Many Goldberg Seats Went Unclaimed

Despite the fact that her credentials range from an Academy Award to lauded improvisational comedy and autobiographies, Whoopi Goldberg could not draw enough spectators to fill the 1,100-seat Sanders Theatre to capacity on Monday afternoon.

"The problem was not that people were uninterested in seeing Whoopi lecture," Thomas S. Lee, coordinator of the Learning from Performers program, which brings visiting artists such as Goldberg to the University, said. "It's that the students didn't follow up and claim their tickets."

While the Sanders Theatre box office had only 980 tickets to distribute to students, more than 1,400 undergraduates signed up for the lottery by Nov. 2.

But when the allotted 980 tickets were to have been picked up by 6 p.m. last Friday 6,527 tickets remained unclaimed.

Tickets to see Goldberg were distributed through a lottery system.

According to Lee, the lottery for the Goldberg lecture was modeled after that used for lectures at the Kennedy School of Government.

"I met with Heather Campion, the director of the Kennedy School lectures, three years ago, when Mel Gibson came to speak at Harvard," he said. "I wanted to find the best way to engage as many students as possible into a lecture by a high profile lecturer."

"When we used this system with Mel Gibson, there was a great response, and we had a full house," he said. "I modeled the Goldberg lottery after what we did for Mel Gibson."

Theodore N. Maynard '00 said he had a ticket to see Goldberg but was unable to go.

"I wanted to go and see her, but I had a gig to go to at 5 p.m., so I couldn't," he said. "I would have given my ticket away to someone--because I am sure that someone would have wanted it--but I just didn't have the chance."

Roger J. Bartolotta '02 did not even sign up for the Goldberg lottery because he said he thought his effort would be futile.

"I thought that the entire student body would have wanted to see her," he said. "I didn't even put my name in the lottery because I thought that I had no chance."

Lee said that although the lottery may seem futile to some students, it really is the fairest way to distribute tickets.

"It's true that winning a ticket is just the luck of the draw," he said. "But since we distribute the tickets arbitrarily with a computer program, it is at least fair."

Bartolotta said that when he found out that extra tickets for the Goldberg lecture were being distributed before the event, he was disappointed he did not know about the opportunity earlier.

"I definitely would have gone," he said. "Since they ended up handing out tickets in the end, it would have made no difference if I had signed up for the lottery or not. I still would have been able to see her."

Despite the fact that Sanders Theatre was not filled to full capacity, Lee said the lecture still drew a good showing.

"When all of the ticket stubs were counted, we found out that there were 711 people in the theatre," he said. "That's almost three--fourths full, and I would not exactly call that low attendance."

Other campus lecturers by guest speakers have been organized in different ways.

When Kofi Annan, the Secretary-General for the United Nations, spoke in Sanders Theatre on Sept. 17, the audience was admitted on a first-come, first-serve basis.

Daniel R. Bryan '02, who waited outside the doors of Sanders Theatre for over an hour to see Annan, said that the organization of Annan's lecture, as opposed to Goldberg's, empowered the attendee.

"Students had to take the initiative to get in line and to arrive there early enough to be admitted into the theatre to see Annan," he said. "With Whoopi, the lottery took away the students' control."

But Christine Y. Chiou '01 said she felt that the Goldberg lecture might also have been poorly publicized.

"This is just completely different from when Nelson Mandela or Kofi Annan came to speak to us," she said. "With them, I knew about the lectures because of word of mouth. But no one was even talking about Whoopi coming to speak to us."

"I am not sure whether this is indicative of bad publicity or just student apathy," Chiou said.