By Patrick DeMarco
Art is Freedom…and the Return to “Normal”’
Pearl-clutching.
Yes, that’s the immediate reaction I had when I read a recent Variety article where top touring executive, Marc Geiger, confidently stated that concert tours and festivals won’t make their grand return to the world stages until 2022. So for those of you that were hoping Lady Gaga was going to save and serve our glitter-filled lives with her rescheduled Chromatica Ball Tour stop in Philly next summer, don’t get your hopes up, just yet.
According to Geiger, ”Look, the whole thing is a s— show…Whether it’s testing or it’s the government, it’s too infinite of a well to go down. But in my humble opinion, it’s going to be ‘22. It’s going to take that long before what I call the ‘germaphobia economy’ to be slowly killed off and be replaced by what I call the ‘claustrophobia economy,’ which is where everybody wants to go out and go back to dinner and have their life and go to festivals and go to shows. And my instinct is that’s just going to take a while because as you can see, these super-spreader events — sports, shows, festivals, anything, the classroom — ain’t going to do too well while the virus is this present.”
There’s also another important factor mentioned by Geiger, it’s that of insurance when it comes to big-name venue and ticket agencies. He added,”There is no insurance against COVID currently offered…and even normal insurance policies are pretty scarce and hard to come by.” The insurers are sitting on the sideline because there’s infinite liability. … ‘Hey I got COVID,’ this and that – how do you prove it, etc.? I think the biggest companies can maybe self-insure, and they can start. Everybody else has to wait till the insurance industry feels good. So that’s one of many, many roadblocks in the way of restarting this vibrant economy that got shut down. So there’s probably 20 (reasons)… Insurance is a biggie. And I don’t know when that comes back, either.”
Yikes.
On a personal note, as a residing Philadelphia entertainment journalist in this great performing arts smooched city for nearly a decade now, this news is absolutely heartbreaking. Not only was covering shows around the city part of my lively hood, but my way of life to feel human. I’m sure I can speak for many of you out there when I say that the arts are a way for us to feel normal to feel connected with this mentally devastating world. To put all our differences aside and come together for a magical evening of Broadway entertainment at the Academy of Music, well, there’s nothing more enjoyable or more freeing.
Sigh… Pretty Woman: The Musical taking over our lives this fall would have been just so damn lovely for everyone. However, there’s another piece of the current performing arts puzzle that’s equally just as pearl-clutching and the shattering fact that many cities across the country have cut their performing arts funding left and right due to the coronavirus pandemic.
It may shock some to know this sad truth, but it was just this past May that Mayor Kenney proposed eliminating Philly’s Office of Arts, Culture and the Creative Economy (OACCE) and completely de-funding the 27-year-old Philadelphia Cultural Fund (PCF), which this year provided essential operating support for 349 city cultural organizations through grants totaling $2.9 million.
Eliminating the fund and its home, the Office of Arts, Culture and the Creative Economy, freed up $4 million, but also tossed aside Philly’s only broad arts funding. About the revised budget, Kenney stated that the city could only afford “the most essential city services,” and the arts office, the city rep’s office, and other decimated agencies “are simply no longer affordable.” Beyond devastating for Philly, let alone that it diminishes hope for all the creative wizards out there who are pining for their chance to shine in these dark times.
Unfortunately, in a torrid era where most theater doors and performing arts studios across the world have been shuttered for most of the year, it makes odd sense that cutting funding for the arts would have to happen to create some economic restore to cities trying to survive. So, now what? Are the arts and concert industries ever going to recover from 2020’s turmoil?
The answer would be – yes – we have to make sure they carry on.
We need to take to heart that the performing arts are more important than ever….we must understand that they are truly the only way we’re ever going to feel a sense of “normalcy” in a post-pandemic world.
Another thing everyone can do? Get involved.
Wonderful Philly non-profit performing arts organizations including Live Connections, Play On, Philly!, the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance, Arden Theatre Company, FringeArts, the Wilma Theater and Kimmel Center deserve our immediate attention and respect.
Check them all out and see how you could help to keep it all going strong for our spotlit future. We may not be able to undo the damage done to the performing arts and concert industries due to the pandemic, but what we can do is rebuild those defunded programs stronger and bigger than before.
Let’s make sure that no funding for any kind of arts get cut in a crisis ever again. And if there’s anyone out there who thinks diminishing arts programs in the future is a good idea to solve any kind of problem, it’s not and it never will be. Art is freedom, freedom is art and it’s the power of the stages and spotlights that will never keep any of us apart.
To sum it all up, dear 2022, please get here now.
About the author: Patrick DeMarco has been an avid entertainment writer for the City of Brotherly Love for just about a decade now, and is happy to keep the fires burning as a contributor for The Philadelphia Globe.
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