But about 10 years ago, a curious thing happened. While the people I had worked with through the years remained committed to theater, we saw fewer and fewer young actors aching to get involved. From the '70s through the early '90s, a casting call for young actors yielded 200 to 300 people. Currently, such a call brings fewer than 100. There are many theories for this: a change in culture, more-desperate financial times, etc. But one theory holds that this new generation has had less exposure to theater due to cutbacks in arts funding in the schools.
I became concerned about where the theater was going without these younger people. As a part-time instructor at Los Angeles City College and at USC, I saw a serious disconnect between schools and theaters. I wanted to create a bridge from a theater-training program at a community college to a professional theater career. We at the Odyssey decided to take action. The Odds project, already a functioning student-outreach activity of the Odyssey, began a collaboration with Los Angeles City College in 2005. Students from LACC's Theatre Academy collaboratively created an original script that was nurtured by the Odyssey, then brought to the Odyssey stage and performed publicly. Actors, writers, designers, stage manager, and backstage crew were from the Theatre Academy. Several of the participants in this production went on to start their own theater companies and continue as writers and directors in the professional theater.
"Bloody Red Heart" is the latest project in the seven-year history of the Odds initiative. Again partnering with the LACC and director Leslie Ferreira, this unique venture brings LACC's budding artists to the Odyssey for a three-week run. With the help of the Marcled Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, and the L.A. County Arts Commission, "Bloody Red Heart" reaches out to middle- and high-school students in the form of a writing competition. The book from which the play is adapted—"Red: Teenage Girls in America Write on What Fires Up Their Lives Today," edited by Amy Goldwasser—is a collection of essays by teenage girls from across the country on topics ranging from the personal to the political, including family, media, and pop culture. Additionally, L.A. teens, male and female, have an opportunity to write essays akin to the ones in the book—true accounts of their lives, stories, and opinions. One of these essays will be incorporated into each performance.
In addition to serving future artists, the Odds serves future audiences. It's not unusual for my LACC theater students never to have been to a play. Amazing! But after we bring the student actors to the theater, they encourage their friends to attend, creating a growing community of young people who see how intriguing and challenging live theater can be—that it's just as exciting, in some cases more exciting, a creative arena as film or television.
This is part of an ongoing dialogue the Odyssey is trying to have with young audiences. How do we get young audiences and artists involved and keep them excited? The hope is to create the next generation of the L.A. theater community, a generation just as lively as the one I saw when I first arrived in the City of Angels.
Beth Hogan has performed in many Odyssey Theatre Ensemble productions, including "White Marriage," "The Caucasian Chalk Circle," "Edmond," "Mary Barnes," "Mother Courage," "Far Away," and "Ivona, Princess of Burgundia." She played Andromache in "The Greeks," for which she won an LA Weekly Theater Award. Odyssey Koan projects include "A Man's a Man," "Sliding Into Hades," "The Faust Projekt," "Buddha's Big Nite!" and "Kafka Thing" (L.A. Drama Critics Circle nomination for best actor). She teaches at Los Angeles City College and USC.
"Bloody Red Heart" will be presented Nov. 4–21 at the Odyssey Theatre, 2055 S. Sepulveda Blvd., L.A. (www.odysseytheatre.com), and Dec. 2–4 at LACC's Caminito Theatre (www.theateracademy.lacitycollege.edu).