Theatre is a community event. When the arts thrive, cities thrive. Here in Tampa Bay, we have an up-and-coming theatre scene! (Just check out this month's American Theatre Magazine to read about it!!) My organization, Tampa Bay Plays will provide a nurturing environment for local playwrights to create stage-worthy works while providing employment for our local professional actors, stage managers, and directors. By generating quality new plays, we hope to help keep local actors in the region, discover new theatre audiences, and challenge Tampa Bay's understanding of the creative process.

Awesome! It's this kind of positive energy and passion that we love at RocketHub. And that's why Lora Hogan caught our attention. Besides having a sweet project on RocketHub, Lora comes to us from our partner Fractured Atlas - which means that her rewards are tax-deductible. I caught up with Lora to learn about her inspiration and crowdfunding journey.

A new play festival doesn't grow overnight. Despite the growing success of the arts here in Tampa Bay--so many members of our community DON'T go to theatre. They don't make time to see a play, they don't buy a ticket to a musical, and they certainly wouldn't be caught dead attending a staged reading. We want to fix that. Tampa Bay Plays' 60:25 event has recruited local "celebrities" to write one minute plays. There are no playwrights involved.

We want to show and teach the region (especially some of those harder to reach Millennials!) that theatre is for EVERYONE. Not just the wealthy, the older generations, the highly educated. EVERYONE. What better way than providing a night of short plays (all under two and a half-minutes) written by the leaders in the community? Your local VIPS, the people you look up to? We have politicians, professors, hip hop artists, musicians, authors, models, children's edu-tainers, yogis, activists, entrepreneurs, community organizers, social media stars, radio personalities, and more involved in this event. We're hoping it changes the way our community looks at theatre. And brings new audiences through the door!

You are learning a lot and evolving your approach. How has your experience been as a crowdfunding pioneer in the world of theatre in Florida - how are your supporters responding?

Our project has been more difficult than I had anticipated. We have met an expected outpouring of support from the community, yet transferring the amazing verbal support into actual crowdfunding dollars is trickier than anticipated! Every single person we have met has been wonderful backing our project through words--getting them to realize that we have only three weeks left and an actual deadline for turning words into reality? That is proving trickier.

We have spoken to some wonderful local Creatives who have had successful crowdfunding campaigns (and those with unsuccessful crowdfunding campaigns) and hope to take their advice and get our amazing supporters to take the time to login and donate. Also tricky--many typical arts donors here in Florida are not the most well-versed with internet and technology platforms. There is also a great deal of educational interplay that must occur--explaining what crowdfunding is, why it matters, where the money goes, how to find the link, how you can give if you live outside our region or can't attend the event, and why we've chosen to use crowdfunding in the first place. The process can be quite fun, however, more challenging than anticipated!

It seems that you've been gaining a good deal of traction lately. Any advice for Creatives looking to crowdfund a similar project?

Don't be negative. We aren't where I would have liked to have been monetary-wise with three weeks left to go. I am not worried. I need just need to think outside the box, evaluate our promotion, improve our online presence, tweak our rewards, and find new ways to reach out. I've also resorted to the good old fashioned phone call or personal visit.

Thank you Lora - we're excited to have your project as part of the RocketHub community.

Join Lora in supporting loca theatre. And if you are interested in having your project fiscally sponsored by Fractured Atlas, click here.

-Vlad