Two Tens Gets You Tickets to Trinity

This from the Trinity Rep:

Trinity Repertory Company is pleased to announce that it plans to continue its tradition of making a night at the theater affordable for all by making 5,000 $20 tickets available for the rest of its 2008-2009 season. These $20 tickets will be available for select seats in every performance of every show – from classics like Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun and Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest to newer works like The Secret Rapture by David Hare and the world premiere of Shapeshifter by Laura Schellhard.

(More information here.)

I know that many of us have been wondering how Trinity would respond to the "economic crisis," especially given that, like lobster or a second yacht, theater seems distinctly like a luxury these days. But theater is only a luxury in proportion to its triviality, and this spring season is anything but trivial. Let me clarify that: for all of my animadversion, the fall season was itself no lightweight. Curt Columbus and the actors at Trinity Rep have tried to give Providence a theater that is both accessible and subversive; I appreciate that recent shows, though far from flawless, were presented as sincere challenges to complacency and compartmentalization. Does it make a difference that I thought these imperfect plays were nobly motivated? Are they better plays because they have the weight of principle behind them? In short, the plays may not be better but the experience of seeing them, now, is. That is what the theater is for: to be seen, now.

So I am excited about Trinity trying to be more affordable: the conversation that it hopes to provoke will be livelier because it will involve more, and perhaps more different, people. Kudos to Trinity and congratulations to all the theater-goers who might otherwise, but for the responsiveness of Trinity Rep, have missed a slate of really terrific shows. If you have wanted to go to Trinity but have been intimidated by the (presumptive) austerity of the experience or dissuaded by the price, now's your chance.