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Play Contest Fees — Just Plain Wrong!

ON MISCELLANEOUS THEATRE ISSUES - by G.L. Horton

RE: "OPP opposition" discussion thread on ICWP-L@LISTS.NETSPACE.ORG.

I think it's worse than mere exclusion. To ask a playwright to contribute money to a contest that may be biased against the themes, structures, styles, genres, ethical positions, policies or groups that the playwright him/her self may champion, is simply wrong. The org holding the contest is using money collected from all playwrights to reward and further the careers of the playwrights they favor.

Now if the call was very specific, and if it were possible to tell in advance that the winner would be someone whose work the losers would themselves approve, then fine-- I'd prefer that theatres not charge, for all the reasons listed in the ICWP letter (which I recently sent out, to ill effect) but I'd kick in a fee to a Good Cause and send along my well wishes to the winner. But contests don't necessarily choose plays that I think are well written, and not all well written plays are Good in the sense that a Cause may be Good, and beyond that there there are talented authors that I simply do not wish to support. I don't mind if they beat me out in a contest-- well, I do mind, but I get over it-- but although I wouldn't try to censor them I also won't buy a ticket to one of their plays nor buy their publications. I would hate to think that my meager financial resources were going to contribute to their success.

Flower shows have entry fees, but all the entries are seen by the public even if they don't get a ribbon. Everyone can note what the judges favored and what was rejected, and decide whether the institution's judgment matches one's personal judgment.

If the plays were all to be published.....

Or if, like Louisville, the winners have been published over a number of years so that a writer has some notion of the values of the judges......

I sent Stockyards some money, but not a script. I didn't think any of my scripts fit their needs-- but I thought what they said they wanted was what the theatre should be doing more of, so I'll support it. (6/4/04)

JSP wrote: Did anyone else sent a play to the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom Peace & Justice Theater Festival 2005? The posting didn't mention fees or copies, nor did its Website. (It said something about Special Submission Guidelines, but they were nowhere to be found.) I just got an e-mail asking for 3 script copies plus $5.

This particular posting has caused more writer-rage than anything I've seen in a long time. The idea that Women are asking Writers to finance their fundraising efforts in the name of Peace and Justice has sent up geysers of outrage all along the email lists. It set me off, too-- but because I was once long ago an actual Member of the venerable WILPF, I didn't dash off a flame, but rather bit my tongue and declined to submit 3 copies of one of my vast collection of unproduced political screeds.

The fee and copies thing was in the original posting that I got: at least it wasn't sprung on me after I'd submitted--- which I surely would have done if they hadn't asked a fee. I've signed on to the No Fees pledge, so not paying them is as firm a principle as any other item in my Socialist-Peacenik-Unitarian-Crusader-for-Justice value system. Free Speech means no access fees: Pay for Play systematically silences the poor.

I think this particular subset of the WILPL organization imagines that playwrights make enough money from their writing that they can deduct their expenses and/or charitable contributions and that therefore their request is reasonable. We don't, so it isn't.

 

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