MOLI VIEW™

Sheldon Epps is an award-winning theater director. Even if you don't get out to the theater much, you may have seen his work directing episodes of popular sitcoms like Frasier, Everybody Loves Raymond, and Friends. For the past 10 years, Epps also has been the artistic director of the Pasadena Playhouse, making him the only African-American artistic director of a major theater anywhere in the United States.

While Epps is committed to bringing more African Americans into his theater, he also has a broad conception of diversity that includes generational as well as cultural and ethnic differences. In 2005, he founded the Pasadena Playhouse Diversity Project to "support new play development, fund productions by minority and women playwrights, and allow access to our theater for underprivileged youth."

Here are some tips from Epps on how to diversify the audience for theater, which MOLI picked up on a visit to the playhouse last week as part of an NEA-sponsored tour for theater critics. These strategies apply not only to theater, but to any organization seeking a more diverse membership.

Community: My father was a preacher. He always felt a church should not only have church services on Sunday, but should also be of service to the community. The church building would host Girl Scout and Boy Scout meetings, and other community activities.

I felt that this theater should be open to the community beyond curtain time. I'm proud to say there is always energy, always something going on, in this building. The theater is alive and vibrant.

Programming: You have to put on stage something that has to do with the lives of the people you want in your theater. You can talk about diversity for 100 years, but until it's reflected in your programming, you'll never get it.

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