For Under the Radar, the experiment is over for now

Mark Russell, performance art curator and former artistic director of Performance Space 122, debuted the first Under the Radar in January 2005. A messy, glittering hodgepodge of mostly American experimental work, the festival occupied St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn, with satellite productions elsewhere. There was theatre, there was dance, there was work that fell between and between mediums.

Oskar Eustis, then the newly appointed Artistic Director of the Public Theater, attended that iteration, who presented an early version of Elevator Repair Service’s “Gatz.” He invited Russell to bring the festival to the public the following year.

“It was the first artistic choice I made,” Eustis said in a recent telephone interview. But after 17 years and 16 festivals, the Public has made a different choice. At a meeting in mid-May, Russell was told that, citing financial reasons, the public would not be producing the festival in 2024 and that Russell’s employment with the theater would soon be terminated.

Russell, who can be reached via video call in Brussels, where he was scouting new work at the Kunstenfestivaldesarts, responded bittersweet.

“I am really proud of the work we have done. And I have a total respect for the public,” he said. “It was not a choice I would have made. But that’s the choice they had to make.”

Under the Radar, or UTR, was founded as both a party and a smart act of service. It would take place in January, following the annual conference of the Association of Performing Arts Professionals. The festival enabled artists to capture the attention of thousands of visiting presenters, who could then offer essential assignments and tours. It included local artists and companies such as Taylor Mac, Young Jean Lee, Tarell Alvin McCraney, Reggie Watts and 600 Highwaymen programmed alongside international work.

UTR was soon joined by related festivals – Coil, American Realness, Other Forces and later Prototype and the Exponential Festival. Most of them are closed.

The online reaction to the news that UTR could meet the same fate was a mix of anger and melancholy, with many reacting not only to the public’s decision, but seemingly to the sense that New York City has become a less welcoming place for artistic experimentation.

A number of festival participants recently spoke about what inclusion in UTR has meant. Many said the festival had introduced them to the work of international artists. It had landed them lucrative touring contracts. It had made them feel that after working on the margins, they finally belonged in a bigger conversation.

“It was inspiration, connection, and community all at once,” Paul Thureen, a founder of the conceived theater group The Debate Society, wrote in an email. The group presented “Blood Play” on UTR in 2013.

Kelly Copper, a founding member of the Nature Theater of Oklahoma, described the festival’s economic impact. “It gave us access to a global audience,” she wrote, “and allowed us, after years of struggling from show to show, to finally make a living.” His “Pursuit of Happiness” appeared on UTR in 2018.

While a statement released Wednesday described UTR as “on hiatus” from the public, Eustis clarified that he couldn’t promise when or if the festival would go on there. “Because we feel like this is a time of real structural change,” he said during a joint conversation with the public’s executive director, Patrick Willingham.

They outlined the theater’s financial conditions: increased spending, attendance numbers that remain below prepandemic levels, sluggish philanthropic giving. Pre-pandemic, the public’s annual budget was about $60 million. Now it’s $48 million.

UTR had an annual budget of approximately $1 million, not including salaries and operating expenses. Fees for performers were low and many international shows were sponsored by their home countries, but like any public show, the festival lost money.

“It’s designed to give our artists their party,” said Russell. “When would you throw a party and expect to get away with money? We had very good parties.”

Ending UTR was the most visible and painful effect of this budget cut, according to Eustis. Because the Publiek is a presenting theater for the festival instead of a creative or emerging theatre, it sacrificed UTR while retaining its own programs such as the Mobile Unit and Public Works.

Yet Eustis did not underestimate the importance of the festival for the artistic life of the city. “It made a huge difference not only to the ecology of the inner city, but also to the international communication between artists,” he said, also noting that Under the Radar became even more important when other festivals and spaces closed or scaled back.

As it remains important, Russell, who owns the intellectual property rights to the festival, is in talks with venues and potential producers, looking for a way forward.

“I feel relieved and hopeful about the changes that may come,” he said last week. “Because it feels like we need new strategies to make a festival work in this city. We have proven that people are hungry for a festival. So what do we do with that energy now? That energy has to go somewhere.”