to tap into a post-shutdown consumer culture. Should we presume extensive Zoom fatigue by now, or has online medium reshaped the consumer experience?
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18 Jan 2023
3.17 Has an Increase in Diverse Shows Attracted a More Diverse Audience?
In the room: Marcia Pendelton, founder and president of Walk Tall Girl Productions, a boutique marketing, audience development and group sales agency for the performing arts with a special emphasis placed on the theater. Recent credits: MJ, Thoughts of a Colored Man, Lackawanna Blues and Skeleton Crew. In addition her company provided marketing services for Choir Boy, Saint Joan, August Wilson’s Jitney, and Sweat as well as significant group sales support for Tina: The Tina Turner Musical and Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of The Temptations. The good news: the current season has shown a significant increase in works by black writers produced by more diverse teams. The bad news: this long-awaited uptick happened during the reluctant post-pandemic reopening of theater. Will this conscious effort to bring more diverse voices to the stage have a lasting effect? Has it changed the makeup of the commercial Broadway audience?
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11 Jan 2023
3.16 Thinking in Zoom: Adjusting to (and Conquering) a Hybrid Medium
In the room: writer David Beardsley (Every Creeping Thing), writer John Busser (Obstacle), writer James McLindon (The First Anti-Vaxxers), writer Kristy Thomas (Only Black), writer Ian Patrick Williams (Slave Trade). A zoom reading can be as simple as talking heads in frames, but what do you do when you need to generate the sense of a real production with interaction and production values, and still adhere to the restrictions of shutdown? Though we're coming back to live performance, in order to use the Theatre Authority Benefit Agreement, TRUSpeak still needed to be shot virtually with actors in isolation. What happens to a play conceived for stage when it has to be rethought for virtual presentation? What did the writers learn, and what might they take with them into the future? What was it like having to think in film terms? What was lost, what was gained?
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4 Jan 2023
3.14 Reaching Across: Revisiting the Post-Pandemic London Theater Scene
In the room: Chris Grady, producer, director at CGO Institute, fellow of the Royal Society for the Arts, staunch networker; James Steel, a Scottish born commercial producer (Ushers) and specialist in ticketing and sales in the West End; and Megan Schadler, a New York based writer and producer exploring trans-National productions and producing for companies in New York and the UK, co-founder of The Fifth Producer multi-national collective. A follow-up to last October's conversation with Chris and Megan, a reality check on the UK scene and explorations of needs/hopes for the future. We'll also hear about current initiatives to foster stronger ties among producers, with a focus on international collaborations that generate opportunities to find what connects us all as human beings. Plus a dive into the differences in producing here in US versus UK, and the variables in reopening theater.
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30 Dec 2022
3.13 Virtual Teamwork: "TRUSpeak" and the Director/Technologist Collaboration
Friday 4/8 - Virtual Teamwork: "TRUSpeak" and the Director/Technologist Collaboration. In the room: director Andrea Andresakis (Slave Trade), director Glynn Borders (Obstacle), TRUSpeak technical director Iben Cenholt, editor Joe Nelms (Slave Trade), technologist Carley Santori (The First Anti-Vaxxers, Slave Trade). In transitioning from live performance to virtual for our TRUSpeak: Hear Our Voices! gala, TRU made a choice to bring on technical collaborators from day one when possible. We'll talk about the value of a director of photography and the absolute necessity for a creative editor, the advantages of bring them on early, what each does and how a director's vision is guided and often inspired by a tech-savvy collaborator.
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16 Dec 2022
3.11 Maximizing Visibility on Social Media
Friday 3/25 - Maximizing Your Visibility on Social Media. In the room: Benita Samuels, Linked In subject matter expert with The Visibility Solutions Group. Understanding of LinkedIn and social media platforms is the start, but Benita expands the conversation into broader marketing, strategy and business-driving initiatives for solopreneurs, including artists. Click here to watch the YouTube video - or click here to subscribe to our channel!
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16 Dec 2022
3.10 Going Off Script: Engaging an Audience with "Participatory" Works
In the room: Brisa Areli Muñoz, theater director, cultural worker, and arts educator whose expertise lies in devising original participatory works, Artistic Director of the New York City Department of Education’s All-City Theatre, and the new artistic director of Musical Theatre Factory; and Pablo Hernandez Basulto, manager of community impact for Public Works at The Public Theater. Non-traditional modes of creating theater have had a long proud history, and yet are not understood – or are misunderstood – by many theater professionals today. Now that we are returning to a post-COVID world of live performance, and we have had a year and a half to reconsider our priorities and our art, perhaps this is a good time to explore creative options. Come hear Brisa and Pablo, practitioners of participatory theater, talk about their passion and their methods of expression that engage audiences. Click here to watch the YouTube video - or click here to subscribe to our channel!
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7 Dec 2022
3.09 Going Places: Touring Opportunities and Support for Artists
In the room: Robyn Busch, program officer/International at Mid Atlantic Arts, known for their work in international cultural exchange and model programs in performing arts touring; and touring solo artists Valerie David (The Pink Hulk) and Heather Massie (Hedy! The Life and Inventions of Hedy Lamar). Robyn talks about the artists Mid Atlantic Arts serves, how they nurture and fund the creation and presentation of diverse performances, and how they connect people to meaningful arts experiences within and beyond their area of funding. Valerie and Heather talk about their successes in touring their solo shows - most recently to Europe - and building their brand and their audience.
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25 Nov 2022
3.08 Making Musicals Happen 2: Connecting Writers with Production Opportunities.
In the room: Tim Jerome, president of Main Street Musicals which promotes development opportunities for original stage musicals throughout regional America; and John Sparks, founding director of NMI (NewMusicalsInc) which is working with Shanghai Grand Theatre and Beijing Damai Culture of Alibaba to nurture writers and their writing in an ambitious plan to create stageable new works of musical theatre in China.
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22 Nov 2022
3.07 Making Musicals Happen 1: Support During Early Development.
In the room: Joe Barros, artistic director of NY Theatre Barn which is focused on the development of culture shifting musicals during incubation; Aaron Salley, president and managing director of Musical Theatre Factory, an inclusive community wholly dedicated to the developmental process of innovative new musicals by early-career artists. Learn about the development process used in each of these organizations, how to become a part of it and what they look for when they consider bringing in and/or showcasing new shows.
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17 Nov 2022
3.06 Politics and the Arts: Updates on Initiatives to Support the Return of Live Theater.
In the room: Aimee Todoroff, managing director of the League of Independent Theater, and Carla Hoke-Miller, Director of Theatre Programs and Partnerships for the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment. What is New York doing to support the return of theater? Is it working? Is it enough? What else should we ask for, and what are the most effective channels to go through to initiate necessary changes? We'll look at city agencies and initiative, plus take a broader look at ways in which theater artists – and all artists – can be proactive throughout the country
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15 Nov 2022
3.05 How The National New Play Network Helps Producers As Well As Writers.
In the room: Anne Morgan, program director for NNPN and Stephen Kaplan, playwright. Learn about the many programs and services NNPN provides for the theater industry, including the Rolling World Premiere initiative and the New Play Exchange®, a cloud-based script database, enhanced with a robust search-and-filter mechanism, crowd-sourced recommendations of plays, and personal script and coverage information storage. Plus the connectivity of a social networking site. These services have helped the development of new work: writers have a credible site for posting their work, and producers and theater companies can look for works of interest. Anne and Stephen also talk about Stephen's upcoming Rolling World Premiere and how that came about as well as the role of NPX in connecting writers and producers.
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23 Sept 2022
3.04 Is the Great White Way Becoming a Little Less White? With Adam Hyndman and Tara Moses
In the room: Adam Hyndman, board member and Tara Moses, advisory board member of Broadway for Racial Justice, fighting for greater equity and inclusion by providing immediate resources, assistance, and amplification for BIPOC in the Broadway and theatrical community at-large. Though its nickname referred to the bright lights on its marquees, intentional or not, white privilege and perspective have shaped Broadway and our business from its very beginnings. On June 8, 2020, the pandemic already raging, the BIPOC proclamation "We See You, White American Theater" challenged theater to acknowledge the problem and address it. The current commercial season boasts 7 plays by BIPOC writers, and regional theaters have announced their most diverse seasons to date. Is it enough? And is our current COVID world stifling progress? Bob and his guests wade into the deep waters of controversy and face both the challenge and the necessity of facing the roadblocks in the way of having a true equity and inclusion in our business and our world
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21 Sept 2022
3.03 What I Did Last Summer: How Producer Jim Kierstead Kept Productive in a Pandemic.
In the room: Jim Kierstead (Tony winner for Hadestown, Kinky Boots and Pippin; plus Ain't Too Proud, The Inheritance, Waitress) talks about moving his energies into the virtual world with Broadway Virtual, a new company specializing in streamed and video content, as well as educational opportunities to help artists master the new technologies. He'll also share his journey balancing the two sides of his ambitions: playwrighting and producing. Plus his plans for coming back to live performance. With a side trip into the current controversies within our slow-to-change business.
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18 Sept 2022
3.02 Keeping Virtual in Our Vocabulary: Integrating What We've Learned As We Return to Live Performance.
In the Room: Kathryn Jones, leader and Innovator in live-streaming, virtual fundraising and social-first content, founder of Collective Agency. Two years in shutdown has pushed us to expand our creative skill set. Kathryn and Bob look at the virtual tools that can still serve us going forward, and how they can contribute to our future success in theater, from livestreaming as a supplementary revenue stream to online fundraising to new ways to approach marketing and increase awareness of our product
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16 Sept 2022
3.01 Fifty Years of Leadership: A Conversation with Producer/Theater Owner Eric Krebs.
In the room: entrepreneur, producer, writer and groundbreaking theater manager and owner Eric Krebs talks of a dedicated life in New York theater. Co-founder of the George Street Playhouse, and manager for years of the John Houseman and Douglas Fairbanks Theatres, Eric has been a part of the evolution of off-Broadway, through the creation of Theatre Row to running several of his own theater spaces including the current Theatre 555 on West 42nd Street. He shares his experiences with candor and offers insights into the challenges of maintaining off-Broadway as a viable environment for developing theater artists and art.
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