There’s a sea change happening in New York City theatre. While on the stage, the actors are the most visible part of a show, backstage there is a whole ecosystem of people in charge of making it happen. A huge player is the producer, the person who decides what gets put up on the stage and how to finance it. And there’s currently a changeover in who’s wearing that very important hat.

In the past two years, a number of longtime leaders of various NYC institutions have departed their positions, making room for new producers to come in and take on the mammoth task of running a theatre, choosing what goes on the stage, and how to find the money to fund it all. It spans respected Off-Broadway venues such as Playwrights Horizons and Signature Theatre, to larger theatres with Broadway houses: Manhattan Theatre Club, Roundabout Theatre Company, Lincoln Center Theater, Second Stage Theater. With these many respected institutions changing leaders, it is clear: The face of New York theatre is changing. In many instances, it’s becoming younger, as a new generation takes over

One of these powerful new leaders is Lear deBessonet, who is the new artistic director of Lincoln Center Theater; she also directed the theatre’s hit Ragtime revival (a production she brought over from New York City Center, an extended run that's currently scheduled to continue through June 14, 2026). When asked about her vision for LCT, which prior had been led for 33 years by André Bishop, deBessonet reaffirms the theatre’s mission, saying: “Part of what thrills me about Lincoln Center Theater is that this theatre does four genres of work: We do new plays; new musicals; big, sumptuous revivals; and classics. And we are going to continue doing all four of the types of work that have been done here.”

DeBessonet comes to Lincoln Center after being the artistic director of Encores! at New York City Center—under her five-year tenure at Encores! deBesonnet transferred two shows to Broadway: Into the Woods and Once Upon a Mattress. And now, she’s the first woman to lead Lincoln Center Theater. 

But she’s not the only newcomer to the institution. On the same day she got the job, she called one of her closest friends, whom she had known (and worked with) for over 20 years: Maria Manuela Goyanes. After years as a producer at the Public Theater (where she oversaw Hamilton), Goyanes moved to Washington, D.C. to run the much-respected Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company. In that phone call, deBesonnet asked her friend if she’d be interested in coming to Lincoln Center Theater as a producer and artistic director of LCT3—the division of Lincoln Center that specializes in new work. 

With one Broadway theatre and two Off-Broadway theatres, running LCT is too big of a job for just one person. So Goyanes' job includes helping plan the overall season with deBessonet, while also curating the works at LCT3, which operates out of the 112-seat Claire Tow Theater. And Goyanes was up for a change, especially because she still had family in New York. “What I'm here for is big ambition and big vision,” she says, while deBesonnet raises both hands in agreement. “It’s bringing opportunity to lots of different storytellers and different ideas—different big, ambitious ideas. It's the artists of tomorrow's American theatre who are working here.”

But both women admit that running a theatre in New York City is no easy task, especially in this economy. For one, it’s rare for women to run any arts institution at all. It's even rarer for an institution to be run by two women. “One of the things that needs to happen in order for more women to walk through the gate is, people have to know that it's possible,” says deBessonet, who points out that she is a mother of two while Goyanes is a caretaker for her elderly parents. “The suspicion that somebody might be less dedicated to their work or have less mental toughness, or any of those things because of being a mother, is one of the things that just has to be swept away.”

After all, in today’s harsh economic landscape, producers are tasked with figuring out how to create impressive art that will attract ticket-buying audiences—while paying the artists involved a living wage and keeping the price affordable for theatre-goers. All tickets to LCT3 shows, are $35 while for the other stages, there’s an allotment for $35 tickets for theatregoers under 35 at every performance. Goyanes says increasing accessibility will be a priority, and that as a Latine woman, “Why wouldn't I want my family to feel like they belong in the place that I'm trying to make work and make art?”

But theatre is not immune to concerns of inflation, though those issues are magnified in the realm of art-making, which has long been dependent on donations of time and money to sustain itself. When speaking on this point, deBessonet’s tone changes, from optimistic to serious. She admits that the ticket price of a show like Ragtime doesn't come close to covering the cost to make the show, which has risen "astronomically" in the past few years. “There’s the need to come around the table and work as a community to solve some of these issues, because on some level, the basic math of what it costs to make a show and how much you feel comfortable charging an audience,” she then pauses, trying to find the words, “It's just math that isn't working. I think that it is important to say just full stop, this is not sustainable.”

Chimes in Goyanes, "How do we all work together? I think it is a pretty big deal that Lincoln Center is going into these co-productions, and sharing resources with a lot of organizations, which is really a first in [LCT's] time. Almost every single show in the season is connected to either a regional theatre, or some other partner or some other collaborator. That's one of the ways that we can keep making ambitious work." Indeed, this season, LCT is allowing outside producers into its space for the first time; Seaview is currently producing a comedy series at the Claire Tow. 

In short, producing may seem like a glamorous job—choosing a show and then putting it on a stage. But there are unknowns that no one has an answer to, and ideas that will take a few years to come to fruition. So how do you show up to work every day to run a theatre in the face of these challenges? DeBessonet says there is a plaque next to the Lincoln Center stage door that she likes to give a small salute to every day. “It's a quote from Rockefeller, and it says, ‘The arts are not for the privileged few, but for the many. They belong, not on the periphery of daily life, but at its center.’ And then there's actually a third sentence … 'the arts should actually significantly contribute to the well-being of society.'” It reminds her that “I'm here to serve that mission … That's the privilege of the role of art and artists in a democracy.”