HARTFORD, Conn. — Audiences are punching their tickets again to downtown Hartford theaters — long a key contributor to downtown vibrancy — but patrons are returning so slowly even as the pandemic eases that theaters face a tough fight for survival.
TheaterWorks was so worried about lagging subscriptions for the new season launched this month that it took the unusual step of sending a letter to longtime subscribers sharing the stunning fall-off and urging them to renew.
“It’s a critical moment that is heading toward crisis,” Rob Ruggiero, producing artistic director at TheaterWorks, said, in an interview. “We have tried to avoid a moment like this, but I really felt like before we are plunged into some crisis that it was important to make it clear how critical this moment was.”
The letter, sent in late September, disclosed that subscriptions — a crucial source of revenue for regional theaters like TheaterWorks that produce their own plays — numbered just 1,700, less than 35% of the 5,000 before COVID-19 struck.
Prior to the pandemic, subscriptions accounted for about $1 million in annual revenue for the 190-seat theater on Pearl Street. For this season, subscriptions are now running at about $500,000, the theater said.
“The oft-used phrase ‘we need you now’ has never been more relevant,” TheaterWorks stated in its letter to subscribers. “We need you to stand with us TODAY so we’ll be here TOMORROW ... there’s no simpler way to put it and the best way to do that is by subscribing.”
In addition to the cultural experiences they provide, downtown’s theaters have the potential to be key economic drivers as Hartford seeks to regain the revitalization momentum it had prior to the pandemic. Theater patrons often visit restaurants and bars before or after a show.
On top of lagging ticket sales, the theaters face the prospect of drying up federal pandemic aid — including the Shuttered Venues and Payroll Protection programs — that brought millions of dollars to the organizations since 2020, much of it in grants and “forgivable” loans.
“So it really was a lifeline, and many arts organizations would have closed if it weren’t for those programs,” Cynthia Rider, now in her fourth season as managing director at the Hartford Stage Co., said. “It helped us get up-and-running, producing and hiring people when audiences were still small.”
Rider said the federal aid programs have expired and won’t help the theaters as they embark on their seasons.
“We need more donations, more public money, more ticket buyers, all those things,” Rider said. “It’s dire. It’s not a little dire. It’s dire.”
Rider said subscriptions at the 490-seat Hartford Stage on Church Street are less than half of what they were prior to the pandemic. She said her assessment is that theaters, not only in Hartford but elsewhere in Connecticut, have already crossed into a crisis.
At the grand dame of downtown theaters, The Bushnell Center for the Performing Arts, Chief Executive David R. Fay said even though audiences are returning, the 2,800-seat Bushnell is nowhere near back to where it was in 2019, coming off the previous December’s buzz that surrounded the Hartford premiere of “Hamilton.”
“We did everything we could to make it through the pandemic with the government funding and everything else to stay standing,” Fay said. “So, here we are standing. But we’re looking at at least a two- or three-year road to get attendance to back where it was pre-COVID.”
‘Magnetic pull of the couch’
Hartford’s theaters reopened for live performances last fall and confronted some harsh realities. Theater-goers were still worried about the spread of COVID-19, a concern that still lingers.
Mask and vaccine card requirements for entry have generally eased, although there still are some mask-only performances.
Still, theaters have to work to make patrons comfortable enough to return.
TheaterWorks’ $6 million renovation that was completed just before the onset of pandemic included a new air circulation system that brings filtered air into the theater six to seven times an hour. The letter to subscribers mentioned the air circulation system prominently.
But the bigger, long-term obstacle is likely to be the cultural shift that took hold during the pandemic.
People got used to spending more time at home, especially if they were working remotely. They weren’t in the office, near to where they could grab dinner and see a show. More got used to watching a wide array of streaming programs at home and simply got out of the habit of going to the theater.
“We all have to resist the magnetic pull of the couch and get ourselves back, going out and doing things with people you haven’t connected with or lost connection with or only saw via Zoom,” Hartford Stage’s Rider said. “This is a great way to do that. If this is something you used to do, you’re going to love it just as much. Come back.”
TheaterWorks wrestled internally for months over sending the letter to subscribers, and Ruggiero said he understands if former subscribers aren’t ready to return. Even so, buying a subscription will help keep the theater afloat, Ruggiero said.
“Even if you are not quite ready to reintroduce a regular habit, by re-subscribing, you can sustain us and bridge us to when you are ready,” Ruggiero said.
Troubled ticket sales
Troubled theater ticket sales extend well beyond Hartford to across Connecticut and indeed, the country. And while concert attendance has surged, even beyond pre-pandemic levels, live performance theaters continue to lag. Some experts say part of the reason may be that concerts typically attract a younger audience than theaters.
The number of theater tickets sold for the 12 months ending Aug. 31 was down by 32%, compared with the same period a year earlier, according to TRG Arts, a data analytics firm that has tracked more than 140 arts organizations in the United States and Canada through the pandemic. Revenue in the same period was off 25%, TRG found.
Downtown Hartford’s theaters each offer live performances, but the challenges they face differ substantially.
TheaterWorks and Hartford Stage produce their own shows and depend on subscriptions to finance a wide spectrum of plays often with lesser-known, cutting edge titles — something that can’t be done on single-ticket sales alone.
At The Bushnell, which hosts touring productions that have often made a splash on Broadway, subscriptions make up roughly a third of box office revenue, Fay said. Single-ticket sales account for the rest, sold with the name recognition that often comes with the plays — many of them musicals — hosted by the historic theater near the state Capitol.
“Our objective from season to season is to find the highly-branded shows that people really want to see and dive into the stream of getting them here as soon as we can,” Fay said. “The whole sequence got disrupted by the pandemic. Not only did it get disrupted with (The Bushnell) being down, but the origination of new shows and getting them branded on Broadway got disrupted.”
Fay said the shows The Bushnell is hosting this season have the titles that were big before the pandemic.
“So people want to see those titles,” Fay said. “Where we are having trouble is in the single-ticket sale side in that if it’s a strong show that people want to see, we sell tickets. If it’s less than that, then you have the problem of getting people out of their easy chairs at home.”
Fay said he worries about the pipeline of shows in the next few years. There hasn’t been the same kind of buzz from Broadway as in the past, and Fay said he is concerned what that will mean for drawing audiences to The Bushnell.
Encouraging signs
Despite the gloomy outlook, all of downtown’s theaters say they have seen some early encouraging signs, but it is still too soon to say there is momentum behind them.
The Bushnell exceeded its gross revenue projections for the recently ended run of “Mean Girls” by $100,000.
Hartford Stage and TheaterWorks both chose to launch their 2022-2023 season with well-known titles — Agatha Christie’s murder-mystery “The Mousetrap” at Hartford Stage and the Tony Award-winning musical “Fun Home” at TheaterWorks. Those performances have been well-received, with the run of Fun Home now extended.
And TheaterWorks said its outreach to subscribers added another 200 subscriptions, bringing the new total to 1,900.
The pandemic also has forced the theaters to reconsider how they approach their businesses.
Hartford Stage is experimenting with bringing live music to its lobby later this month, to encourage patrons to spend longer periods of time socializing before a show.
With a smaller subscriber base, TheaterWorks said it is considering staging one less show a season in order to attract different uses for the venue, though it hopes plays will remain at the center of its mission.
“We understand that the way to engage with the community and our audience is to think about that differently,” Ruggiero said. “We don’t need to have runs as long because we don’t have 5,000 subscribers. We can lean into other events and programming to bring in more income and attract different audience and hopefully cross pollinate.”
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