by David Fairhurst
As an actor, I don’t have a problem with that. “But what I really want to do is direct” is a T-shirt I’ve never worn. Only once have I ever directed a play, and the experience was not one I care to repeat: While fretting over costumes and lights and sound cues and a thousand other details that would put your average control freak in obsessive-compulsive nirvana, I found myself instead envying the actors, who only had to worry about their own parts. During performances I would pace at the back of the theatre like a pre-Lamaze expectant father, feeling powerless and out of control, while the actors were the ones who seemed relaxed and in complete command. I vowed I would never direct again, and 20 years later I haven’t broken that vow.
But I never said anything about producing. Every two decades or so, apparently, the entrepreneurial urge to take the reins—to “make your own opportunities,” as they say in the actor self-help books—strikes even me. So two years ago I decided to take an old screenplay of mine called “Immortality,” adapt it into a one-man show, and submit it to the New York International Fringe Festival. The festival accepted it, and so, with nothing but a half-finished script and a phony but cool-sounding company name, my adventure in producing began—a process I wrote about in the pages of Back Stage in 2004. Looking back on that experience, I find that the passage of two years has helped to clarify some of my lessons while miring others in an impenetrable fog.
In the beginning, I had the same hopelessly unrealistic “Matt & Ben” visions that many self-producing actors undoubtedly have: a short, buzzworthy festival appearance fueled by enthusiastic word of mouth, leading to a commercial run Off-Broadway that’s met with rave reviews, sold-out crowds, and the occasional sighting of a B-list celebrity in the audience, followed by a little national press, maybe a tour, a tidal wave of career momentum, and, finally, a series regular role on “The Office.” That vision lasted until Week 4 of preproduction, at which point it was replaced by “Please, God, just kill me now!”
“You can have it fast, cheap, or good: Pick any two.” I can’t remember when I first heard that expression, but it was sometime during the months leading up to my show, and nothing sums up the small-time producer’s dilemma more succinctly. It’s a formula as unyielding as E=mc2: If you’re willing to sacrifice quality, you can get away with fast and cheap. If not, then expect to either spend a lot of money or take a really long time. Unfortunately, I had neither, so quality was the element that suffered. Not that it was a bad show: The director and I worked our asses off, the crowds (and I use that term loosely) seemed happy and appreciative, and given the constraints we faced, I might even call it successful. In fact, some productions actually benefit from a raw, roughhewn aesthetic (our one positive review went so far as to praise the show’s “no-frills, seemingly just-scraped-together charm,” as if we’d planned it that way—hah!). But the slick multimedia extravaganza I had envisioned? Not so much. So if you’re not rich and you don’t have a year or more to prepare, make sure you’re not biting off more than you can chew. Unless…
“Hire as many people as you can, then delegate like crazy.” Even if you’re producing a one-man show, there’s really no such thing as a one-man show. Everything is going to take longer than you expect, cost more than you expect, and require more people than you expect. Between logistics, marketing, tech, and some nine gazillion other details, I found myself with so much to do that the show itself became almost an afterthought (I didn’t even start memorizing the script, an hourlong monologue, until two weeks before we opened). If I had to do it over, I would recruit more bodies, pay them generously, set a clear agenda and vision for the show, make sure everybody’s on the same page, give each person a small, manageable set of responsibilities suited to their skills, then let them go to work (while keeping a watchful but not intrusive eye), allowing me to concentrate on—and maybe even enjoy—the acting part. (It sounds so simple now, doesn’t it?) However…
“Don’t hire friends unless you can imagine yourself firing them.” Everybody likes working with friends, right? More fun, less stress, easy communication, no trust issues. In most cases, I suppose, that’s true. But make no mistake: When friends become employees, it can make for a dicey situation. And if you find yourself having to fire one of them, there’s more than the show at stake.
“It’s the marketing, stupid.” No matter how much money you have budgeted for marketing, double it. No, wait, triple it. Come on, this is New York: Do you have any idea how many Off-Off-Broadway shows are running in the city right now, all of them scratching and clawing over the same small group of theatregoers with limited disposable income? Yes, some festivals will try to inculcate a rah-rah, “Go team! We’re all in this together!” high school pep rally–type atmosphere among their participants, and I suppose that works for some people, but maybe I’m just too competitive to buy into it. More than half my budget was spent on marketing—the fear of playing to an empty house was never far from my thoughts—and even that wasn’t enough. Trying to fill my measly 30 seats every night felt like a battle I was unequipped for. I get twinges of post-traumatic stress disorder just thinking about it. On the other hand…
“It’s the show, stupid.” If I had spent more time and money on the production itself and less on marketing, would the show have been in better shape to generate some eager word of mouth, lessening my need to do so much marketing in the first place? The fact that I have no answer to this question explains why I’m not a producer.
But that won’t stop me from producing again. Ironically, perhaps the most important lesson I learned from this experiment in indulging my inner control freak was: Don’t be a control freak. As I said before, you can prepare the ship, set a course, and keep a firm hand on the tiller, but eventually you just have to let the wind take you and enjoy the ride. I suspect that if I’d let myself enjoy the experience more, the critics would have done the same, and the show would have been a bigger hit, perhaps even generating a little of that career-enhancing buzz I was looking for.
Having learned that lesson, I have a bulletin board above my desk at home on which I’ve tacked notes for half a dozen projects I intend to produce in the coming years—including the slick multimedia extravaganza version of my one-man show. Right now it may be nothing more than notes tacked to a bulletin board, but stay tuned. Given the rate at which my producing jones strikes, look for it on YouTube around 2026.