If you believe in the old adage that “we in the theatre are a band of storytellers,” then what makes good theatre is a story or experience worth telling for an audience willing to listen. Without the audience, there is no theatre. Without the story or the experience, there is no theatre.

What makes the story or the experience worth telling to a specific audience is much more difficult to describe and unrealistic to define. But I’ll try, because that is the challenge for this series.

Of course we want our work to entertain, enrich, enlighten, engage, enrage (and a host of other E words) our audiences. The work should connect with our audience on an emotional and/or intellectual level and, hopefully, send them out of the performance space feeling or thinking about something brought on by the experience.

Process and collaboration between theatre artists in pre-production meetings and the rehearsal hall prepare the story/experience for the audience to receive. These collaborative stages are where most of the potential of “good theatre” is either discovered or lost forever. If bookwriter, lyricist, composer, director, producer and design team can begin the collaborative journey and agree upon a shared single vision, there is hope that the discoveries made along the journey may add up to a story/experience that an audience is willing to endure, accept and maybe even enjoy.

Working in the developmental arm of new musicals has taught me many lessons over the last two decades. You can’t do it alone. Collaboration is not easy, but you’d better learn how to work with a team if you hope to move a new work from the page to the stage. Even then, the project may miss the mark or lay an egg. This doesn’t mean that the partnerships will be void of tension. Each participant in the creative process brings their own expertise, ego and aesthetic to the table. Healthy creative battles are inevitable. Hopefully, the artistic chemistry of these individual specialists will discover the heart, spine and soul of the story/experience. And then maybe, if the planets all align and the muses send sweet kisses, an audience might be moved by the experience.

Every new musical that I have worked on has had its share of headaches, heartaches and artistic problems to solve. Weak book, prosody problems in the lyrics, budget restrictions, bad casting, uneven ensemble, personality conflicts, prima donnas—the list goes on and on. And yet we continue to do our work.

One of my mentors used to enjoy grouping people into two broad categories: those who dwell on problems and those who seek solutions. Hopefully, we in the theatre spend most of our waking hours in the camp of solution seekers, but probably fit into both of these categories at some time during the process of creating good theatre.

Those that dwell on the problems are overwhelmed by fear of the unknown and a fear of failure. (Or is it really a fear of success?) They have a tendency to play it safe when it comes to show selection, type casting, and have a formulaic development process of all projects. A problem dweller might be overheard saying, “I don’t do that ‘type’ of play or musical. That sounds really intriguing but that’s just not me.” This approach is not conducive to “good theatre.”

On the other hand, a solution seeker sees the potential in those intriguing ideas. “I want my audience to hear this story. What forms of expression will work best for this story and my audience?” They’ve suddenly stepped out of that hard-to-leave, comfort zone and entered into a world of possibility. The risk is high and yet the potential return is much more artistically fulfilling. Maybe even, “good theatre.”

Playwrights and librettists search for inspiration and sources that comment on the human condition. What is the social and political climate in which we live? What are the wrongs that need to be righted in our existence? Theatre artists should identify and dwell on the problem or problems, and then set out to dramatize those social evils. Raise the questions for an audience and then seek the solutions that may carry on in an audience beyond the four walls of the theatre.

What makes good theatre is passionate artists sharing their stories with audiences willing to listen and participate in an exchange of ideas and potential solutions.

Allan Chambers is associate artistic director of Theatre Building Chicago. 

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