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Guthrie Artistic Director Joe Dowling is struggling to protect his theater's reputation after a week of outrage in the arts community over the Guthrie's new season, which some have declared "a tragedy."

Stephen Yoakam as Creon in the Guthrie Theater's production of "The Burial at Thebes" directed by Marcela Lorca. It was one of two plays directed by women in the Guthrie's 2011-2012 season

When the Guthrie Theater announced its 50th Anniversary season last week, the absence of women and minorities among the playwrights and directors ignited a fierce debate in the Twin Cities arts community.

Many who felt they have long been excluded from the Guthrie's main stage - and some who haven't - used the Guthrie's announcement to highlight what they called the flagship theater's failure to embrace diverse audiences. Actress Heidi Berg was among them:

The theater's defenders rushed to say the Guthrie was only doing what it must do to fill seats and stay on budget.

Note: The Guthrie declined to make available members of the theater's board, on the grounds that the board has no say in the theater's season. 

Given the region's increasingly diverse population - one the Guthrie will be pressed to cater to in coming years -- the controversy might have led to a timely and thoughtful examination of the theater's selection process.

Christiana Clark played Oya, a talented sprinter, in Pillsbury House Theater's production of "In the Red and Brown Water." The play was performed at the Guthrie Theater, but not produced by it.

Guthrie Artistic Director Joe Dowling fumbled the opportunity, at first appearing to encourage a discussion on diversity and then - despite his protests to the contrary - taking the defensive. By the end of the week, he was openly hostile to the premise that the Guthrie does not present diverse works. When asked in a recent 

 about charges that the season suffered from a lack of women,  Dowling said:

"This is a self-serving argument that doesn't hold water."

Underlying the artistic turmoil surrounding the Guthrie is a fundamental question: Does the theater have any obligation to present the stories of women and people of color? And if so, to what extent?

If not, at what peril is a theater that doesn't do so, given the demographic changes transforming the nation and the Twin Cities?

In the next three decades, the seven county Twin Cities metro area will see its minority population grow to more than 40 percent of the region, nearly double the current percentage, according 

a recent report by the Metropolitan Council.

theater company, and a board member of the national 

Joe Dowling's wide ranging responses to criticism's of the 50th season might appear to be the comments of a man who's still figuring out what the issue is, and where he stands. But today's debate cannot come as a surprise to the man who was interviewed back in 2003 for a City Pages cover story titled "

." The entire focus of the story was the lack of women playwrights on the Guthrie stage. Here's an excerpt:

When Dylan Hicks wrote his piece for the City Pages back in 2003, a survey of the past ten seasons found that only 10 percent of the plays (7 out of 70) on Guthrie's stages were by women.

Today, a similar look back at the number of female playwrights in the Guthrie Theater's last ten seasons, 

, finds it staged 111 shows, 18 of which were written by women (that's counting two plays based on the novels of Charlotte Bronte and Jane Austen).

That means that in the past decade, 16.2 percent of the plays were written by women.

At this rate, women will make up 50 percent of the playwrights by the year 2036.

However, critics of the Guthrie will tell you that staging a play on the Wurtele thrust stage - which seats 1100 people - is not equal to staging a production in the Dowling studio, which seats less than 200. And many of the works by women or playwrights of color are being relegated to the smaller space.

Greta Oglesby earned rave reviews on stage at the Guthrie for her role in "Caroline, Or Change" written by Tony Kushner.

Joe Dowling celebrated the opening of the new Guthrie Theater

 on the Mississippi riverfront, he had this to say:

Dowling has got his wish. The Guthrie Theater is indeed a national center of theater art and theater education. And as such, the Guthrie is seen as a leader in its field. So what message is it sending to theaters across the country when it programs seasons that are dominated by white men, both as playwrights and in the director's chair?

Last week Dowling alluded to the pressures of selling tickets when he told the Star Tribune "It is a very stern task to direct on a stage of our size, and I am responsible to the board for the shows we produce" (

Point of clarification: the board does not approve the Guthrie's season, however it does approve the theater's budget

 for large theaters to stage work by women, or playwrights of color, and still balance the budget?

James Craven, T. Mychael Rambo and Abdul Salaam El Razzac in Penumbra Theatre's production of "Gem of the Ocean" on the Guthrie Theater's proscenium stage

No, it's not impossible, according to Zan Sawyer-Dailey, associate director of the Actors' Theatre of Louisville, which programs three different stages and also runs the national Humana Festival of new plays.

She said her theater makes a concerted effort to program seasons that feature a diverse array of plays.

Sawyer-Dailey said it's not just good theater, it's good business:

Sawyer-Dailey admits there are challenges involved in finding and scheduling diverse work, but she says finding female directors is not one of them:

Joe Dowling built the Guthrie Theater complex on the Mississippi River to be a center for regional theater in the nation. So what message is it sending to theaters across the country when it programs seasons that are dominated by white men?

Public Funding and a Mission that includes Diversity

In the last three years the Guthrie Theater has received more than $2.2 million from the 

 alone. But the Arts Board does not make reflecting a community's diversity a condition of funding.

Many argue that the recipient of so much public support has an obligation to reflect the diversity of the community in which it lives. Twin Cities theater director Ben Layne wrote in an open letter to Joe Dowling that the season announcement reflects a lack of recognition of the current climate:

The Guthrie Theater, founded in 1963, is an American center for theater performance, production, education and professional training. By presenting both classical literature and 

, the Guthrie illuminates the common humanity connecting Minnesota to the peoples of the world.

 occasionally present work of diverse cultures, but not to the extent that critics would like. And often time "presenting" means giving one of its stages over to Penumbra Theatre or Mu Performing Arts, local theater companies that specialize telling the stories of specific cultures.

The Guthrie has also received funding from the National Endowment for the Arts. On two occasions it was awarded $20,000 for specific productions - 

, directed by Guthrie's only resident female director, Marcela Lorca, and 

, written by Asian-American David Henry Hwang. So even the Guthrie Theater recognizes that when applying for grants, diversity is key.

A scene from the Guthrie Theater production of "The Master Butchers Singing Club" written by Marsha Norman, based on the novel by Louise Erdrich, and directed by Francesca Zambello.

A Self-Fulfilling Prophecy and a National Problem

Many critics point to the Guthrie as the cause of its own problems. Bonnie Schock, one-time Artistic Director of the former Twin Cities theater company Three Legged Race, said there are fewer "high profile" female and minority directors and playwrights 

 institutions of power and privilege such as the Guthrie are consistently failing to challenge the cultural assumptions that support that power and privilege.

When asked about the pool of diverse and female playwrights available to major theaters, Jeremy Cohen, Director of 

 rattles off an impressive list of names.

According to Cohen currently more than 50 percent of the Playwrights' Center's core writers and fellows are women and/or playwrights/theater artists of color.

Making theater more inclusive is a national challenge according to Teresa Eyring, the Executive Director of 

, the national organization for American theater.

Eyring says a number of major theaters across the country need to be more inclusive, and she believes they are aware of the problem. She says the particular difficulties those institutions face are determined, in part, by the character of the institution itself and the community it resides in.

Arts and Culture

State of the Arts Blog

Marianne Combs

Author

The theater has no obligation to stage more plays by women or people of color. But if it wants to invest in its future health and well-being, it will.

Guthrie Theater’s debt to women and diversity

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