Is Vagabond Theatre dying?

I was just speaking to my buddy, Bill Roddy, who is an accomplished actor, heavily involved in all aspects of theatre. Bill is currently a member of the cast of Vagabond Theatre's production of That Darned Plot by David Belke. He tells me that they have been playing to a handful of patrons each night.

In some ways this is a puzzling development; in other ways not. It is puzzling in that Vagabond Theatre has developed a loyal following over more than two decades. In a small city like Cornwall, that should count for something. It is not puzzling in that the venue for the play is much too large; any audience that does show up always comes away with a sense that the community is not really into this venture. Of course, there are two aspects to theatre production that affect theatre attendance, and they are almost totally unrelated: production quality and good old selling hustle. You can have all the quality in the world, but if you do not have the hustle, nobody will know you exist. I think that as far as Vagabond Theatre is concerned, they have not hustled. The same is true of many community ventures: you can't resent your audience for not showing up; you have to rethink the selling side of the venture and get some real hustlers out there pushing it.

It would be a shame to lose Vagabond Theatre, but, then, very few community theatre groups survive very long. We'll be there Saturday. I hope a lot of other people will, too.