Erika Kae recently served as lighting designer for Off-Center @ The Jones’ immersive staging of ‘Perception’ at the DCPA’s Newman Center. Photo by Sam Adams for the DCPA.

A group of young, self-starting local theatre artists are initiating a community-wide conversation on sustainable theatrical careers, resource sharing and artist advocacy.

STAND – Sustainable Theatre and New Development – is a developing new performing-artist advocacy non-profit that seeks to fill a significant gap in the Colorado theatre ecology. The group of five hopes to form a company that would in essence pool administrative costs and other overhead responsibilities on behalf of dozens of small performing groups in the metro area, freeing precious financial resources that then can be spent on making art.

“One of the national companies we are modeling ourselves after does your grantwriting, helps you find performance spaces and runs your box office for you,” said STAND co-founder Erika Kae. “So instead of having 100 companies paying 100 different administrative costs, it would all be centralized with one company. STAND seeks to become that company.”

STAND is hosting a community forum from 7-9 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 31, that is intended to identify and bolster the community theater support structure; encourage interconnectedness and resource sharing; and explore the possibilities of sustainable support for theatre artists.

In the interest of resource sharing, this free event is being held at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts’ Conservatory Theatre in the DCPA’s Newman Center for Theatre Education. While the forum is free, for security reasons, an advance RSVP is required for front-desk check-in by clicking the word GOING on the group’s Facebook event page, or by emailing your name to Erika.a.kae@gmail.com

Kae will be co-hosting the forum with Alex Polzin. Their panel will include Colorado Shakespeare Festival Assistant Stage Manager Jonathan Allsup; The Catamounts founder Amanda Berg Wilson; DCPA Senior Arts Journalist John Moore; Colorado Theatre Guild General Manager Gloria Shanstrom; and Ripple Effect Theatre Company founder Maggie Stillman. New DCPA President and CEO Scott Shiller is expected to be in the audience to lend his support and expertise, if needed, but he is primarily planning to attend to learn more about the Colorado theatre community.

Kae is calling the evening “a community think-tank with guest speakers, food and good conversation. During this forum we seek to talk about taking risks and widening possibilities while embracing new audiences and supporting the artists within a sustainable theatrical structure.”

Kae is a 33-year-old theatre artist who recently served as lighting designer for Off-Center @ The Jones’ immersive staging of Perception at the Newman Center. She is also a scenic artist at The Edge Theatre.  Polzin was most recently a scenic artist with the Creede Repertory Theatre. The other members of STAND are Jo Gerlick, Production Stage Manager for the StageDoor Theatre in Conifer; actor and designer Laura K. Love, who designed the set for Vintage Theatre’s The Spitfire Grill and is now a tenured professor and designer at Metro State; and wunderkind Anson Nicholson, who at age 20 already is the in-house Audio Engineer for the DCPA’s Garner-Galleria Theatre.

The goal for Monday’s panel, Kae said, is to create conversation in order to initiate action.

Colorado Theatre Community Forum

• Monday, Aug. 31
• 7-9 p.m. (Doors and conversation at 6:30 p.m.)
• Conservatory Theatre, located in the DCPA’s Newman Center for Theatre Education
• 1101 13th Street (at Arapahoe St.)
• Free
• Advance RSVP required by clicking the word GOING on the group’s Facebook event page, or by emailing your name to Erika.a.kae@gmail.com
• Information: email Erika.a.kae@gmail.com