Encyclopedia News; June 7

[Gaetan Charlebois]

Hello All

I am caught up in the Fringe and was belted in the stomach by a crash of my
new computer (those of you with the new Macs...hot-pluggable USB does not
mean hot-pluggable USB; I can tell you that after eight hours of repair work
on a damaged hard drive...) I'm also planning a new feature at the site but
before I do this, I could use advice from anyone who is willing to give it
about he potential feature.

Here in Montreal we have a problem, theatre companies all launch their
productions in the same few weeks and as a result, much, much theatre gets
totally ignored. I propose setting up a national registry/calendar with two
reasons to exist: to give companies planning a production a chance to look
at a calendar for their city to see what other plays have already slated to
launch for that time and to avoid log-jams which can signal the death of a
production (especially a small production) for lack of media exposure. Also,
the calendar would advise companies about slow/bad periods for presenting
live theatre (Super Bowl, Oscar Night, Tony Night, Christmas/New Years etc).
It would also warn companies about Festivals etc. But the second purpose of
the feature would be to serve as a calendar for tourists in and outside of
the country planning trips to the various regions and who would like to see
some theatre there. (There would be mailto links to the companies so that a
tourist might get complete information.)

This is where I need the advice: this is no small job (indeed it is a huge
enterprise) and there is one big thing that entesr my mind before I embark
on it: the difficulty in getting Western input. Now I do not have the time
to hunt down the information for the calendar (people will have to submit
it) and it would just be an utter waste of time if I had listings for every
province but those West of Toronto. The thing is, canadiantheatre.com now
receives upwards of 3000 hits a week (and that's during the slow times...).
It is becoming, whether any of us want it or not, a central source of
theatre information and I am looking for ways to provide and improve that
information. The calendar is a great idea, I think, but I don't need to give
critics one more chance to tear the project apart (ie: "How come there are
no #$%?&* listings for Vancouver!").

The other "problem" with the Calendar might be this; to cut the massive task
down to a size I can handle I propose dividing the calendar thusly: Atlantic
Provinces; Quebec; Ontario; Manitoba and Saskatchewan; Alberta; British
Columbia; The North. If anyone (anyone!) finds this insulting please contact
me.

Meanwhile, I still enjoy this project immensely and the positive feedback I
get greatly outweighs the negative. But it is the unusual viciousness of the
negative, like I was on the wrong side of some holy war, that gets
increasingly difficulty and it often comes from people who should know
better (publicists and in one case an associate artistic director).

Meanwhile, don't forget Heavenly Voices for your regional news
(http://www.canadiantheatre.com/heavenlyvoices.html) and if you haven't told
us about your favourite Canadian plays, please do
(http://www.canadiantheatre.com/tenfavourites.html).

New Features:
Teachers' Guide

Updates:
Thea-Tricks; Reviews; Heavenly Voices; Ten Favourites; Sources; Lyne, S.;
Bolam, E.; Hutt, W.; Monette, R.; Rain, D.; Van Bridge, T.; Nelson, G.;
Williamson, S.; Begin, C.; Soiree des Masques; Barry, F.; Morgan, R.; Cote,
J.; Theatre de la Recidive; Short., M.


Gaetan L. Charlebois (Editor, The Encyclopedia of Canadian Theatre on the
WWW) http://www.canadiantheatre.com or
http://cantheatre.canoe.ca
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