Question for Ask BK Day. In the notes, BK wrote:
"The problem with these endless workshops is that the invited audiences are invariably made up of friends, well-wishers, and cheerleaders, so of course the creators get marvelous “second coming” feedback."
My question for BK or anyone else, hopefully not rhetorical 
: Don't you think, though, that given that the readings and workshops have become essentially disguised backers auditions, the system has forced the creators to stack the audiences with friends and well-wishers, since the producer and money-type people who are there will think the show is a dud if reaction from the crowd isn't vocal?
Well, you said it all - what Michael Bennett evolved (the A Chorus Line workshop) has devolved into glorified backers' auditions. Mr. Bennett designed his workshop process as a way to work out his material in a safe way. It was not designed to have friends and cheerleaders come in nor to get backing for the show (which he had). That's the way it went for years, and then it all changed at some point. When I saw the Flower Drum Song "workshop" it was basically the show I saw in LA at the Taper. Oh, a little of this and that had been done, but because everyone had clapped everyone on the back and said "GREAT SHOW!" the author and creative team just assume everything is working grandly, which, of course, it wasn't. When we did our little staged reading of The Brain, my booklet designer said it was one of the best readings he'd ever seen and that in his opinion nothing should have been changed. Well, that was very sweet, and I sure knew better, as did my writing partner. I learned exactly what I needed to learn and I'm sure I'll be learning more over the next few weeks. After the show that became Bounce had its famed workshop, I did a ten questions with Stephen Sondheim at the old jernt and asked him about workshops and what they've become - he was vitriolic about it and said "never again." You read on the chatboards every single day about new readings and new workshops and gee, everyone, come on down and be supportive and it's all just horse pucky and does no one any good.
I always use Seussical and Sweet Smell as examples - you could not have had better buzz coming out of a workshop (in Toronto) - I mean, everyone was saying "watch out - these are going to be mega-hits." Then, both shows opened in their out of town tryouts and the creators found out the truth - they should not have gotten cocky and they had cold water thrown at them and I don't think in either case were they prepared for it or prepared to do the work it would have taken to fix them. Seussical went through the most changing - it got better, and has had a life in stock and amateur, but it certainly was not the show you would have thought we were getting after that workshop buzz. Sweet Smell had gotten too far along for its creators to do anything - and that's the other problem - technology has basically killed what out of town tryouts are for. In days of old, if something wasn't working out it went, new things went in daily and that was that. Sets were changed, lighting was changed, everything was changed in service of the SHOW. Now, it is virtually impossible to do major surgery without closing down and taking weeks to redo things. That's because shows have become all about the technology and not the show - the lights are all programmed into a computer - very difficult to just change cues now - the sets are all programmed and the whole show is like a machine that must go forward no matter what. So, you can do cosmetic fixes, but it's much more difficult to start inserting new scenes or shuffling scenes around. Out of town tryouts weren't there so that you'd do the show, shut down for a month or three, then go to B'way. You did your out of town run, fixed what needed to be fixed, and went to B'way, had a brief period of previews and opened.
Creators and producers spend too much time reading chat boards and not enough time being creative and listening to their own hearts and minds - in today's world, everyone is an armchair critic, and most are teenage armchair critics - everyone's got an opinion, only each person's opinion is different and that way madness lies. Do we think that Jerome Robbins, Arthur Laurents, Stephen Sondheim, and Jule Styne would have been on the chat boards reading the bitchy invective and then worrying about it? No, they would have been watching their show, listening to the nightly audiences, and doing what needed to be done. That's why Forum fixed itself without benefit of chat boards, that's how every successful musical that had some out of town woes did it - they did their work, they were pros, if they needed other eyes they brought in professionals, and we got classic B'way musicals. Obviously, some creators weren't able to fix their shows because the shows weren't good - and all the workshops and readings in the world wouldn't have changed it one bit because of all the gladhanding and back clapping.
Well, that was long, wasn't it?
