What Could Happen In 2026?

Send a textThe team looks ahead to 2026 with clear eyes about programming, funding, audiences, and the practical tools leaders can use to regain momentum. We argue for multi-year season plans that balances familiar titles with new work, a rebuilds middle donor base, and smart tech that amplifies people rather than replaces them.Email us your ideas at [email protected] This will be our last episode of the year! We're taking a break and will be back with more episodes in early 2026. 

Send a textWhat do you call a year where lobbies buzzed, budgets tightened, and policy storms hit midseason? We call it 2025—and we’re unpacking what actually mattered. Al, Leandro, and Tiff get candid about the dissonance nonprofits felt: sold-out shows alongside rising costs, NEA guideline whiplash colliding with DEI commitments, and a post-pandemic audience that behaves by new rules.Listen as we unpack 2025 and what we learned as we look back on a dizzying year. Leave a comment, follow, or email us at [email protected]. 

Send a textTickets chosen by algorithms. Glasses that guide you to the bar. A digital lobby that follows you home and sparks a late-night debate about the ending. We explore how AI is rewriting the audience journey from first spark to final takeaway and why the art still sits at the center.

Send a textJob hunting in the nonprofit arts can feel like shouting into the void, so we break the process down into a clear, usable framework: your resume is your data, your cover letter is your voice, and your interview is your presence. Across the hour, we show how those pieces add up to one story about value and fit: what you did, how you think, and why you’re right for this moment.By the end, you’ll know how to align metrics, voice, and presence so committees can see your edge fast. Ready to turn a scattered application into a coherent narrative that lands interviews? Subscribe, share this episode with a friend who’s applying, and tell us: which piece needs the biggest upgrade right now?

Send a textWhat if the future of theater isn’t a choice between the room and the screen, but a smarter way to hold both? We dig into how live streaming can expand access, deepen community, and stabilize budgets without draining the electricity of in-person performance. Using fresh reporting on the National Theatre’s hybrid work and lessons from our own practice, we unpack what counts as “live,” why hybrid storytelling matters, and how to design digital experiences that feel intentional, intimate, and worthy of your art.If this sparked ideas or pushback, we want to hear it. Subscribe, share with a colleague, and leave a review with one question you’re wrestling with about hybrid theater so we can tackle it next.

Send a textA flagship theater, a city that loves to make things, and a leadership team ready to push past old limits. This conversation with Portland Center Stage Artistic Director Marissa Wolf and Board Chair Jelani Memory opens a candid window into how Portland Center Stage is building its next chapter. We trace the path from Marissa’s new-play roots and community-focused seasons to Jelani’s entrepreneurial approach to board leadership, revealing a clear-eyed view of what it takes to grow audiences, stabilize revenue, and keep the art at the center.Click the link here to apply for the Managing Director role. Applications for best consideration are due November 14. Subscribe for more conversations with arts leaders shaping what comes next, share this with a colleague who should hear it, and leave a review to help others find the show.

Send a textLeandro sits down with Kevin Laibson, a director, producer, and educator working at the edge of live performance and emerging tech, to draw bright, useful lines between AI, VR, and the human heart of theater.Kevin traces the path from cheap, scrappy stages to virtual spaces where physics is optional and paper tech becomes a live demo. He explains why virtual rehearsals can cut late surprises, how actors walking first-day sets in VR changes design conversations, and what the Royal Shakespeare Company learned prototyping spatial tools for real rehearsal rooms. Then we press into the hard question: should theater keep AI out of the art? If you’re hungry for a human-first roadmap where VR strengthens rehearsal and documentation, AI automates the boring bits, and the stage stays gloriously alive—this one’s for you. Listen, share with a colleague, and tell us: where do you draw the line between tool and co-author? Subscribe, leave a review, and join the conversation at emcforward.com.

Send a textA great job description doesn’t start with bullet points, it starts with a story. We take you inside our executive search process for Portland Center Stage’s next managing director and show how we craft a job profile that so candidates have a clear idea of what to expect and the opportunities ahead.We talk candidly about the post‑pandemic reality for theaters: season sizes have shifted, revenue mixes have inverted, and audiences and funders behave differently. That’s why we frame the role around four clear charges: strategic leadership and administration, revenue generation and enhancement, staff management and culture building, and community engagement and external relations. You’ll hear how PCS’s landmark home at the Armory, its proximity to Powell’s, and its role in a recovering downtown shape the expectations for a leader who can fund, partner, and represent the institution with credibility. We also surface what surprised us: a staff culture that lives its values, real trust across teams, and inclusion that feels natural rather than performative.This is a conversation for candidates, board members, and arts lovers who want to understand how executive search can honor both numbers and nuance. We unpack how repeated themes from stakeholders become core competencies, why storytelling is the thread through budgets and campaigns, and which soft skills such as grit, humility,  and presence are needed for success. If you’re considering the role or advising someone who is, you’ll leave with a grounded sense of the work, the city, and the partnership with Artistic Director Marissa Wolf.Ready to dive deeper or apply? Visit emcforward.com/apply, email us at [email protected]. Follow the show, share it with a colleague, and leave a review so more arts leaders can find it.

Send a textWe welcome Theater Mu’s new artistic director, Fran, and managing director, Anh Thu, for a candid talk about service-driven leadership, sustaining bold art in a tight funding climate, and building trust as co-leaders. The conversation moves from search lessons to advocacy, legacy, and why creating new stories matters for AAPI communitiesWe talk openly about money from sunsetting grants, consolidating foundations, and why “profit for nonprofit” thinking matters when artist labor is too often treated as an afterthought. Together they map how a theater rooted in AAPI stories responds to immigration raids, visa barriers for artists, casting controversies, and local tragedies without losing artistic ambition or community trust.

Send a textWhat if adding more leaders isn’t the solution—and sometimes makes things worse? We dig into the real work behind shared leadership in nonprofit arts with guests Devon Berkshire and Miranda Gonzalez, tracing why so many theaters moved beyond the traditional AD/MD model and what it actually takes to decentralize power without breaking your culture. We follow the arc of this conversation in organizations from trend to practice, unpacking the difference between shared leadership and shared responsibility, and how “move fast and break things” becomes “move slow and build trust.”Go read the Howlround series here: The Evolution of Shared Leadership - https://howlround.com/series/evolution-shared-leadership-theatre