I’ve just returned from my energizing, wonderful and successful trip to New Zealand and Australia. As we talked about in my first blog post, I attended the 50th anniversary conference of Musical Theatre New Zealand where over 350 artistic and managing directors representing 80 societies came to Auckland for three days of meetings, workshops and events. The goal of Musical Theatre NZ is to foster and encourage the development of, and commitment to, the highest standards by community theatres, including standards of excellence for production, health and safety, management, governance, community relations and service. Throughout the conference the importance of, and belief in, this mission statement was brilliantly carried out and demonstrated by everyone.
New Zealand
Full Text of Steve Spiegel’s Keynote Address to the NZMT
You’re about to create a new civilization and for your starting point, you want a center of this new town. A town square. To start, you will build an environment where artists can converge. Poets, painters, dancers, storytellers and musicians. And, all will be fine until the government realizes that these artists influence people. So, the artists get rounded up but quickly society realizes that without art, there is no community. And without community, there is no environment for self-expression, interactivity, socialization, mentorship, personal creativity and growth, friendship, knowledge, risk taking, and yes, without community, there is no environment for debate or leadership. So, this new civilization learns the value of community, especially that of its artists.
