Anyone who’s looked into producing a show on campus knows
how hard it is to book a venue. Even established student-production
organizations such as Campus Events and the Student Committee for
the Arts, complete with charters and budgets, have to fight the
good bureaucratic fight to get their performers a stage.
It’s not that venues are going empty. On the contrary,
competition for performance spots ensures that on almost every
night of the week you can find something to see. On weekends, you
can even find something you sort of want to see, and once a month,
something you’ve got to see.
Competition between organizations such as Campus Events, SCA and
even UCLALive raises the bar and produces successful shows ““
if you can’t fill the house, or the show stinks, not only are
you going to lose money but you probably won’t be booking the
venue again any time soon.
And so UCLA has built a reputation for putting up great
professional shows. As a result, UCLA performance real estate has
skyrocketed. Opportunities for students to use UCLA’s
premiere venues to present their work to a larger community just
don’t seem to exist.
The crime is that the prestige of the UCLA performance community
and the support of student organizations such as SCA could do so
much for UCLA student artists.
That first step into the professional art world is half the
battle. Imagine how giant the foot in the door would be if a highly
qualified student artist had his/her work included in a UCLALive
season, complete with audience members from the Los Angeles
professional community.
And yet professional performers have priority for venues because
they bring in the professional audiences with professional-sized
wallets. Even SCA, the student artist’s best friend and
supporter on campus, seems reluctant to produce student work in a
venue that caters to professional and community audiences ““
the risk of a student artist not delivering, or a community
audience not buying tickets, is just too high. Nobody wants a flop
in the Freud Playhouse or Royce Hall, not when there are two or
three other organizations on campus competing for the same venue
and a long list of professional artists eager to pick up the
slack.
SCA and UCLALive shouldn’t assume community audiences
won’t appreciate the best of what UCLA students have to
offer. Figuring out a way to incorporate student artists into
professional productions without undermining the quality of the
show is not the hard part ““ getting everyone to bite the
bullet and take even a small risk to benefit students is.
Student organizations such as SCA are in the perfect position to
take the risk: Annual budgets from student registration fees means
funds don’t have to be recouped for the program to
survive.
According to SCA co-chairs Theo Perkins and Natalia Schyfter,
producing student shows is SCA’s main goal, while UCLALive
works with the majority of outside artists.
And yet, when SCA produces a major event, it seems to follow the
lower-risk model and hire professionals. A list of recent
productions in the “About the Committee” section of
SCA’s Web site contains several professional events in venues
ranging from Royce Hall to UCLA’s Sunset Canyon Amphitheater.
Not one student production, however, made the list.
The fact is that even when students are given opportunities,
they are never on the same professional level that UCLA lends to
other artists. As part of last year’s Project ARTS (Arts
Realized Through Students), SCA provided compensation and on-campus
performance spaces for 150 student artists.
There’s a major difference, however, between having 250
artists perform on campus over a three- or four-day period, and
giving one student three weekend nights in a venue that welcomes
audience members from the larger Los Angeles community.
I don’t mean that Project ARTS is pointless. I’m all
for widespread artistic expression, especially at a university. But
giving select, qualified student artists the chance to bring their
productions into the professional market would set them up for a
lifetime.
Programs like Project ARTS prove that UCLA student performances
tend to be billed and produced as just that, student productions.
Programmers assume student productions are less valuable than
professional shows, and therefore market those shows only to
students who will sit through junk if it means getting the chance
to wave to their friend on stage.
A lot of student art may fit this category. But surely there are
students on campus, particularly in the MFA programs, worthy and
eager to take their work to the next level.
The money is there. SCA and other organizations are in the
position to take the risk of producing a student production for a
professional audience.
Athletic programs have flourished by spring-boarding athletes
into professional athletics for decades, all based on the support
of students, alumni and community members who want to see students
take their craft to the next level. We don’t need to bring
the Lakers into Pauley Pavilion in order to sell the place out.
Maybe it’s not as easy as I’ve made it sound; maybe
the risks of staking a student artist are just too high. But
whether you’re a producer in SCA or UCLALive, or a loyal
patron of UCLA performances, you have to agree that giving worthy
student artists the all-important first step into the professional
world is a worthy cause. Good art is all about taking risks.
Think your great idea and big foot will fit through the
door? E-mail Macdonald at jmacdonald@media.ucla.edu. Send general
comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.