In February, Edward Albee and other Off-Off-Broadway luminaries joined Judith Malina at her Living Theatre, when the League of Independent Theater announced plans for its LIT Fund, to financially assist groups and individuals creating independent theater in New York City. That collective fundraising effort launched last week, when its members began contributing 5 cents from every ticket sold toward the fund’s seed money. For a list of contributing groups, visit LIT Fund’s Member Companies and Venues.
The funding process will evolve as the needs for the indie theater change. For Year One, money collected for the fund will be divided as follows: 20% to create an endowment, 20% to establish an Emergency Fund, 50% toward unrestricted funding and an annual group resource, and 10% to cover operating costs.
Inspired by the inaugural Indie Theater Convocation sponsored by Martin Denton’s New York Theatre Experience in April 2006, John Clancy, Paul Bargetto, and John Pinkard met to discuss creating a league for Off-Off-Broadway. They were joined by Shay Gines, Abby Marcus, Leonard Jacobs, Martin Denton, Erez Ziv and Robert Honeywell to create the League of Independent Theater in June 2006.