Tynan's Anger

In the midst of reshuffling the purpose of this blog, I have decided to provide a neat little summary of where it has been from 2008-Present:

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Major Features:

The Top 10 Quotes from English-language Drama This Decade:

• Part One: Quotes 10-6
• Part Two: Quotes 5-3
• Part Three: Quotes 2-1

Rock N Roll Case Studies:

• #1: So This is Girl Power: Rock 'n' Roll as Defined By Hillary Clinton's Democratic Convention
• #2: “Hot Topic is the way that we rock”? How Le Tigre and MC Lars address the Adorno problem.
• #3: Holy Shit! Holy Shit! Holy Shit! The Jesus Lizard is getting back together!
• #4 Thoughts on the Day Ron Asheton Died

How to Save Theater Criticism

• Part One: No Sex for the Critic: Why theater critics are not normal people
• Part Two: Would Kenneth Tynan Twitter? Theater as the ultimate digital diversion.
• Part Three: What is to be done

Screeds:

• How America Failed Theater: Theater from a Business Perspective
• Bush is not Batman!
• The Dark Side of Internet Dumb-ocracy
• Neil LaBute hates American theater, and sounds immature doing so
• How Michael Riedel is killing theater criticism
• Is hipsterism dead? Or was it already dying?

Prominently Linked/Commended Posts:

• Was Mark Prior's downfall the fault of Dusty Baker, or incompetent doctors?
• Rock ‘N’ Roll Case Studies #3 Holy Shit! Holy Shit! Holy Shit! The Jesus Lizard is getting back together! “Nice post, Ethan. You've gone to my head and made me feel all swooshy. –David Wm. Sims, bassist for The Jesus Lizard.”
• Tom Stoppard discusses Chekhov, the media, democracy, and the theater with David Remnick at BAM
• What Sweet Search has to say about the future of SEO
• The Don Hall/Mike Daisey/Scott Walters/Adam Thurman debate
• New Stanislavski translation: RTFM, Actors!
  - "[Ethan Stanislawski is] the best-named theatre blogger in the 'sphere" Kelly Nestruck, The Guardian

And yet, the most trafficked individual post:

Gerard Butler Not Into the Whole Celebrity Gossip Thing

Labels: Blog, hipsters, how theater failed america, how to save theater criticism, links, michael riedel, rants, rock 'n' roll case studies, top theater quotes of the decade

Image via WikipediaHOW TO SAVE THEATER CRITICISM

Lately there’s been a lot of rambling about the death of theater criticism. Michael Riedel has felt demeaned as an old stodgy covering theater, a far cry from the classic depiction of the theater critic. The Playgoer has wondered whether mainstream theater is now immune to critics in the same way that movies have gotten. On a guest post on The Critical Condition, Variety’s Sam Thielman saw the role of theater criticism deteriorating and scattering across the medium’s spectrum.

Over the next few days, I will give my take on the role of theater criticism and the critic in contemporary and future American theater. In Part One, I explored the differences in the theatergoing experience between the critic and uncommitted audience member. In Part Two, I explored the relevance of theater in a digital age. In Part Three, I conclude my discussion by outlining the role of a theater critic in the current economic and cultural climate.

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PART THREE—What is to be done

If we are to save theater criticism—and I believe it is truly worth saving—we’re going to need to equip it with some tools for its own survival. Here’s my modest proposal for ways to ensure that theater criticism stays current and vital through the digital era.

Embrace the digital era
Forget the Algonquin; print media is no longer sustainable under any respectable business model. Print is not going to be dead in 2 to 3 years; it’s dying as we speak. There are some elderly theater patrons who still want print. Let them have their print for as long as humanly possible, but in the choice between going digital only and shutting down an entire publication, the former is better from both a business and human standpoint. Don’t think theater criticism can survive in print just because of the old theater attendees. If you want to obtain that under-30 crowd that every person in theater so desperately craves, digital is the only choice.

Ditch thumbs up/thumbs down, A-F grade, 1-4 stars, and all that
Some would say with the rise of sites like Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes, providing a numerical score is more essential. But theater doesn’t have an infrastructure like that yet on the web, and there’s no need to create one. Even the binary system of see it/don’t see has become obsolete in an era where the financial disparity between the critic and patron’s decision to attend theater has never been higher. Instead, provide a summary of what segment of your audience you think would like this production, and which one wouldn’t. No sacrificing of editorial standards is involved in saying that.

Cover any and every professional production
What is the benefit of online media if not creating an infinite platform for expressing one’s belief? Why should a theater section cater to the limits of print column space in their online coverage? I don’t care if it’s a 50-word summary of a show that no one would or should be seeing—every work of theater needs to be addressed by some publication or another. If a theater section is serious about being the voice of the theatrical critical community, it will leave no stone unturned. In the age of volunteer writing, this shouldn’t be such a financial risk, either.

Go national
I was shocked to open my New York Times Arts section a few months ago to find a front page review by Charles Isherwood of—gasp!—a Chicago production. It shouldn’t have to take winning a Pulitzer and Tony to have your work reviewed by the leading theater authorities if you dare to open outside of New York City. Now that no one has to struggle to find reviews from any publications from any location, the long-standing need to create a national theater discussion can be easily addressed. Call it the Terry Teachout model of criticism—if a regional theater is willing to have a major critic or publication review its work, why hold back due to geography?

Interact more with the artists
This is a dangerous proposition for any neutral critic—as Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s Lester Bangs said about the artist/critic dynamic in Almost Famous, “These people are not your friends.” A detached, professional relationship is necessary, but in order to build a bridge between practitioner and critic, everyone must at least be courteous to each other. The responsibility is on the critic’s end as much as the artist himself. If you’re building a discussion about theater, it’s hard to maintain the current system where critic and artist are at each other’s throats.

Pander to the theater geek
In catering to a mainstream audience, most theater editors will beat the Brecht out of all their budding critics. But a market that hasn’t been tapped in the online press is the theater geek; one who can quote Carol Churchill plays and Rodgers and Hammerstein on a moment’s notice, and know every last detail of what’s been on Broadway for the last 15 years or so. I’m not saying every publication has to do this—this is just a huge side of the theatrical community that is currently lacking a real online voice, even as the film and music geek have found online outlets multiple times over.

Talk about theater in larger terms
It’s not enough just to focus on the theatrical community any more. It’s gotten too small, even on Broadway, for someone just to think in terms of what’s beneficial to theater. More talk has to involve how a particular play benefits society. The problem is that through theater critic lenses, it’s often impossible to think outside that prism. Well, get with it, boys and girls, because even today’s theater crowd cares about a lot more than just theater, as strange as that may sound.

Labels: Broadway theatre, critic/artist relations, how to save theater criticism, new media, regional theater, terry teachout

Image via WikipediaHOW TO SAVE THEATER CRITICISM

Lately there’s been a lot of rambling about the death of theater criticism. Michael Riedel has felt demeaned as an old stodgy covering theater, a far cry from the classic depiction of the theater critic. The Playgoer has wondered whether mainstream theater is now immune to critics in the same way that movies have gotten. On a guest post on The Critical Condition, Variety’s Sam Thielman saw the role of theater criticism deteriorating and scattering across the medium’s spectrum.

Over the next few days, I will give my take on the role of theater criticism and the critic in contemporary and future American theater. In Part One, I explored the differences in the theatergoing experience between the critic and uncommitted audience member. In Part Two, I explore the relevance of theater in a digital age. In Part Three, I will conclude my discussion by outlining the role of a theater critic in the current economic and cultural climate.

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PART TWO: Would Kenneth Tynan Twitter? Theater as the ultimate digital diversion.

Most sane people don’t go into theater criticism for a paycheck. Arts criticism in general is becoming an even less profitable way of making money, and theater criticism as a non-academic profession is at this point almost as extinct as the panda (though the image of an attempted mating between a caged Mary McCarthy and Walter Kerr is significantly less adorable). When in doubt, current critics like to point to the death of theater in general. But theater isn’t dead—it’s still got a national appeal even as it has become centralized in a few major areas, and there are communities—yes they’re fragmented, Prof—around the country.

The main reason people go into theater criticism, however, is their desire to be at something like a modern-day Algonquin Roundtable. The theater critic carries a history of status and image that the middle-aged sweater-wearing film critic or the drug-fueled rock critic lacks. There are paintings in New York subway stations of theater critics surrounded by the likes of Eugene O’Neill and George S. Kaufman, Harpo Marx and Edna Ferber. It may seem completely irrational to go into a field for a 70-year-old image, but theater critics do so all the same.

These are the same critics who find absolutely no respite in the digital age. With multiple critics being old, that is to be expected. But there seems to be a larger theme of the Algonquin image crumbling under the image of new media. Would Kenneth Tynan Twitter? Would Bernard Shaw post his rants on his blog without editing them beforehand? The idea of the print journalist critic losing his voice in the digital age hits especially hard with theater criticism, since theater can never really be tapped digitally.

Rather than a problem, however, I say that theater’s distinctly analog qualities are precisely what can make theater vital in the digital age, and make theater criticism just as vital. Theater is defined by performers performing in front of a live audience, as in an audience who is actually in the same room. Live performance cannot be replicated by a computer. Both dance and music, other methods of live performance, can be translated to digital media (though they differ from their live counterparts, the core of the medium stays the same). Theater, however, is the part of live dance and music that doesn’t translate digitally. Theater is absolutely untouchable—have you ever tried watching a taped performance of a show? It’s almost unbearable, even though you’re still seeing all the actions that would take place in person.

What this means to me is that, rather than being outdated by technology, theater can regain its importance in society simply because it is the only medium where in-person human interaction is built into its DNA. If art exists as a means of pleasure to take us away from our daily lives, theaters artistic power is amplified in a culture where all other human interaction is digital. With other forms of digitalized art, the value of entertainment and diversion gets cheapened and makes the audience lazy. Why go to the movies when I can wait until its on-demand? Why go to the record store when there’s a record store on my computer? There’s no way to encounter theater without it essentially turning into a night out. The need to go out at night won’t diminish, which means theater could increasingly prove to be a sociological necessity.

That theater can’t exist in the digital realm also places an increased premium on theater criticism. With digital access to any other form of art, people can make judgments for themselves without putting on pants. You don’t need to go through the effort to deem whether a work of art is worthy of your time, and increasingly, you don’t need to decide whether to spend money on that art, legally or otherwise. But with theater, there’s no way of knowing what goes on without actually being there. If someone is looking for an assessment of a play, they cannot download the play and judge for themselves. The need for an independent party to relay their experience, whether on the blogosphere or in a major paper, is at a higher demand for theater than for any other form of art. That’s the closest link to the Algonquin era that we’re going to get.

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Labels: digital vs. analog, how to save theater criticism, kenneth tynan, Mary McCarthy, new media, reproducable art, theater criticism

Image via WikipediaHOW TO SAVE THEATER CRITICISM

Lately there’s been a lot of rambling about the death of theater criticism. Michael Riedel has felt demeaned as an old stodgy covering theater, a far cry from the classic depiction of the theater critic. The Playgoer has wondered whether mainstream theater is now immune to critics in the same way that movies have gotten. On a guest post on The Critical Condition, Variety’s Sam Thielman saw the role of theater criticism deteriorating and scattering across the medium’s spectrum.

Over the next few days, I will give my take on the role of theater criticism and the critic in contemporary and future American theater. In Part One, I will explore differences in the theatergoing experience between the critic and uncommitted audience member. In Part Two, I will explore the relevance of theater in a digital age. In Part Three, I will conclude my discussion by outlining the role of a theater critic in the current economic and cultural climate.

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PART ONE
No Sex for the Critic: Why theater critics are not normal people
How do normal people see theater? Normal people go to a show with their significant other, usually with dinner beforehand. After they see the show, they go home, have sex, and go to sleep.

When a theater critic sees a play, he needs to find time in this cycle to write a review. When exactly can the critic fit that in? Do critics write reviews before sex? After sex? During? (At least in their heads). Do they wait until their significant other goes to sleep, then get out of bed at 3 a.m. and write the review? That doesn’t sound all that healthy.

The point of this admittedly silly thought experiment is to show that there is no real way to reconcile what a theater critic does with what a regular audience member experiences seeing theater. If you have a deadline, you can’t act like a normal individual when you see theater. If you’re a good critic, you also need to think intensely about the show, and do research before and after seeing it. But the very nature of the theatrical experience as it relates to one’s mundane life is fundamentally different between the critic and the normal audience member.

That difference does not mean that the critic is out of touch with the audience, nor does it mean that the critic is the only one expert enough to opine on a show. But this problem does offer an explanation for why the opinions of the critic and audience member clash so frequently. If the fundamental experience of a show is different, of course opinions will vary. The important thing is to remember that the critic’s primary responsibility is to the reader, and to know what kind of audience is reading the publication you’re writing for. No publication represents a perfect cross section of a play’s audience, even for small, far off-off-Broadway shows.

Here's where I go out on a limb: what I’m arguing is that it is not the critic’s responsibility to tell the reader whether or not to see a show. The fact that the audience member has to pay money to see theater, while the critic does not, creates an irrevocable disparity between the critic and reader in the decision to see a show in the first place. Instead, the critic should focus on what his audience should keep in mind about a show when (not if) they do see it. The essential role of the critic is to give voice to an opinion that represents a segment of the theatergoing audience about what was good about a show, what wasn’t, and what was significant regardless of quality. If a theater critic doesn’t do this—whether it be in the New York Times or in a blog no one reads—who does?

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Labels: albertine theatre, Arts, audience relations, critics, how to save theater criticism, new york times, theater criticism, Theater in the United States