Report #9 of the Wisconsin Theatre Diversity Study
Check out this post for more info on the study and our methodology.
Our ninth report is for Milwaukee Opera Theatre. The reporting period covers their 23/24, 24/25, and 25/26 seasons.
Actor Breakdown
The below data is the number of roles cast with actors of each demographic and the percentage total.
White - 43 roles, 74.1%
Latino/a/x - 7 roles, 12.1%
Black - 3 roles, 5.2%
Asian-American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) - 3 roles, 5.2%
South Asian (SA) - 1 role, 1.7%
Indigenous - 1 role, 1.7%
Director Breakdown
The below data is the number of times a director of each demographic was hired and the percentage total.
White - 6, 100%
These numbers reflect 6 full productions consisting of 58 total roles for actors. Only actors listed in the adult cast/adult ensemble were considered for this study.
For this report, we have excluded The HMS Pinafore due to the nature of that collaboration solely casting students within the UW-Milwaukee PSOA. Our team believes this qualifies it as educational theatre which is outside the parameters of this study.
Their casting rate of white actors at 74.1% puts Milwaukee Opera Theatre at the 3rd highest/6th lowest rate out of the 8 total Equity companies.
That 74.1% represents a little under 2.4 times the representation in city racial demographics, while their 5.2% Black actor casting rate is about 1/8 of the representation of Milwaukee's largest racial demographic of 38.5%. Milwaukee Opera Theatre’s casting rate of AAPI and Indigenous actors matched or exceeded their relative representational populations in the City of Milwaukee that were tracked per the census.
Milwaukee Demographics
White (Alone) - 31.1%
Black (Alone) - 38.5%
Latino/a/x or Hispanic - 20.9%
AAPI (Alone) - 5.2%
Indigenous (Alone) - .8%
All Others (Including Multiracial) - 3.6%
Current Milwaukee Census Estimates: Link
We acknowledge that census data is imperfect, in part due to a lack of representation for SWANA and South Asian populations and confusion for Latin/Hispanic populations, but it gives us a starting point to understand where we’re falling short when it comes to representation in our community.