Submission 139 / Day 138

VALU-MART to Next Act, Milwaukee.

Next Act's play selection is fascinating because it practically invites a guessing game as to how much their choice in scripts is driven by artistic considerations and how much by economic ones. After the production of LOMBARDI: THE ONLY THING, a home-grown play about the legendary Packers coach that has a cast of six, the three remaining plays in Next Act's season (Hatcher's MURDERERS, Blessing's GOING TO ST. IVES, and Wright's THE PAVILION) contain a total of eight roles. And, if you add in two other "non-season" shows that Next Act is producing, WINTER TALES by John McGivern and ROBESON IN CONCERT, both of which have a cast of one, we have, in all, six productions with a total of sixteen roles . . . or two and two-thirds of an actor per play (I'm pretty sure that "two-thirds of an actor" has appeared in the productions of many of my plays).

THE CRUCIBLE alone has 22 speaking roles. How times change.

The fact that LOMBARDI has six roles demonstrates that Next Act's space can accommodate shows of that size, so we're left to ask whether the fact that none of the other plays contains more than three roles is purely coincidental and represents a simple artistic judgment -- after all, we're talking about three well-regarded plays by three equally well-regarded playwrights -- or whether economic considerations were a major factor.

I'll be grateful if anyone can share with me analyses of the evolution of "average cast size" in plays written and produced over the last few decades. And, if the data shows what I expect it will, I'll be happy to hear opinions about the "chicken or egg" question: did theatres start demanding smaller-cast plays or did playwrights simply start preferring to write them?