Having Our Say

Today I sat with Renie Barger who was the director for Having Our Say. We had to make the difficult decision to cancel the production. We were unable to coordinate schedules with the talented people who auditioned and with the need to review all expenditures at this time we decided to cancel the production at the present time. I sincerely hope that we will be able to produce this wonderful show at some point in the future. At the present time our expenses for doing this show in the studio theatre and doing adequate marketing both free and paid are greater than the income from the box office and sponsor.

I have spoken to several other business people and we are all unsure of the economy at the present time. We could have a good year or a really bad year. We don't know yet. We have seen a slight drop in ticket sales for some plays while at the same time seeing an increase in the cost of royalties, marketing and materials. Our Adult studio productions with a sponsorship are budgeted to break even. With the increased costs and smaller audiences for our studio shows we are having a more difficult time producing shows in the studio. We tried to produce Doubt using all the free marketing that we could get. We got lots of great publicity from Ilistpaducah, WKMS, and a nice feature story in the Paducah Sun, but it still was less audience members for the entire run of our studio show than one sold out performance of Doubt-the Movie at the Maiden Alley Cinema. It was at that point that we decided to look closely at what we are producing and consider redistributing our limited funds into the major productions still planned for the season.

It is a tough decision but one that is the responsible decision. My personal thanks to the three ladies who auditioned for the show and to Renie Barger for all the prep work she put in. I hope that next season or two we can look at possibly producing this show again.