We love the action that unfolds on stage at Sugden Community Theatre, home to The Naples Players (TNP). Equally intriguing: the troupe’s off-stage activities, from its pandemic response to new community partnerships to its commitment to wellness and inclusivity.
At center stage is executive artistic director Bryce Alexander, who proved to be a master of improvisation when the 2019-2020 season went off script. Costume and set designers raced to stitch face masks and design plexiglass intubation boxes for medical workers. The theater went dark, but the troupe lit up the internet with concerts, comedy shows, educational programs, wellness offerings and even a full-length virtual play—the majority of it free. For a time, the nonprofit theater company moved outdoors, staging shows at Baker and Cambier Parks and at the Naples Zoo, where it produced a one-of-a-kind rendition of “Madagascar Jr.,” featuring young, animal-costumed performers along with real-life critters and zookeepers. “It allowed us to show the synergies between art and science,” Alexander says. “It’s too bad it took a global pandemic to teach us that lesson.”
The crisis brought renewed commitment to the nonprofit’s central tenet: That the arts are among a community’s core institutions—not an amenity on its margins. “We thought, ‘How can we serve the community?’ And, in turn, the community served us,” Alexander says.
Donors and smart in-house management allowed TNP to weather the financial crunch. Since the pandemic’s start, TNP has added seven staff and, this fall, launched a $15 million capital campaign to include theater renovations and expansions.
Alexander anticipates a traditional upcoming season, but hardly a return to status quo. The success of the virtual programs—212 classes, 24,000 audience members and 11,600 online students in 2020—prompted the company to reassess how it delivers programming and how it reaches beyond its downtown Naples core.
New collaborations have emerged. These include a program with the Naples Therapeutic Riding Center that combines equine and improv therapy and an agreement with the Collier County Public Schools to install theater programs in middle and high schools. Though TNP sustained $1.6 million in pandemic losses, the troupe still prioritizes looking outward, staging fundraisers to help other area nonprofits, such as a campaign built around the show “Calendar Girls” to address food insecurity. “Everybody is always raising money for themselves,” Alexander says. “We asked: ‘Why don’t we raise money for other organizations that benefit our community?’ It feels radical, but it is the basis of being a community-centric organization. We’re excited to continue that.” —J.R.