Real-Life Math
Math can come in very handy for a playwright, especially when it
comes to producing, budgeting and figuring out the take at the door.
Playwright
Chris DiGiovanni once produced a play in workshop format, rather than in full-production
format. "When we feel a play is ready to be seen by an audience, but isn't
quite ready for the critics, we will 'workshop' the piece to see
how it plays," says DiGiovanni.
A workshop format is kind of like a
test run, giving the playwright the opportunity to fine-tune his play.
A
typical workshop has a very limited budget with minimal sets, costumes, props,
lighting and very few performance dates. "A budget for this type of production
would be about $1,000, versus the $10,000 to $15,000 that an actual production
would cost."
In this situation, DiGiovanni was given 8 performance
dates. "The theater in which this workshop production took place had 167 seats.
Since it was a workshop, we couldn't charge full ticket prices," says
DiGiovanni. The tickets sold for $8 each for adults and $3 each for children.
But
many of the tickets were "comps," or complimentary to the industry. That means
a number of tickets were given free to potential actor agents and managers,
as well as to friends of the actors, writer, producer or director. All the
comp tickets were for adults.
"Also, since it was a membership theater,
anyone who was a member could get in for free. So, actual tickets sold for
cash were few," says DiGiovanni.
The total intake is $5,841 for all
8 performances. You know you sold 107 children's tickets. Assuming the
theater was filled to capacity each night, how many adult tickets were actually
sold for cash and how many were comps?