Danny Feldman, photographed at the Los Angeles Situations in El Segundo on Oct. 4.
Danny Feldman is experimenting in authentic time with how to make theater make any difference yet again.
At a time of common retrenchment in the American theater, Feldman has gone massive and bold at Pasadena Playhouse, the place he is the artistic leader. He devoted the very first six months of 2023 to the Sondheim Celebration, a vastly bold and profitable festival honoring the late Broadway lyricist and composer. As a end result, membership memberships are up and the theater’s artistic name has hardly ever been greater.
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A Tony award additional validated Feldman’s gambit, confirming a Times headline: “The finest theater in L.A. appropriate now? It’s in Pasadena.”
But whilst danger has brought reward, Feldman, 44, knows superior than to just take everything for granted. The playhouse was on the brink of insolvency when he took above in 2016, nevertheless in look for of security immediately after filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2010.
“One terrible season, and we’re in a lousy place once more,” he cautioned.
Feldman does not need to glimpse far for a severe reminder to stay humble. Even just before Heart Theatre Team announced final calendar year that it was halting programming at the Mark Taper Forum, once the city’s flagship venue for ambitious drama, Pasadena Playhouse has been filling the void still left by its downtown rival, which lately introduced that it is reopening in the slide.
Creating on the operate of his predecessor Sheldon Epps to diversify programming, audience and institutional tradition at Pasadena Playhouse, Feldman is committed to creating new function from traditionally underrepresented communities. Residing up to the playhouse’s mission of “making theater for everyone” signifies deepening connections with neighborhood audiences. Feldman details to a Sondheim Celebration manufacturing of “Into the Woods,” a collaboration amongst Pasadena Playhouse and large faculty pupils and academics from the Pasadena Unified College District, as a way toward restoring the pleasure of communal possession.
“For two decades, we’ve been hearing that the regional theater product does not perform,” he stated. “The reply often appears to occur down to a lot more cash. We will need the governing administration and donors to give us much more. We’re doing the job on that, but I’m fascinated in discovering what new models for the place and L.A. might be.”
Feldman admits that he doesn’t have “a five-issue plan,” but he’s confident that it’s likely to take large swings like the Sondheim Celebration to revitalize the theater-going behavior. “This is the time to drive,” Feldman said. A Sondheim lyric from “Into the Woods” is urging him on: “Opportunity is not a lengthy customer.”
