Watch and Learn

As one who works front-of-house at a number of theatres in Perth (and a performer), it has always interested me what it is that makes people want and not want to attend certain types of theatre. I'm currently working at shows for the Perth International Arts Festival at UWA and have noticed how empty our venues can be for certain shows. Take, for instance, "Aftermath" [currently on at the Octagon Theatre]. My shift on that show last night (an usher shift) was canceled due to low booking numbers. Now, the Octagon is a relatively large venue that seats between 650 and 750 people, but to cancel ushers, the bookings have to be lower than 400 people. For an international show to draw that few people is pretty astonishing. Then turn to community theatre. It has been a fairly oft-spoken topic of late, the lack of audience at certain shows, but it does draw the question - what is it about some shows that draws more or less of an Audience? It's generally not the quality of the show [take "The Return" at Melville Theatre last year], or even the cast. Is it because the shows are "safe" or "tried and tested"? I, for one, prefer to see shows that I haven't seen 1000x before, and doubly prefer to be in ones that people haven't seen again and again. It's a weird world, this theatre space. A world where people on the stage want to work outside the box, and people in the audience (apparently) only want to watch 'reruns'.