The Comeback Campaign
In order to meet the challenge of producing live theater in a new era, we need your help raising $300,000 in individual gifts by the end of our fiscal year, June 30, 2022.
We cannot return to our usual operational capacity without these critical funds.
The Needs
-Rebuilding our administrative team
During the pandemic, Urbanite Theatre kept our core staff for several months after closing our productions. However, we were eventually forced to furlough important team members. Hiring talented administrators to replace these employees is our immediate focus.
-Equitable pay and living wages
In order to level the playing field among artists of all backgrounds and privileges, we must offer fair and competitive living wages across all departments.
-Humane Working Hours
It has been an unfortunate tradition in professional theatre to work in "urgency culture" where 6-day work weeks and occasional 20-hour tech weekends are common. To provide a more considerate and human work environment, we're changing the "show must go on" mentality. Our new structure will include 5-day work weeks and more reasonable hours. This change has extended our rehearsal and production processes, lengthening our professional contracts.
-Artist Housing
Bringing the best professional artists from all over the country to perform for Sarasota audiences is one of our greatest joys. The real estate and rental boom in Sarasota has raised our housing costs significantly, and part of the Staging a Comeback campaign funds will help us address long term solutions.
-HVAC
In order to provide for the safest environment for our audiences and artists, we're having a union-mandated ventilation verification assessment performed and executing the necessary upgrades to our HVAC units.
-Theater rent
For several years, Urbanite enjoyed the gift of donated theater rent, allowing the company to grow quickly and organically in the community. With success comes change, however, and we are now responsible for full the rental amount for our theater and rehearsal room, adding approximately $50,000 per year to our annual budget.
-Building for the future
Due to passion and generosity of our community, we were fortunate to have reserve funds to survive the pandemic for 18 months without significant ticketing income. But, now those resources are depleted, leaving us with the challenge of rebuilding our stability so that we may produce daring theater responsibly for years to come.