Interview with Ken Davenport

Ken Davenport is a commercial producer/blogger, who likes to explore innovative business practices that could be applied to the theater world. His blog was an inspiration to start this blog, and can be found here. Coming up, Ken is producing the Godspell revival that is coming back to Broadway. Ken is using a type of audience participation fundraising to put together the capital to produce the show, which I think is a genius idea, and a way to get mass groups of people interested in the show from its earliest stages. Exciting stuff.

Ken was kind enough to answer some questions for me, and I share them with you here.

GD - You mention in your blog about the best way to get someone to see your work is to produce it. But with so many people self-producing already, it seems that market is overly saturated too. What makes a reading or a production that you are invited to attractive enough to make you want to go check it out?

KD - You have to find ways to get your product to stand out amongst the hundreds of other shows out there.  casting, the director, the subject matter, etc. are all ways to make things more attractive to a producer.

GD - You are a huge proponent of using social/new media to reach new audiences and to come up with creative business solutions as a producer. What can writers do using new/social media to get their work out into the world? Is there a way that young playwrights can gain mass exposure without a producer or publisher?

KD - Every artist out there should have a website.  there great thing about this era is that an artist doesn't need a producer or publisher to start to gain fans, sell product, etc.  you are your own producer or publisher.

GD - What do you look for in a writer that makes you want to produce his/her work? For you, is it more about the writing, or is it about the relationship you develop with the writer? Or is it about the balance of the two?

KD - The work comes first.  it's all about the work.  the better the work, the easier it is to deal with an a-hole.

GD - Want to produce one of my plays?

KD - OK.

So there you have it. Look forward to a future collaboration. I'm really coming up in the world...

Many thanks again to Ken Davenport for talking to me this week. Until next time, make sure you're reading my column on www.culturematchup.com