Thursday, November 07, 2013

American Theatre mag asks: Can an online database bring transparency and efficiency to the play-submission process?

And the answer is no.

No matter how great a database it is, producers still have to - or designate somebody else to - read the damn script.

They quote Adam Szymkowicz in this piece - it seems like I can't go anywhere online anymore without running into Szymkowicz. He's interviewed a whole bunch of playwrights. How that makes him the go-to guy for an article about a play database and getting producers to read playwrights' scripts is apparently because one out of his 600 interviewees said:
"It is logistically impossible for theatres to have an open submission policy. There are too many plays and not enough time to read and consider them all. I would like to change that."
What I would have been interested in finding out is how Szymkowicz ended up writing the dude-bro "romantic" comedy web series Compulsive Love.