From RLewis, in the comments:
You say that you don't give into despair, but your blog does its best to spread despair to anyone who'll read. Eventually, that has the very effect that you purport to be against. Have you checked out Sheila C.'s blog? She doesn't seem so disgruntled. Any guess why? Institutions of all different sizes are doing really great work, Sheila seems less concerned with their status, but if your problem is that it's not everyone's work, you're gonna be ranting till the end. How do we get the theatrosphere to be a place that supports and grows the theater community, instead of just constantly ragging on it? If you're not part of the solution....
Just...*sigh* Since it's worth saying, Sheila is awesome. Big fan of her work, her blog, her aura. Big ups to Sheila. And maybe I don't seem quite as satisfied as she does...because maybe I'm not. I don't have the writing gig on a TV show. I didn't get a great production this fall to rave reviews and accolades. And if that bitterness comes through, well, sorry. It is there and I try to keep this blog from being all "The way to make theatre good is to produce more of my plays!" That's not what I'm all about.
And since it apparently bears repeating, I'm not a Cassandra. I don't believe that live performed entertainment of scripted material is going to going to die out any time soon, if ever. I do not think that the theatre is endanger of losing all relevancy or becoming a quaint museum piece. I do, however, think that theatre can be more relevant than it is, be more vibrant and be more enjoyable for all, artists and patrons alike. The whole point of this endeavour is to make it better, make a better theatre culture, make a better theatre environment. I do not think the current status quo is working, either for the artists, staffs and boards involved or for the majority of patrons (or potential patrons). And I do think that our current non-profit producing and developing model is not working and we will need to investigate alternatives. That's what this is: an investigation of alternatives. With a little snark added to make it fun. (At least for me.)
And, I want to say this out loud and publicly, this whole "with us or against us" mentality is totally false, bogus, wrong and out of place. I mean that for RLewis and for Scott. It's not one thing or the other. I don't have to endlessly cheerlead for the system in order to keep it a "community" and I don't have to howl for its demise in order to be "honest." If I see something that doesn't work, I'm going to call it out. If I see something that does, I'm going to praise it. And if I see something that I disagree with, but works for some, I'm going to leave it alone. Not everyone wants to move to New York and go to work on Broadway, and not everyone wants to move to Indiana and do community theatre, so those shouldn't be the only choices or the only ideals.
The theatrosphere is full of varying voices, sometime rising in unison, sometimes falling into Babel, and that's a good thing. Sometime I'm massively inconsistent and that's also a good thing. This current NY theatre season is really great and exciting and there's a ton of good new things happening. And it hasn't escaped my notice that the theatrosphere, and the internet in general, and these discussions that we've all been having for the last five years are part of it. This is how change happens.
So...if you do read this and despair, well, read something else. I don't get paid for this and I don't need the hits. (I don't even keep track anymore.) No one should be despairing. We should be acting and pushing and finding what works for us. And then letting other people find what works for them. There's, what, 300 million people in this country now. That's a helluva a lot of an audience. I think we should stop worrying so much about your audience and think about ours.
Okay. I'm going to get a cup of tea or something and chill the frak out.
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18 comments:
In class today, we were discussing "Volpone," and I was asking about the morality of the protagonist and its connection to the world today.
"Isn't what he does wrong?" I asked. And a student responded: "That's how it is." And that is the answer to so much that is wrong in our world: shrug, "Well, it's how it is." Where is the outrage? Yes, I suppose it does get people down a little, mainly because seeing something that is wrong requires you take some action to put it right, and people don't want that responsibility laid on them.
For the record, I have never said that EVERYBODY should do community-BASED theatre in Indiana. What I HAVE said is that it should be recognized as a viable and respectable alternative to the New York track, and that simply because a sizable myth has been created around a system doesn't mean that system is viable, useful, or necessary.
Now, I will say that artists in NY get awfully touchy whenever anybody even hints that there might be another value scale that doesn't start with "those little town blues" end with "if I can make it there, I'll make it anywhere, it's up to you New York, New York." Apparently, we are all supposed to love them because they're in NY or something. Well, I say get a life. There's a whole wide world out there, and a lot of theatre, and believe it or not some of it happens west of the Hudson and is damn good.
Dude, thanks for bringing this forward (if out of context). I hope others will join in (and read the original post), because I believe a more honest discussion about the theatrosphere is certainly needed. It had such potential to grow the theater community (even if I didn’t think that US-wide production idea would get off the ground), but now I wonder what potential theater-lovers think when they read these blogs today. I doubt it’s very positive, but maybe you disagree with that, too.
Sure, like any business theater can always do better, we all can, but I refuse to apologize for balancing all the snark with some of the many terrific things going on in the community. “Despair” was your word first, and now you’ve added frustration and bitterness. But no one is making you do anything, so spare us the “with us or against us” republican rag. I admit that I feel a responsibility to the art I love to stand up for it sometimes - just to go on record so that other theater surfers see in your comments section that there’s another side.
Look, big theaters will always be an easy target - like a cruise ship they can’t turn on a dime just cuz you tore them a new one. Blogs are different – they could change things quickly if there were some good ideas. And I’m sure if there had been any, we’d all know it. Where are they? What realistic alternatives has your investigation turned up?
I would love to see the theatrosphere make a difference, but too often what I read is folks getting out their anger online, and I hope they feel better for it. So for 99, I tried to come up with some shows that might make you feel a little better about this biz; tried to come up with a writer that might exemplify reasons to be positive, but some folks just don’t want to go there. Maybe that’s you – I don’t know or care. But it won’t stop me from trying to get you to stand by your words “to make a better theatre culture, make a better theatre environment.” I’m not sure how you see this bettering anything, but I bet you’re smart enough to do it in a more Obama way – by lifting others up, not always putting them down.
You say, “If I see something that does, I'm going to praise it,” so I just stopped by to say that I’m not reading that here. This happens too often in the theatrosphere, and I think if the rest of us pointed it out from time to time, you bloggers might stand a better chance of making some positive change in the theater.
And for Scott: Sir, you really have no idea how many of us are behind your decentralization idea, because you spend so much time running down those who aren't doing it. Anyone would be stupid to not want your plan to succeed; we'd just like you better if you lost the negativity towards others.
But, see, Scott, right there in your comment is exactly what I (and I'm sure other NYLACHI artists who read and respect your work) react to: I (and others) have no problem saying that community-based theatre is a viable alternative to the current regional theatre system. It's just that you don't seem to think coming to New York is a viable alternative to the community-based theatre model. You may not like it and it may not be the best for everyone, but it IS an alternative. And it doesn't always lead to being co-opted by the system. There are alternatives within NY (or LA or DC or whatever urban hub you're near). I think we just want you to extend the same courtesy back. We appreciate you, we do (at least I do!). It's just not what we want to do. Not out of inertia or fear or lack of outrage, but because the work we're doing is here.
I'm honestly really trying to see where I've used the word "despair" in my recent posts. I might have further back, or maybe in a comment somewhere else, but I'm not really seeing it. And, yes, when I've read pieces I agree with or seen work developed in a different way, I've tried to highlight it. But I don't think just talking about what's working is what we need. We do have a morale problem in the arts in general, but focusing on the "good" isn't going to help that, not exclusively. And I do think these ideas are filtering up, by the proliferation of new theatre companies with different models, the work of companies like the Nature Theatre of Oklahoma, partnerships like theirs and Soho Rep. There is a lot of good happening and it's being talked about. But going around and making sure everyone plays nice all the time, that just feeds into a culture of complacency. I disagree with Scott; there's a lot of outrage and a lot of frustration, but it hasn't quite coalesced into a movement. In part because it's all so disparate. But I do believe change is coming and coming fast and in new and exciting ways. I see frustration and some anger, but not a lot of despair.
99 -- I have never argued that NYC is an option, and exactly the right thing for some people. And if NYCers argued, as you have, that NYC is just another region, then everyone would be fine. But my experience has been that many just can't help justifying their preference by calling NYC the "major leagues" where anyone with talent "of course" wants to play, and putting forward the idea that all theatre artists with talent would do best playing on the "national stage" and so on.
I don't attack individual artists, NY or otherwise, except as an they illustrate a common ideology that privileges NYC over all other theatre scenes. When people in my comments, for instance, while defending their choice of NY, refer to not wanting to be in "Bumfuck, Idaho," they may think they are not dissing non-NY theatre, but they are nonetheless. Their worldview is the classic New Yorker cover of the map of the US from the New York viewpoint (http://strangemaps.wordpress.com/2007/02/07/72-the-world-as-seen-from-new-yorks-9th-avenue/), and I feel that I need to call them on it until they become aware of what they are doing. It is the same process that African-Americans had to go through, and women, and gays. You have to call people on it when their prejudices are showing.
And I guess the same comment relates to RLewis's: no matter how many times I have said it, NYLACHI people seem to feel attacked if the Big City Myth is at all referenced in a less-than-admiring way. But until those towns are taken down off the pedestal, young artists will feel as if they have only one choice with their career.
I have never asked anyone to leave NY or Chicago, only to acknowledge that there are other career paths, and those paths are valid, and enriching, and just as important as what is happening on the Isle of Manhattan. If that makes me negative, well, I guess I'm stuck with it.
I totally hear that and I know it's easy to get caught up in urban triumphalism. But the opposite is true, too. Like I said, no matter who you're talking to, it's like we all work in Broadway and because we haven't stormed the gates or turned our backs on everything, we're "part of the system." There is outrage, rebellion and revolution here. In the same way that the big corporate theatres suck up all the oxygen in the rest of the country, they suck up the oxygen here. But we keep on fighting the good fight.
Oooh -- I like that phrase: urban triumphalism.
I don't expect you to storm the gates or turn your back -- just quit singing a little less loud so that others can hear the melodies coming from elsewhere.
A true commitment to, say, the OOB theatre scene (rather than OOB as a stepping stone to "bigger things") is as regional as starting a theatre in Asheville. The challenge in both places is to put down roots, establish relationships, tell the stories that matter.
It is harder in NYC, because the market is flooded, the rents are high, the audience is huge and dispersed, and the artists are too often focused on stepping stones. But it can be done.
Yes, it can. It's tough, but things are, indeed, tough all over.
Would you agree, though, that the skills and tactics needed to thrive in NYC are different than those needed to thrive in Asheville? Because that is my contention -- that it's different. And if it is, and yo9ung people are only taught the NYC model, then they are ill-prepared to thrive in a different environment.
I don't necessarily agree, in terms of pure theatremaking skills, that you need a different kind of theatre education. A different kind of career training, sure, but not actual training. I think part of how we get on different tracks is that it seems like you're only thinking of New York as Broadway and the big corporate theatres. In just the same way as "we" think of the rest of the country as a stretch of Piggily-Wiggilys dotted with regional theatres, even though it's not. Do you need to think differently about theatre to make a community-based organization? Yep. And that kind of training is what's needed everywhere, and on all levels. Honestly, that's why I focus so much energy on the model itself. It doesn't matter if those kids go off to Evansville, or Fargo or wherever and build a theatre on the same model as the Guthrie. Just like the Guthrie, it will eventually atrophy. That's the change I'd like to see.
If there's any way that I'm fatalistic, it's about human nature. Some people will be better suited to live in an urban center, some won't. It's not a matter of toughness or skill or talent. Some people thrive here, some don't. What we need is to teach our students to take their skills where they're needed. But I don't think any amount of training, education or arguing can change that nature. But we should be able to help people find their way.
I probably should have been more specific about what I was saying. I agree that, at least to some extent, the skills of creating theatre are the same no matter where you are. I was thinking more of the "survival skills" that often are taught as part of a degree in theatre. For instance, audition skills are relevant if you are going to be in a place with an established and busy theatre scene, but they are less relevant if you are running a company in a small community. In that case, skills in grantwriting, community building, arts education and other such skills might be more relevant.
However, I would also say that the actual skills of theatre making might be different in a non-urban context. For instance, if you adopt Wendell Berry's idea of artist as "rememberer," then it might be good if artists knew something about gathering stories, devised theatre, storytelling, ethnographic interview skills, and so forth. Designers might look into the use of recycled products ala the Rural Studio under Samuel Mockbee. The biggest change would be how you think of yourself as an artist -- seeing yourself as part of a community, in service to the community.
I completely agree with that. Those kinds of skills are necessary in any setting, urban or not. If we can prepare our young (or young-ish) artists more fully, with more rounded arts skills, we'll be better preparing for all kinds of things. But I do think that there are still different kinds of theatre a person can pursue, whether in a rural or an urban setting. It's not all monolithic. A community-based, storytelling theatre might be a good fit in some communities for some artists, but not for all. Ideally, we'd have different kinds of theatres, or at least theatres that do a variety of things, no matter where you are. A theatre that does a community-based project, followed by a new play commissioned by a local artists, followed by a classic or an American standard, followed by a musical is, to me, the ideal, no matter where it goes. And you need artists skilled in each of those, but not necessarily all artists skilled in everything, if that makes sense.
Well, yes, although I guess I am pretty committed to the idea of a company, not jobbed-in artists. Especially in a small community. I think the level of specialization isn't sustainable anymore, if it ever was.
And I'm not saying that anyone is jobbed in. I'm very much against that. I'm just talking pure skill set. Not all artists are comfortable in all formats. Someone who is brilliant at musical comedy may not be great at Shakespeare and vice versa. Ideally, your rep company would have people of all kinds and stripes, so your company can do the widest range of work.
True, true.
I guess I keep thinking about the model I will have to create for <100K Project, and I know that that group will have to be VERY small.
But, hopefully, as more people become interested and engaged, it can grow. I'm thinking about the most ambitious of companies. Smaller companies would be more tailored to the members strengths, whatever they are.
There we go. I think we have reached consensus, haven't we?
Indeed. And it wasn't even that hard.
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