Why am I Counting Actors?

So my Counting Actors Project has gotten some notice recently.  (Here and here are a few of the bigger ones). And new people are reporting in. I'm really excited to see how much I'm getting for the August list. I want to thank everyone who is helping to spread the word about the project, and everyone who is contributing a count of a show they've seen or participated in.

But also, people have been wishing me well as I work on my "report" or hoping that I have good luck with my "study".   In my mind this isn't either of those things.  I'm just counting and collecting.

Why am I counting actors (and directors and writers)?  Because I couldn't find anyone else who was.  Equity isn't.  Theatre Bay Area isn't.  None of the local companies are (or maybe they are, but not publicly). If you're at a party or social event with other artists, it seems like someone eventually mentions something like "all the good roles go to people from out of town." Or "no one hires a woman to direct." Or "the only plays with roles for women in them are by women writers." Or something else.  But no one has the numbers to back things up.  They aren't out there.

So, with your help, I'm counting what I can.  I'm making totals.  Monthly ones for now, but I'm planning to put it together when I get to 6 months and then to a year.  I can only hope that someone will use this data for a report or a study or to advocate for change in some way.

counting actors reminder

If you've seen a show in the Bay Area this month, will you go here and follow the instructions?

August results will go up between Sept 1 and 5. 

Thank you!

books!

As I've said before, I love reading books about history and historical people.  Here's a few ones I've read recently that were really great.

1)The Long Song by Andrea Levy is fiction, and set in Jamaica towards the end of slavery and British rule and just after it.  A great picture of life in colonial times.

2) Nothing Daunted: The Unexpected Education of Two Society Girls in the West by Dorothy Wickenden.  In the early 1900's the author's grandmother and her best friend went from New York to the frontier in Colorado to teach at a country school.  I tore through this book.  Frontier life came alive for me very strongly in this book, as well as the extraordinary choices these college educated women made - to have an adventure when most of their peers were getting married.

3) To End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914-1918 by by Adam Hochschild.  I am halfway through this book, but it's about WWI, and specifically about several British people who were dissenters at a time that not many dissented from popular opinion that war was just and right.  So far, this is also a really interesting book, with info about the Boer War, the fight for women's suffrage in Britain, and the Christmas truce in the first year of the war.