There are rush seats. There are standing room tickets. And then there is what one arts organization in Toronto is offering its patrons.
Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, the world’s longest-running and largest queer theatre organization, is paying 50 audience members up to $180 each to see its shows this season.
It’s no gimmick. And all that the company asks in return is for guests to provide detailed feedback on their experience: everything from the venue’s way-finding and accessibility, to the theatre’s bar offerings and box office services.
The initiative is part of an audience-in-residence program at Buddies, the findings of which will help inform how the company can better serve its patrons.
Across Toronto, other theatres are making similar changes — reimagining how their venues can function not only as performance spaces but as community hubs that are open to visitors throughout the day, and with programming that stretches beyond the stage.
The shift comes as the number of shared gathering spaces continues to decline in the city and as many arts organizations are still struggling to rebuild the audiences they lost during the COVID-19 pandemic.
For the arts leaders steering these institutions, it’s meant throwing away the traditional playbook that’s guided their companies for decades. And in its place, an existential question: what is the purpose of a theatre in our society today?
“This audience-in-residence program is meant to test this idea of hosting culture,” said ted witzel, artistic director of Buddies. “Art should no longer be a consumer product. So what I’m trying to build here is an experience.”
Buddies, located in the gay village near Yonge and Wellesley streets, was already considered to be one of the first major theatres in Toronto to pioneer a community-hub model. In addition to its mainstage programming, the company hosts club nights, open mics and other cabaret events, along with operating an in-house bar that’s separate from its theatre.
But witzel wants Buddies to continue evolving and find new ways to connect with its audiences. “The primary means through which we build community here is through theatre. We are, first and foremost, an arts organization and we’ll always orient ourselves in that direction,” he said. “Yet I’ve also tried to expand some of the programming. I’m interested in interdisciplinary work, including those that balance on the edge of theatre.”
He points to the company’s foray into podcasting and recent collaboration with the queer arts collective New Ho Queen to host a series of dance party events.
While the feedback received from the audience residency will help witzel plan future programming, he’s also hoping to gain more insights into more intangible aspects of the theatre, such as the atmosphere Buddies projects into the community.
“What is the sweet spot between being really welcoming and approachable, but also having our own vibe that is authentic to itself?” he asked. “Do people want to be reached out to? Or how much do they want to be invited to lean into us?”
Funded by a grant from the Metcalf Foundation, the audience-in-residence program’s 50 participants were selected from a pool of more than 800 candidates who applied late last year. They’ll be attending events at the theatre incognito, their identities withheld from all but the one member on Buddies staff who is co-ordinating the program. Witzel, however, said the participants were drawn from a wide range of backgrounds, and include young adults, seniors, disabled patrons and those from various socioeconomic backgrounds.
“They’re like secret shoppers or the spies that the Michelin Guide sends to restaurants,” he described.
Other theatre organizations in Toronto have also expanded their community offerings to open up their venues outside of regular performance hours. The Theatre Centre on Queen Street West has a café and mini library that’s open from the morning through to the evening. Theatre Passe Muraille, near Queen and Bathurst streets, has previously hosted neighbourhood meals and book clubs.
Though many theatre companies have long worked to make themselves more embedded in the communities they serve, the rollout of these new initiatives has only accelerated since the pandemic, said Kelsey Jacobson, an assistant professor at the DAN School of Drama and Music at Queen’s University, whose research focuses on audience and spectatorship.
“The financial precarity of the pandemic spurred this consideration of what theatres offer,” she explained. “Companies are realizing that buildings are very expensive and that they need to figure out how to maximize the use of those spaces, given that people are only slowly returning to live theatre. And I also think theatres are recognizing the need to have a social impact, that they must serve the communities they’re in.”
This has all led to not only new forms of programming at theatres, but also physical changes to how these performance spaces are designed. While traditional theatres, particularly those built in the 19th and 20th centuries, often employed imposing designs that blocked out the exterior world, many newer venues favour more welcoming, open designs.
The Tom Patterson Theatre at the Stratford Festival, for instance, boasts floor-to-ceiling windows and a wavy exterior that mirrors the geographic features of the lake adjacent to it. In Toronto, Streetcar Crowsnest, the multi-venue home to Crow’s Theatre, is seamlessly integrated into the podium of a condo building.
Soulpepper, the city’s largest not-for-profit theatre company by operating revenue, has invested more in recent months to activate its atrium space with community events. It’s tested out ancillary programming such as free movie nights, concerts and dance classes.
These pilot events have been so successful that Soulpepper is set to officially formalize them as a key pillar of the company’s operations, under a program called “Public Domain.”
“What we’re trying to do is redefine the role of the theatre in the community, and think about how we can create a third space that fights this kind of isolation and social tension that we’re all experiencing right now — in ways that don’t just require you to show up at 8 o’clock, sit in the dark and pay 100 dollars to see something,” said Gideon Arthurs, executive director of Soulpepper. “We’re trying to meet people where they’re at.”
Within the last two years, the company has hired three full-time staff to oversee these events. And Arthurs estimates that a fifth of Soulpepper’s programming budget is currently spent on community engagement initiatives.
He added that the change was prompted, in part, to meet the needs of the neighbourhood. The Distillery District, where Soulpepper is located, and the surrounding communities are among the fastest growing areas of the city.
According to census data from 2021, the neighbourhood recorded a 36 per cent increase in population over the preceding five years. Yet, in spite of this accelerated growth, there’s still a lack of shared gathering spaces in the area, said Arthurs, adding he hopes the theatre can help to fill that gap.
Beyond the benefits that these changes can have on surrounding communities, they can also help connect theatres with new audiences and foster a sense of belonging, said Jacobson.
“We’ve had the subscription model for so long in Canada and North America, and that was one way in which people found a sense of loyalty,” she said. “But having these additional events might be another way to forge that connection.”
For witzel, who’s eagerly awaiting the results from Buddies’ audience-in-residency program, being a theatre and a community hub doesn’t have to be mutually exclusive.
“A question that has plagued this institution for 46 years and counting is whether we’re a theatre or a community centre,” he said. “The answer is both. Because I don’t actually think those things are different.”
