Phoenix isn't usually the first city that comes to mind when one thinks of major culture capitols, but that isn't for lack of trying. It certainly has the size, currently ranking as number four among the most populous cities in the United States. Further, Arizonans have adopted the habit of taking in theatre Phoenix, the largest city of the Southwestern United States, assumes its due place as a culture capital.
It can be challenging for a newer city, one lacking two or three centuries of background, to assert itself. But there is a lot more at stake here than civic ego. There is also the matter of building a community in a typical Western city built along highways, and the theatre is a great community builder.
Phoenix, AZ has roots in the Old West, but it truly came of age during the same decades that brought us the highway system and the novelty of TV. In ways that tended to dove-tail each other, these novelties worked to corrode the development of a sophisticated urban life. People driving about at eighty miles per hour rarely take the time for the pleasure of walking about, taking in the night life alongside fellow citizens.
If anything, television is even more debilitating to urban life, since it offers the ultimate convenience of being entertained in one's own home. We now have several generations who might be expert in the finest television drama, but who have no idea of the unique energy of a live performance before a packed house.
Responding to this challenge, Phoenix has cultivated a cultural center right where it belongs, in the heart of the city's downtown. The first pleasure one takes in is the architecture. It delights many whose night involves little more than taking a starlit stroll after dinner at one of downtown's many fine restaurants.
Some halls provide first rate but popular entertainment, which adds to the vitality of the new downtown. The Orpheum specializes in popular, broadly loved musicals as well as other entertainments. The Comerica concert hall offers world-class popular music and comedy.
Among these treasures are two lovely spaces that provide the best in live drama. The Phoenix Theatre, located on McDowell Road, presents contemporary plays penned by some of the most gifted playwrights in the country, and the also features new musicals. To help the taste for live entertainment cross into the next generation, it offers writing and acting classes for teenagers as part of its ambitious public outreach program.
The Arizona Theatre Company has its home in the lovely Herberger Theater Center, with another venue in Tucson. It too is committed to cultivating an appetite for drama, with outreach programs for school students and their teachers. Its program emphasizes popular but excellent fare, such as new thrillers and suspense drama, along with dramatic efforts from the finest of TV writers.
Perhaps it is time to retire the term "fly over country" completely, now that such sophisticated pleasures are available in such a sophisticated urban environment. Suddenly the desert is a desert only in the sense of its lack of water, for there is no lack of culture. More and more often, people are turning off the television and coming downtown to take in a show. One can always leave the DVR running, after all.
It can be challenging for a newer city, one lacking two or three centuries of background, to assert itself. But there is a lot more at stake here than civic ego. There is also the matter of building a community in a typical Western city built along highways, and the theatre is a great community builder.
Phoenix, AZ has roots in the Old West, but it truly came of age during the same decades that brought us the highway system and the novelty of TV. In ways that tended to dove-tail each other, these novelties worked to corrode the development of a sophisticated urban life. People driving about at eighty miles per hour rarely take the time for the pleasure of walking about, taking in the night life alongside fellow citizens.
If anything, television is even more debilitating to urban life, since it offers the ultimate convenience of being entertained in one's own home. We now have several generations who might be expert in the finest television drama, but who have no idea of the unique energy of a live performance before a packed house.
Responding to this challenge, Phoenix has cultivated a cultural center right where it belongs, in the heart of the city's downtown. The first pleasure one takes in is the architecture. It delights many whose night involves little more than taking a starlit stroll after dinner at one of downtown's many fine restaurants.
Some halls provide first rate but popular entertainment, which adds to the vitality of the new downtown. The Orpheum specializes in popular, broadly loved musicals as well as other entertainments. The Comerica concert hall offers world-class popular music and comedy.
Among these treasures are two lovely spaces that provide the best in live drama. The Phoenix Theatre, located on McDowell Road, presents contemporary plays penned by some of the most gifted playwrights in the country, and the also features new musicals. To help the taste for live entertainment cross into the next generation, it offers writing and acting classes for teenagers as part of its ambitious public outreach program.
The Arizona Theatre Company has its home in the lovely Herberger Theater Center, with another venue in Tucson. It too is committed to cultivating an appetite for drama, with outreach programs for school students and their teachers. Its program emphasizes popular but excellent fare, such as new thrillers and suspense drama, along with dramatic efforts from the finest of TV writers.
Perhaps it is time to retire the term "fly over country" completely, now that such sophisticated pleasures are available in such a sophisticated urban environment. Suddenly the desert is a desert only in the sense of its lack of water, for there is no lack of culture. More and more often, people are turning off the television and coming downtown to take in a show. One can always leave the DVR running, after all.
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