>> I am Rosalba Rolon, Artistic Director of Pregones and Puerto Rican Traveling Theater. >> And my name is Jorge Merced, Associate Artistic Director here at Pregones, Puerto Rican Traveling Theater. >> Our common mission is to create works, original musical theater and plays rooted in our Latino experience and to present artists that who's aesthetic and who's mission is in harmony with our twin commitment with the arts and civic enrichment. Pregones and the Puerto Rican Traveling Theater have consolidated this year, our merger and we have entered a brand new era and I believe that the cycle has been really important in helping us shape the framework for our future in many ways. >> And a cycle that says, your first step is to really create create art for us spoke immediately as to the things that we can, perhaps contribute to a process that allows us to understand the extent to which our art can connect with communities. And to provide that springboard of ideas and resources that come right back into the organization, and to our art making. And what we'd like to share with you was one of the instances is in which we took one of our main stage productions and applied the entire structure of the cycle from great art, studying with great art and how that beautiful pathway allowed us to expand the reach of that production, of that art. Incorporate new collaborators and partners from the community, from the business sectors, from individual donors who became then part of our family and allowed us to increase the revenue of the company, so that we can continue to create great art. >> Now, we have two theaters. One in the Bronx, our beautiful theater in the Bronx and- >> Right here. >> Right here and the theater ad in the Broadway district, in Manhattan and those are two very different realities. Very, very different. How are we going to reach that broad base? And beyond that, how is that going to help us increase our audience? How do we get more people into our family? And ultimately, how is that going to bring greater stability, so that we can continue to make great art? Part of the challenges that we faced during the merger process is how do we take these two destination points that we have worked so hard for, the Bronx and these 47 Street in the middle of Manhattan, in the center of Manhattan, a theater that has been there for the past almost 50 years. How do we interconnect both theaters and how do we rebrand our institutions, as one theater institution with these two great stages? And we had made a promise to New York City that it was going to be amazing and how do we turn up the level on that promise, and how do we deliver on that promise? We require first something very different. So we thought of the idea of our audiences getting on this imaginary Bronx, Manhattan theater express and knowing that they would find great art on both places. So we went into that place that we know best, which is our repertory and we thought how about if we take one of the pieces that have been associated with both our theaters for many, many, many years? And that piece is a theater production called [FOREIGN] or the Blackout about a major blackout in New York City and this man who is trapped in the subway trying to get home, because his wife is about to give birth. That's been a story that has spoken volumes for our audience. We have created a very fabulous way of telling this story with our band with a sample. This piece has been in our repertoire now for over 25 years, has traveled the world. How do we make it different? How do we take these that this production, the Blackout and make it special, super special and we went to the cycle. We thought we have a great piece. We have a great show that is going to connect with thousands of audiences. We went on to create new conversations with national consulting agencies and many of them were friends, and who have always been there. But this time around, the conversation was different. It was about how do we take this message to a much larger stage? How do we use our megaphone in a way to engage not only [COUGH] our usual audience or reengage them, but expand them aggressively? How does that is going to affect our season? How do we enhance the the value of our message by being very consistent in our marketing strategies? >> The cycle invites us to make decisions that are strategic throughout the entire work process. Problematically, we chose to cast a spoken word artist, Flaco Navaja to connect with this invitation for our audiences to travel across boroughs to see the production in the new venue. So both the story and the institutional marketing were able to join, and made the play a success. In order to build family, we connected with both patrons and funders. We decided to engage ambassadors for different nights of the production. One of them was particularly memorable to us. We connected with a very popular Bronx blogger who happened to have an amazing collection of photographs of his father's last day as a train conductor here in New York City. As I was viewing his photographs, we started to talk about having an exhibit of that amazing day with his father as part of the production and inviting him and his father to welcome the audience for that particular night and having a party for their friends and their guests. That event was a highly successful event in which our audience was able to celebrate their value and their importance in our theater. This blogger is a taste maker in the Bronx and his readership expands from the Bronx to many, many different circles and he was able to help us communicate the message of the play and the institutional merger of the two organizations. >> With this production, we ran at full capacity and exceeded box office projections by 60%. >> The cycle enabled us to graduate our efforts to a different level and to communicate these graduate these graduation consistently to our VIPs, our funders and our donors. For instance, our current airline sponsor doubled the value of their sponsorship in recognition of our deepened commitment with our community. >> This season delivered the sharpest spike of productivity in a decade for both theaters. That first season of our merger was in many ways, a rehearsal for the future and the cycle helped us be very consistent in the application and its development. >> And as our audiences continue to embrace our two venues, our two stages in the Bronx and Manhattan, the cycle enables us to continue to repeat the success of that inaugural season at Pregones, Puerto Rican Traveling Theater. >> What made me fall in love with the cycle, as a structure was that it begins with great art. [COUGH] We are an artist-led company, an artist-led institution and it couldn't have spoken louder to us the fact that none of what we do would makes sense if it's not really firmly based on great art and that to me is what triggered an interest in understanding what happens after we create great art. What is the next step? And of course, we as artists are so immersed in creativity and creating that unless we know where this is going to land with the audience, then we're in trouble. And this cycle prevents those troubles by early on, reminding us that as we are creating this work, we are creating it for somebody and that we need to begin to plan that next step. So that, that production, that work can go to that next level. >> And having the cycle for a frame of reference for a lot of the things that we do has been really very helpful and it's become like a language. And what's really interesting in our company, because we have two venues. One in Manhattan and one in the Bronx and we choose strategically which productions, and which projects are going to be harvested at each of those spaces, and we also are a Puerto Rican theater company. That means that we have two languages, very often on stage. So the cycle is almost like another language and a frame of reference, and a point of view that allows us to plan way in advance, invite and incorporate other potential collaborators that don't necessarily or don't normally work in the daily bases with us. But the cycle allows us to plan in advanced and to bring a lot of those partners into contribute to building a family and building the resources that can allow us them to continue to create, so that awareness is something that we carry with us. And we try to apply it as often as we can, especially to major productions or major events in the theater. As an advice to those who are beginning to use a cycle, I think it's a beautiful learning process where you have to get to know your organization and your circumstance really well and see which are the moments in which the cycle language and methodology best applies to the work that you're doing.
