But plays? Nothing. You can have a paragraph of text, if you’re lucky, and maybe you can trust in the reputation of the playwright, if they’re sufficiently famous that you’ve even heard of them. (A fun party game: “Quick! Name ten living playwrights.”)

What I want is more video clips of plays and musicals online.

For very short-run shows, especially where costumes aren’t worn and the show isn’t in the theatre until the last moment, okay, it could be difficult. But for anything even remotely professional, please, why can’t you post something online showing me even sixty seconds of the play, even thirty seconds, to give me a taste of its visual and dynamic style and of how the actors perform.

I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I’ve seen this done: once on the Playhouse Theatre’s website, where a clip from “Studies In Motion” clinched our ticket sales, and once for each nomination for “Best Play” at the Tonys last year, where again I was able to think “Whoa, those look good”.

Without that, I’m sorry, but it’s just very difficult to persuade myself to go see a play, no matter how good it says it is – like any poster will ever mutter under its breath, “Eh, this play is okay, I guess, for people who like that kind of thing.” In England in the 80s there was a joke to the effect that all plays described themselves on their posters with the tagline “Searing indictment… savage critique… Thatcher’s Britain”. Well, yes, that was a very populous category of play, but it’s not exactly very informative, is it?

For people who just generally like plays, of course, this information isn’t necessary. But advertising and marketing aren’t supposed to influence people who are already interested in your product. It’s supposed to make yours truly – casually interested in theatre if it’s likely to be a good use of my time – turn his head and say “Whoa! That looks interesting! I must see that!” And a piece of static graphic art is not, in my view, the right medium for advertising a stage play.

I’m pretty sure, from my limited experience in show production, that there would be copyright issues with this, which can’t be solved by my waving my hand and saying that copyright holders should wake up and smell the coffee. But they should. It’s 2010: get a website and put clips on it, or I’m not coming. I have spoken ;-)

I agree with what you’re saying. I feel everything – posters, logos, etc helps to tell the play’s story, and some designs are not very good at doing that. (though some are visually very nice)

I remember seeing posters for “Mom’s the Word” when I was in Vancouver in October and only sort of got what it was about when I saw other artwork on the actual theater on Granville Island where it was playing. I do like the Don Juan poster since it has enough elements to give you an idea of characters, time and setting, as does “Mrs. Dexter” to a simpler extent.

I would say use the tag line – they’re used for a reason.