Pay what you can for the first night of MetroStage's A Broadway Christmas Carol on Nov. 18, but if you can't pay at least $10, you'll be priced out. The pay-what-you-can designation is a bit of a misnomer for MetroStage, which is the only theater in the area to have placed a limit on how low you can go to attend one of their preview shows.

"We felt, on principle, $2 or $3 to walk into a live performance is an insult to the actors and the theater," says Carolyn Griffin, the theater's artistic director. "I'm not interested in being a part of that."

For pay what you can productions around the city, patrons will line up hours in advance - and often only pay $1. That's what Wayson Lee, the first person in line for last month's pay what you can production of In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play at Woolly Mammoth paid. He defended his choice, saying "I'm not rich. It enables me to tell other friends who go to theater if the show is good or bad.... If it's good, I'll give them more money or I'll see it again."

That won't cut it at MetroStage, says Griffin.

"By even offering a pay what you can night, it is a gift to the theater community for people who don't have $40 or $50," she says. "It's a personal soapbox I'm on: Don't insult my actors. You pay $10 to $12 to see a movie, $8 for popcorn. I think that live theater is not well-served when people think they can see it for peanuts."

Griffin says that the policy has been in place almost a year now, and that people will often chip in $20 or more. Only a few people have questioned it — "The majority are grateful and appreciative" — and she always fills the house, which is a boost for the actors on opening night.

Griffin says she isn't sure if other theaters should adopt her policy, but she thinks that encouraging people to be less stingy for pay what you can nights will foster a greater appreciation of theater in an era where it stands to dwindle.

"As a society, we're losing track of how important live performances are," she says. "Those of us who work in theater are hoping that the next generation discovers what we do and why we think it is so valuable, and understands that it costs real money to do it."

But if they don't?

"I'm not worried about the people who will pay $1.They can do that somewhere else."