In this ongoing feature, WCBS culture critic Jim Taylor shares 30 seconds with the theatre stars and upstarts of NYC. From Broadway to Off-off, Jim tracks down the talent and gets them to spill just enough for our collectively shortened attention spans.
So you want to see the new stuff? We recommend checking out the Claire Tow (pronounced like “tao”). The theater is built on top of the Vivian Beaumont Theater at Lincoln Center, and home to rising LCT 3, which fosters rising theatre creatives. Paige Evans is the artistic director of LCT 3, tasked with feeding this creativity.
Jim Taylor: You seem to specialize in “newness.”
Paige Evans: Our tagline is “new artists new audiences.” The idea behind LCT 3 is that we are bringing new artists to Lincoln Center Theater — playwrights and directors and designers. We cultivate a collaboration with them, we cultivate their work. And then the other part of newness is to bring in new audiences. We have $20 tickets — and the idea behind that is that it will allow younger and more diverse audiences to buy tickets.
JT: Can you make money doing that?
PE: The challenge is, the ticket prices will never cover cost of productions. We are heavily underwritten and subsidized. It has been five years now, and Clare Tow is our permanent home so far — we have not rented it out. We have a great space. Artists love working here.
JT: And audiences are digging it too.
Now playing at the Claire Tow, the Obie Award-winning We’re Gonna Die, through August 17. (Top photo is from that production; photo by Blaine Davis.)