Counting Together, a coalition of theatre artists, industry workers, and performing arts organizations engaged in separate, long-term studies of race, gender, and disability, have launched a new online resource to provide free access to industry-wide data and statistics in these areas. CountingTogether.org is hosted by The Dramatists Guild and the American Theatre Wing and facilitated by Todd London, director of field engagement for the Guild, and Luis Castro, advisor to the American Theatre Wing.
The coalition aims to identify pathways to greater equity and inclusion within the theatre industry and is currently made up of 15 separate projects. Users can research statistics on equity, inclusion, and access through a number of filters, including artistic discipline, economic sector, and location. The data itself comes from actors, designers, playwrights, composers, educators, students, and arts administrators from around the country.
In addition to the Guild and ATW, Counting Together partners include Asian American Performers Action Coalition; Baltimore Theatre Demographics by Brent Englar; Bay Area Theater Accountability Workgroup; The Count; The Lillys; “The Count” for Liberal Arts Colleges, Davidson College; Gwydion Suilebhan, Olivia Haller, and TheatreWashington; Derek Miller, Historical Perspectives; The Living Document of BIPOC Experiences; Maestra Music; Porsche McGovern, Who Designs & Directs in LORT Theatres by Pronoun; Performers with Disabilities Watchdog Report, Anita Hollander; The Sol Project; Stage Directors and Choreographers Society; Theatre Development Fund; Theatre Makers of Color Requirements; and Women Count.
Counting Together was formed in early 2019, though many of the participants have been researching on their own for a decade or longer. In the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement in the spring of 2020, the coalition was expanded to include newer artist-led initiatives collecting testimonial evidence of racism in the profession and/or taking steps to make change on a local or national basis.
