About Us

With more people going to the theater each year, there is an increasing need to satisfy what Margo Jones terms the 'demand for more human material,' and that increase suggests opportunities for diversity. Finally, it was Virginia Valian, one of the few non-theatre participants, who noted what we in the field may sometimes forget: It is the unique creativity of the medium itself that offers the best hope for change. She explained, 'The theatre has a way of making people think about issues of sex, ethnicity and age that isn't possible elsewhere.'

– New York State Council on the Arts Theatre Program
Report on the Status of Women: A Limited Engagement?

And Toto too Theatre Company is made up of dedicated artists and business people who recognize the importance of the contributions of women in the arts.

Illustrating and validating this stance is a recent (and timely) report by The Theatre Program of the New York State Council on the Arts assessing the status of women in theatre.

The following is excerpted from that report:

'The gender of the author also provokes assumptions and generalizations about the nature and universality of the work.'

New Georges Artistic Director Susan Bernfield expressed her frustration with this: 'Women's theatre is not a genre... We produce plays by women. I don't know what 'women's theatre' is.' Plays by women, as well as plays about them, are perceived as less universal and less important. Bernfield contended that while the work of women is marginalized within most large theatres, theatres that exclusively produce plays by women are marginalized wholesale. The gender of the playwright even informs expectations about the form of the play, and the skill of the playwright.

As NYSCA Theatre Program Director explained, plays by women are considered 'risky,' regardless of their subject or form, even conventional plays by women are perceived as unconventional.

Furthermore, when form is indeed experimental or unconventional, plays are evaluated differently by critics according to the gender of the author. Critic Jonathan Kalb compared the critical reception of similar plays by Beth Henley and John Guare, to demonstrate that when 'a man challenges received ideas of form... he is seen as taking a risk,' but when women challenge the status quo, or 'try to do something different, they are often treated as though...they don't know what they are doing.'

So we ask you to consider this question: How would you be able to tell the gender of a playwright if it wasn't written on the page of your program or the front cover of the script?

Join us in our journey as we strive to remove assumptions and generalizations, presenting to audiences thought-provoking new works. Written by women.