Thursday, May 15, 2008

A Word on Promoting






See the pretty Oscar Wilde flags that greeted us on our arrival in Dublin's City Center?  The same logo was all over the place, even on garbage cans at the airport.  I was quit pleased and a little surprised at how well advertised the festival is.  I guess I'm a little jaded from living in New York where theatre is constantly happening.  I have to admit I take it for granted a lot of the time...the posters, the subway ads, the billboards.  I've never been in a show with a flag.  It's a little hard to tell from the picture above, but it's an image of OW with a green carnation in his mouth, which is a "former secret symbol of same sex love with and association to the theatre" (thanks Festival website!). Karen initially thought it was just "some random gay guy with a flower in his mouth." She found it quite offensive. I explained who it was, we had a laugh, and we now refer to him as "the pervert with the rose in his mouth."  The whole concept is hilarious especially after 48 hours of sleep deprivation.

However, as much visibility as the Festival has, I regret that we don't have a poster specifically for "Some Are People."  I really love this show and I wish our audiences were bigger.  This is all 20/20 hindsight stuff, and you learn a lot from experience. The last thing I want to do is sound whiney ("I'm doing theatre in Dublin and the weather is beautiful! boo hoo! poooooor me!") but if I had to do it all over again I would have personally made a kick ass poster that featured the two beautiful girls I am in the show with.  It seems like every other show in the Festival has posters plastered all over Dublin, and almost all of them feature evocative images of mostly naked men. Our show deserves to have that too (but featuring the hot ladies, of course). If I were a lesbian I would see the posters that are up now and think "what about us? Don't we get a show?" I feel partly responsible since I could have made it myself. But, like I said, live and learn. I guess I could be standing on the street corner right now and passing out post cards to passersby instead of blogging. Or going to medieval churches. Or seeing the book of Kells.  Or going on the Guinness tour.  Or having lunch with Karen  and Ron.  Or going to the Molly Malone Statue and the Oscar Wilde Statue to make goofy pictures with Karen and Ron.  Which brings me to my favorite picture from that afternoon...
If that wouldn't sell tickets, what would? 

1 comment:

EATinIreland said...

How much for them oranges, lady?

;-)

kw