Chuy and I were discussing something I had written. He has an invaluable set of eyes. Because unlike almost every other person I've ever worked with, he didn't study theatre in college. He sees our theatre differently than most who've been indoctrinated into the prevailing theorys at their particular college when they were there. He's also fairly new to theatre.
He sees theatre for not just what it can be, or what we'd hope it to be, but what it actually is. It's an enviably outlook in an industry creating work mostly for others already indoctrinated.
At one point he said, (I'm paraphrasing from memory)
What I don't get . . . people all over the blogosphere, and in shows I've worked on, talk about business models, rehearsal processes, the whiteness of theatre, women playwrights, 501c3-- they talk about all that stuff . . . but why doesn't anyone ever talk about content. The actual content of theatre? No one ever talks about the actual content of what is on stages. Why?How would you answer him?
42 comments:
Well, the cynic in me (why do I let him respond first? I don't know) would say that the reason why most theatre practitioners dont talk about the actual content is that it would require a degree of curiosity and engagement in creative expression that has nothing to do with oneself or one's own theatre endeavours...in fewer words artistic egotistical self-centeredness is a major obstacle to meaningful conversations about our content.
I've called for more talk on content till I was blue in the face. I get an occasional huzzah, but I also get folks who tell me that such a conversation is total navel gazing selfishness.
So instead the talk turns to the political/economic turns to the world in which we live.
Another less cynical response would be that in the main, the degree of difficulty getting a dialogue started about a show's content is related to the total number of folks who saw the piece.
The etheral nature of theatre's content doesnt linger quite so long as doubt regarding marketing techniques and budgetary red ink dread.
I agree with chuy though, the whole point of it to me is not to prove I can say something on a stage and make everyone listen, or even how... I always yearn for the equvilant of those DVD extras where people talk about the content and the actual making of the story rather than the selling of the story.
-dv
My answer is probably even more cynical than dv's (and this is, after all, a competition): we don't talk about the content because most of the content is so pathetically shallow that it isn't worth talking about. That is the weasel under the cocktail table, as pinter would say: that most of our (new) theatre is trivial. Now, we could have a reasonable discussion about some classic plays, which actually do have things to say. But, you know, we'd have to actually read them.
DRUMDRUMDRUMDRUM
-dv
Lots of cynics today.
My own personal cynic says that content isn't discussed because fewer and fewer theatre practitioners are placing priority on content over business, both within their work and within their entire view of theatre as a form/industry. This might also partially explain why so much new theatre is trivial (a point with which I mostly agree, at least in the vein of traditional theatre).
This is one of the things Chuy and I talked about. I wonder if the discussion is avoided so we don't have to answer why we (as a field) have done so much work, for so long, devoid of meaningful content.
It'd be easy to put some post shots toward Durang and Ruhl here, but it's far too widespread for that. And it's not just theatre (but I've written about that before . . .)
Paul, I wonder, if it's not only a priority on business, but even before that--is so much emphasis is put on form that content has become secondary to the point of being ignored for many of us?
This was awesome stuff to read, thanks to all of you.
One question though... Would not new theatre stay trivial, as you guys say, if people don't talk about it? Might it not be more productive to show or state, how and why something is trivial than just throwing that blanket statement out there?
As a person whom is fairly new to this, it would benefit me more to hear, Why new theatre is trivial, why new work is less than the classics. To put some context to the thoughts others have, or else it just sounds like bitter grapes, or a wishing for the days that were...
The one thing that I hold true, as a theatre belief of mine, if you will, is that the only way to get better at this is to hear what other people think about the work. Granted there are a of stupid opinions out there, but a well thought out response to a piece from someone you respect is critical if we are ever to make good work, better.
Granted there are problems, not everyone sees everyones work, but there have to be ways in which the discussion can include more about the actual work of theatre, the content, than the business.
I'd posit a couple other possibilities (what can I say, I'm just not feeling particularly cynical today), but before I do I feel we need to define content a bit. I’m explicitly referring to existing content of an actual show, not the generation of said content
1. It’s subjective.
Content is a large part of the Art (note the capital a) of theatre, and because of that it’s subjective. What I might find to be an artistically valid piece of content someone else might just not get, or at the very least they might not get in the same way. Sure there are some pretty broad strokes we can paint, but when it comes down to it every person’s interpretation is colored by their own personalities and experiences. These different interpretations impede discussion because in order to have that discussion you need to be able to accurately provide insight to your complete point of view; not only about the content but also about you as a human being, and not everyone is prepared to take that look in the mirror on a regular basis. *
2. We’re supportive of our fellow artists.
It’s hard to provide criticism, even constructive criticism to the people within our community. Theatre practitioners are a touchy bunch and any criticism, no matter how well intended, could potentially upset someone. Lord knows, it’s hard enough just to get a production up so there’s a certain part of our brains that say "Hey, it might not be up to snuff, but at least they’re not sitting at home on their asses playing video games; at least they’re trying." This fear of pissing someone off is compounded by the fact that we’ve got to survive in a very competitive business and the folks we may offend might decide not to cast us because we stepped on their toes. **
The Devil's advocacy section:
* Translation: We're lazy and unwilling to take the time and effort to do the soul searching and personal exploration required to make our art better.
**Suck it up Nancy. Honesty should be valued above politeness, especially in the world of theatre.
I guess I am feeling a little cynical after all.
:)
My $.02
Ian
I believe that there is a lot more discussion of content than you all want to see out there. It's just veiled in other issues.
The discussion about women playwrights is as much about the content of the work as it is about equity. Only the Prof bothers to spell it out, but the implication is that the female perspective is not present enough which is a roundabout way of talking content.
The discussion about "Fringe theater vs. Commercial theater" while centered on the business and marketing aspects is as much about content as it is anything else.
The Prof's NYLACHI discussions were as much about the regionalist content of plays as it was about the geography involved.
I think Ian is dead-on - we don't have direct, in-yer-face discussions about content very often because we don't want to piss anyone off or to color a potential artistic relationship with bad blood.
Further, if we actually get into content, the old argument of "edification vs. entertainment" rears its ugly head and we will never resolve that argument - are we noble sayers of Truth or dancing monkeys and whores?
Truth is, most theater is crap and we all know it. Sometimes that crap is ours and who wants to admit to putting up crap and charging money? On the other hand, in our nostalgia-loving endearment of the "classics" we forget that the classics were produced in fields of crap themselves and the reason they are classics is that they rose out of the shit and endured.
And DV - the reason no ones leaps to your cries of content is that everyone wants to be seen as brilliant practitioners of the art and would much rather discuss their own work than listen to you (or me or Tony or Isaac) detail your process of creative expression.
Also, process and content aren't the same thing. Content is what you have at the end of process.
One of the cool things for a book worm like me is with the advent of the internet, you can now read some of the drecks of the Elizabethan era.
It's not accidental that most can only name one writer from the 1500's.
"And DV - the reason no ones leaps to your cries of content is that everyone wants to be seen as brilliant practitioners of the art and would much rather discuss their own work than listen to you (or me or Tony or Isaac) detail your process of creative expression." Well I think that is very similar to the first portion of my first statement.
What I love about this is it sort makes me out to be a little whinny put upon... my "cries" as it were... Priceless Don Hall.
I will agree that for most out there Process and Content are not synonymus. I think though that a deeper communication about the former among artists can grease the wheels when it comes to communicating about the later (again between artists).
I'll also agree that there is indirect talk about content implied in alot of the examples Don mentions. But does that sort of indirect shop talk equate the sort of thing Chuy is stating here?
It seems to me, he is talking more about a direct engagement with the narrative by the spectator and the creator about the ramifications of the story themselves. I.e. rather than indirectly getting around to "story", putting "story" first. Chuy is that accurate?
-dv
It is sorta Chekhovian, I think. So in Chekhov's best work people talk about mostly insignificant trival things, so they don't have to bring themselves to talk about the fact that the world they know is crumbling apart all around them.
The passion and despair is always under the surface, just below the boiling point (in good productions at least.) And well, we all know what happens at the end.
I was reading this month's American Theatre and there's a story about "post-subscribenowism." New ways to look at Danny Newman's Subscribe Now.
I know many, Scott included, are not fans and the subscription model has taken quite a beating over the last decade or so. It even gets blamed for the lackluster programming that abounds in larger houses.
But what is missing from the discussion about the subscription model is a pretty close parallel. It only works if the work is good enough to create demand.
Lack of content is what hurt most subscriber bases, far more than changing buying patterns. Marketing is insignificant if what is being sold is not interesting in the first place.
No matter how skillfully told the story is, and no matter how well packaged it is, or how great the business model is--if it's not a good story it's usually not interesting to watch.
There is a lot of crap out there, always has been, but we can never work to do better if we can't bring ourselves to talk about it.
Does Art with nothing to express fall back into itself under the weight of it's own pretense? Without more meaningful content, is our theatre a dark kitchen riddled empty bottles of spirits, a conch without sirens, or if you will, an old orchard without any trees left?
Or is it simply not interesting enough, often enough to attract folks to watch?
If we can't talk about it who will?
DV- if the whine fits... :)
(see - I did a smiley emoticon to indicate a gentle ribbing)
I'm not so sure that Chuy is talking more about a direct engagement with the narrative by the spectator and the creator about the ramifications of the story themselves.
I think he's talking about the content of the theater. Not the direct engagement or the process of inspiration. The content. What stories are being told, how those stories being told, who are we telling these stories to and for?
And whether any of it means a fucking thing.
Does Art with nothing to express fall back into itself under the weight of it's own pretense? Without meaningful content, we in the theater are nothing but toothless whores begging for a nickel (four cents of which goes to the fucker who rents us the bed).
"I think he's talking about the content of the theater. Not the direct engagement or the process of inspiration. The content. What stories are being told, how those stories being told, who are we telling these stories to and for?"
Chuy'd have to answer that for himself, but that's what a lot of our original conversation that started this post was about.
A while back I was talking with one of our better critics in town and he said something that struck me. We were talking about the mfa syndrome and what that is doing to theatre.
He was saying that one problem is you have someone like Paula Vogel talking up her students, trying to get them work (like a good mentor should.)
No one calls her on it they just take her, and others', word for it. So a lot of plays are getting produced in major theatres by Brown and Yale (and other high status MFA programs) playwrights because of their network.
Other folks produce and comission them just because they were produced at Lincoln Center or Yale Rep, The Goodman et al.
The only problem is you have to be fairly affluent to be able to afford to pay $100,000 for an MFA in playwrighting and a lot of time, not always, but often writers from that type of background don't really have anything to say.
He put it more succinctly than I would have.
"Without meaningful content, we in the theater are nothing but toothless whores begging for a nickel (four cents of which goes to the fucker who rents us the bed)."
That's if you can even find a decent licensed bed when you need to sleep :)
Thanks again to all of you for all of the feedback, this is very good for me... and part of what I was looking for, I'll explain...
What I mean content, now that I think about it a week after having this conversation with Tony and a few hours after reading all of this is broad. I mean content to be a mix of both of what Don and DV are referring to.
Why are we doing the work we are doing, for who, does it even fucking matter... Yes! Exactly this is very, very, important, I think.
What choices were made in an individual production, what choices have those in the sphere seen in works, that they really liked, why? That they hated why? Then start a conversation on those terms, expand the discussion about the craft.
In my mind those two questions are very important for two reasons. 1. Its the best way to make the work better. Its the best way to learn from each other and make theatre better. Its already a collaborative art to begin with, why not expand that conversation, company to company, artist to artisit. WE talk about it in rehearsal, why not outside?
2. This is also important because I think it aids the money question. Indirectly, I would say. If the work is better, tighter, more appealing, better thought out and run the ringer of thoughtful criticism, one would like to believe that and the end you get better work. Better work, means more audiences.
I think that before you talk about how to sell this stuff or get money to put it up you need to know... What the hell are we putting up and why, and how.
If my definition of content is not falling into the right definition, I apologize, but what I say above is what I mean.
Now, I agree with Ian, Paul, and others where they raise the points about why this doesnt happen more often, artist to artist, and that is fair.
I guess the only thing I can say then is... To those that I know and those that I do not now, if I should happen to meet you someday, after a production I have worked on, please feel free to tell me what you think about my work, or any show I have worked on. In private to the side if needed, but I will always want to hear what anyone has to say. I think it will help me. If I think your an asshole or stupid, I will weigh that in my assessment of the comments. If I respect your opinion and work, I will weigh that into my assessment of the comments. Either way, I will be polite and hear you out. As I said its one of the best ways I can think to get better.
If this is all a mess and scatter brained it is cause I am three minutes over on my 30 break... Shit, I gotta run.
Part of the problem is that sooo many theatre people I know actually take in very little theatre. And what they do go to is merely for networking or supporting friends and family. Don has a point in that we are all so busy in the center of our own worlds that no one has any time to visit anyone else's simply for the sake of seeing what they are doing.
I'd like to think that the current format that my blog has taken is very conducive to this sort of content-related discussion, yet hardly any happens. Of course I realize that much of the reason for this is that of course people have no comments for a show they haven't seen. But I'm hashing out my own little personal discoveries as I go, so it's not all a loss. But how do we overcome that obstacle? There's a ton of theatre in this city and we're all very busy people -- how do we make sure we've got enough overlap to actually discuss shows?
Also, Chuy, I genuinely would love to get together and chat over coffee or a beer sometime. Your enthusiasm is very catching and you're throwing a ton of great questions and great answers out there. Just laying that on the table. (Also, while I'm here, we've still got a long overdue beer between us as well, Tony...)
Dancing monkey whore and proud of it!
I'd love to talk content, as soon as my play is "finished" (sometime in January - or this month if I'm really good - for a production in late February).
I don't come from a theater background either, and I'd welcome the ability to talk Art with people free from the usual theatrical myopia.
It's sort of weird, come to think about it. I'd always imagined story to come first.
*shrugs, puts on her dunce cap, and proceeds to dance with the other monkeys*
Bear with me, y'all, I'm putting my toe back in the theatrospheric waters after a very long (but not complete) absence and an even longer period of insane busy-ness (which hasn't fully let up)... so look kindly on my inability to complete a full sentence or defend an argument.
A couple of quick thoughts about content, MFA-or-no-MFA, "writing what you know," etc., drawn completely from my own experience and in no particular order:
-- If you're a playwright, get a job or find a way to make a living that has nothing to do with theater. Yeah, it cuts into your writing time and you may not have as many "networking" opportunities... but at least you're diversified and the tit you're sucking on for food (i.e., survival) isn't the same one you're sucking on for artistic sustenance. Your rent is paid? Good: now go make art.
-- Better yet, get many jobs. Go many places, do many things. Live in as many worlds as possible, because whether you're "writing what you know" or exploring what you don't know, you'll do it all a hell of a lot better if you've been around your block, and somebody else's block, a few times. You won't lose contact with your own work or perspectives or passions, but you'll begin to see it from other points of view and that can only enrich your product (i.e., content). We all know writers who write about writers (who can't write, who won't write, who don't write, who wanna write), and I think we've exhausted the genre. (Which, I realize, opens me up to the possibility of being blindsided by a surprisingly awesome new play about a writer... but I'll rejoice in that event when it happens.)
-- As for an MFA... my little two-cents added to a five-dollar discussion: I don't have an MFA, I have an MBA. I rather suspect, however, that getting an MFA is a lot like getting an MBA, that there is very little taught in either program that couldn't be learned or discovered on your own, from reading books, and in a series of great discussions with really smart and creative artists (or economists). It really isn't rocket science, and there are no keys to the kingdom. The main difference is that, at least when I received my MBA, getting the graduate business degree meant an almost-automatic increase in earning power that paid for the education in short order. An MFA? Not so much, it seems... And credibility schmedibility: yeah, the paper on the wall buys a bit of it, up front, but that only lasts as long as you continue to deliver. Or have found yourself in a small, self-reinforcing circle with the resources to keep the circle going.
All of which probably makes me sound (as some have commented on themselves, above), pretty cynical. Or as relishing my John McCain-esque "outsider" status (an outsider when it serves me, an insider when it serves me). And that's quite possible. But I do think that it's generally quite freeing, from the perspective of creating art and content, to be free of the economic and industry pressures that often combine to squelch art and content.
That's not to say that I would ever say "no" to a large check. And that doesn't mean you should avoid getting fully absorbed and involved in the world of theater and creating theater. And I think artists deserve a living wage for the contributions to society. But today, now, I'm feeling really practical: just do the work.
I've certainly put my work out there on occasion for discussion and tried to discuss the content and process. It's an oddly naked position to be in, to put unformed material into the blogosphere, to be picked over, dismissed, discussed and sniffed at. I've found the blogosphere to be occasionally generous with this, but mostly awkward and/or indifferent.
What can I say? I'm not really in class anymore. I never really was. I occasionally discover useful thoughts about my process and about content, but the risk vs reward factor is pretty low.
And I think there's something to be said for professional relationships too. It's hard to be entirely critical of someone you might hope to work with, or have worked with.
DAM -
You rock.
Freeman -
I agree. On the other hand, regarding professional relationships that can't handle criticism, are those really the people you want to work with?
Don -
I didn't say anyone "couldn't handle criticism." I think it's more my own trepidation.
If someone needed to be handled delicately, that doesn't discount them from working with me. The only qualities that I respect in a person aren't an iron-clad self-image and emotional detachment for criticism. If that's how I felt, I wouldn't work with ... myself.
I do think that there could be a lot more discussion of content. I just can see why it's a subject that is often avoided by those who aren't professional journalists or critics.
I'm surprising myself by dissenting a bit here. Our content is always going to be the way it is, and it's fine. What makes content seem so much worse all the time is the fact that we can't make bad plays go away very quickly.
TV has cancelled shows after single episodes. Paintings are easy to take off the wall. Bad movies don't see second weekends.
Bad plays go on for at least four weeks.
Theater is no better or worse then it ever has been, but the model has changed little since antiquity. A show is set to run for weeks well before that show exists. If it's bad, it will still run for weeks. Broadway's a little different, and maybe that's what gives Broadway it's allure. The bad shit closes relatively quickly. The good stuff gets extended indefinitely. Smaller theaters should maybe figure out how to do that.
And I'd like to say I've got a BFA in Acting and that's it. My view of an MFA is that it's a way to establish professional contacts. I don't really see how it makes theater, or theater writing, better.
Poetry has gone the way that theater is heading - it's become fully academic. It's blood flows entirely through the arteries of academia. There will never be another Robert Frost, who penetrates the national consciousness during his lifetime. The poems of today are technically impressive, ballsy, artful and they do not reach into the living room. They've stopped trying.
If theater keeps going the way its going, we're going to be in the same boat. Plays will be written to please other playwrights, for grants, and seen as artistic exercises, comments on other work, an internal discussion among intellectuals and students of form.
I'm sorry. I said "if."
This has already happened.
All it takes is one talented poet to break that cycle, Freeman -- or, even better, a group of them. They're out there, and they're about 23.
Same will happen with playwrights, as Tracy Letts showed last year. They will find a way to work around the workshop process. David Mamet wouldn't be David Mamet without Gregory Mosher, whose sensibilities as a producer and director matched his work. I have faith that there are playwright/director combinations in the future that will show new steps in American theater, just as there are companies that will understand that a sold-out house at $10 a head is better than a half-full house at $30.
Martin--I'd disagree on a minor point. One way to make bad plays go away (or at least slow the tide) is to not produce so many bad scripts in the first place.
Eric Z--I'd agree.
And I didn't mean to say that no one out there is writing anything of substance. Though I have said in the past that I wasn't seeing it in scripts that I was reading. There's far more bad plays than remarkable plays, but the only way to sort them out is to put the time in to read them.
I should maybe clarify that--for myself--I put the blame squarely on producers/AD's/groups that produce as ensembles. A lot of folks work on shows but usually it is a small number, or one person, who actually green light projects.
And maybe I should also ad that while I do many things--write, direct, design et al. I'm saying this with my producer hat on.
The terminal degree doesn't in and of itself make a playwright good or bad. What I think is problematic is how specific MFA's intersect exclusively with the green light, to the detriment of all other potential voices.
Tony - thanks for not calling out my incorrect use of 'it's'. Now I'm curious as to what you think about this:
Walk out of any high school production, and you're going to think Our Town is a piece of full-of-itself crap. The Hypocrites' recent production = awesome. Theater's a team sport. A great show can come from a bad script, and a horrible show can emerge from a good one.
I saw the first production of The House's Dave DaVinci and loved it. The recent remount left me literally confused (and I already knew the story!).
Bad shows happen to brilliant artists and their teams. I appreciate your producer hat perspective. I still think you have to figure out how to close the bad shows quickly. Which may be impossible with a subscription model.
As a final aside: improv was started and exists wholly outside of academic mainstream, and improv based theaters continue to emerge in major and minor cities alike. Many do produce written work, and not just sketch shows. Maybe if poetry was really, really funny...
I've always thought Our Town was a great script, beaten down by decades of bad productions. But you could make the same case for Glass Menagerie, all of Shakespeare, probably most if not all of the classics.
I had fun at the 1st production of Dave Divinci, but I thought the script was never more than mediocre at best. Mostly for lack of content, actually.
I don't know if I'd agree that a great show can come from a really bad script, but I've seen enough great scripts be butchered to be open to the possibility.
And yes, sometimes no matter how much you put into something, it won't work out as well as you hoped. But to my mind, starting with nothing leads to nothing.
As far as the subscription model, only a few (large to very large) theatres, at least in Chicago, are really driven by it. Most of those rely heavily on single tickets as well.
A lot of the small and midsize companies are itinerant, and have to book a set amount of weeks to get space, locking them in.
So you're eating that rent with no chance of taking at least a small chunk of it back if you close early and it's really hard to extend if it's blowing up at the box office.
Not saying it is not a problem, it is. It's just one driven for most by real estate issues and not the subscription model.
Not sure I get your analogy with improv.
On and I screw up its and it's all the time when typing in comments, so I'd be the last one to call someone out on their grammar in a comments box.
The improv thing was a response to Freeman's claim that theater is heading the way of poetry - i.e. only created more-or-less for other poets and the English Professors that read them. I really did just mean it as an aside.
You're right about itinerant companies being locked by real estate issues and not the subscription model.
I have nothing else to add.
I think fixing the content problem requires first fixing the production problem.
The way theatre is organized now most of what is produced isn't really discussion worthy content. Shakespeare, the greeks and other classics aren't worth talking about because we already know these stories, if we haven't seen them, we've read or studied them, if we haven't done that, we've seen derivatives of them. The formulaic dramas and comedies aren't worth talking about because there's nothing interesting going on in formulas. That's most of what goes on. Experimental work is often about form over content, and the content can't be talked about or expressed (this is for me experimental work's strength). Narrative plays that deal with new themes or innovative content are rarely produced, and when they are, it's by no-budget companies that A. often mount rough productions, which lack the polish that gets attention in the theatre world. B. lack the resources to promote and draw a big enough audience to be seen by enough people to get interesting conversations going.
I know what content i want to see, and what content new audiences want to see. So that's not a problem, doesn't need to get talked about. The fact that this content isn't going to get produced by MFA artists working in NEA funded houses, and that theatre is dominated by those people is a problem, cuz new audiences expect theatre to be snooty poo and don't give it a chance.
"I know what content i want to see, and what content new audiences want to see. So that's not a problem, doesn't need to get talked about."
Rex - Do you mean that to be sarcastic and if you are serious, what is it the content that everyone wants to see? I am not trying to be a jerk with that statement, I am genuinely interested in what you think it is the content people want to see is.
I have have an idea of what people want, but I am not sure enough in that idea to be able to say that I know, for sure, unequivocally, that I know what people want.
Now for something completely different...
In regards to the discussion of content, I believe that it is important to establish what the goal and purpose of theatre is. The why we do theatre affects the how we do theatre immensely and as such. I do not think that anyone will agree on that, but it is important to understand why someone is doing something, that helps to better assess and form opinions about how they are doing it.
Coupla observations:
1. Chuy's question about content was accepted as revelatory, but after I see a show, what the show was about is always a major part of the conversation. And when I see a show that I think lacks real content, that, too, takes up a lot of focus.
2. Every rehearsal I've been to - my show or not - all the directors and actors always seem to be discussing what this or that means and/or how to convey this or that idea. Ie, content.
3. Granted some people make things because they think it's fun - regardless of whether it's trivial. Why is that so horrible? That said, many also produce work that they believe in because they believe in what the play says - again, content. And while I don't like the idea that people make plays because they're "interested in the voice of the writer", that has lead to the support of several writers who've gone on to make some good contributions.
4. Every theatre and producer I've been a reader for has been interested in not just the style of the writer (they are looking for new voices, after all), but also, what is the play about. Whether or not these conversations were reflected in the season's programming, they were and are happening. Every day. Again, content is quite thoroughly a part of the conversation.
5. Specifically, I don't see how the MFA resentment exhibited in some comments has anything to do with content. Clearly, there is some unfamiliarity with MFA programs, what they do, how they work and the variety of writers, actors, directors, managers, technicians and dramaturgs they produce.
6. I agree with one of the previous commenters (Ian) that content is very subjective but all things have content of some kind. I wonder if what we should really be discussing is subject matter, relevance and resonance. They are related to each quite closely and take us beyond style or presentation to what matters. E.g. I saw a production of DINNER WITH FRIENDS - not what I'd considered an amazing well crafted play, but when intermission came, everyone in the theatre turned around and started talking to their neighbors about their marriages. That play struck a major chord. And that's the kind of thing that brings people back.
Part of my response to this issue would be to look for ways that I might practice and promote talking about content.
Due to my lack of experience in theater, this might take some time . . .
Has anyone seen anything on stage, content wise, recently, that thrilled them?
Malachy, I think part of the problem, for me at least, is that while the conversation goes on often, it's usually a private conversation behind closed doors. So someone looking at the theatre in general, or new to it, has never heard it.
And while each theatre may have the conversation for itself we as a whole don't seem to.
"we should really be discussing is subject matter, relevance and resonance." I'm not seeing the difference in subject matter vs. content. Could you elaborate?
Freeman, I started a new threadwith your (great) question
"Rex- Do you mean that to be sarcastic and if you are serious, what is it the content that everyone wants to see?"
I am not being sarcastic. But, re-read my statement, i didn't say that i know what content everyone wants to see, i said i know what content new audiences want to see, and by that i meant a particular group of new audiences, one large enough to i think sustain the right kind of theatre company, which is all i'm interested in, cuz i desperately want to see theatre as a flat world with many modestly successful companies each serving a particular purpose well. That's a big run on sentance. Now for the answer.
People want to see content that is relevant and important to them. The people i want to make theatre for are people who critically examine their lives, and who use the arts as a lens through which to conduct that examination (which is my answer to your second question). So, content that i want to see and that i think the audience i'm interested in connecting with wants to see is about how to live in a modern hegemonic superpower in a globalized world.
Wow. I've nearly posted so many half-finished comments to this thread it's absurd.
Tony, I think I'm finally getting past my cognitive dissonance (why are we evaluating the MFA-driven process for choosing plays at regional-sized theaters and the ensemble- or experimentally-driven process for choosing plays at storefront theaters like they're the same animal? Totally different purposes, totally different financial resources, and totally different subjective measures of quality) to see your question, which I think you've asked many times before in one form or another: Why are we not all talking about and evaluating the specific emotional and intellectual content of specific plays on the blogosphere?
The answer is pretty darn simple: There is no cross-theater public forum in which people are seeing the same work. So to compensate we talk on the blogosphere in meta-speak and give examples. But to ask the blogosphere to have rich conversations about the content of plays that only two or three of us have seen, well that's just not going to happen here. It demands another, I'd suggest face-to-face venue. Where we see the same play, and we discuss it. Maybe we should all join the Jeff Committee. Oh wait, there's problems with that, too - It of course doesn't work for our NY, WI, and NC friends.
Finally, and this is mostly to PRekk, I agree, I don't think you can separate form from content, so thinking about them as separate things to answer Chuy's question has literally made my brain explode. What's more, I don't think you can separate process from form from content, and so the desire to run subjectively bad work out of town is a pretty good way to shut down the spark that actually drives the theater community in this town. Think of the example of Vivian Girls - one of the best and most original shows to grace our stages in Chicago in the past few years. Well, knowing what went into that creative process, there were 40,000 opportunities for that show to end up a steaming lump of poo, and everyone on that team will tell you that. What saved the show was four or five complete do-overs during the rehearsal process after they learned more about how the play worked. How many "bad" shows have you seen that were one choice or one night of audience feedback and retooling away from brilliance?
This isn't to say "who are we to judge"? We are good judges of good work. But it is to say - what good work needs to flourish is people who are capable of evaluating the art on a granular, rather than a sweeping "bad" or "good" level - and a more robust preview process by which theaters can actually talk nuts and bolts with outsiders who can provide a useful perspective. Remember that Ira Glass video about practice that was floating around?
http://donhall.blogspot.com/2008/10/close-gap.html
But that conversation about specific shows can't really happen on the blogs until we can perform theater on blogs, or we have a community of people who actually see - and yes yes to Rex, INTERESTED IN - the same work. I for one have found meta-conversations useful, but make no mistake - blogosphere talk is a sideshow and a respite from the work itself, and those of us in this conversation come from so many different approaches to theater it's more often than not that we're speaking a different theatrical language.
MFA? Maybe, if it doesn't get in the way of practice, which is the only thing that makes your work good. By all means, keep blogging to get as much of that otherworldly perspective as you can, but If you find yourself blogging more than practicing your craft and seeking feedback about your craft, time to reprioritize your time a bit.
Ok, fine, lesson learned -- no more Spaghetti Western metaphors from me. I'm not looking to run anybody out of town, but I think there should be a proper barometer of "Hey, this show you put up? It sucked. Don't do that." when necessary. And I do still believe that the difference between bad shows with substance and possibility and bad shows that are an utter waste of everyone's time is visible.
I would throw Court's Titus Andronicus up as an example: I hated, hated, hated that show with every passion I have, but it was because of very strong and very intentional directorial choices made by Charles Newell. I would very readily throw my opinion down on the show (and did on a Court comment card -- something rarely ever do for good or bad shows), but it wouldn't fall in the 'run out of town' category, I don't think, precisely because it was the very strong and very intentional choices that made me hate it, and I think there's something to that.
I agree completely about the impossibility about widespread content discussion on the blogosphere, but I do think there can be more than there is. I love the meta- bloggy talk as much as anyone, but it would be nice if we could also have some more discussion on concrete examples as well -- even if it ends up in the vein of some bastardized online Oprah's Theatre Club bullcrap. It's the sort of thing that our NY and otherwhere friends might not be able to participate in, but it's also the sort of thing that I would hope our NY and otherwhere friends would enjoy doing within their own localities as well.
And can you imagine a blog contingency on the Jeff Committee? There's something about that image that makes me grin...
"Has anyone seen anything on stage, content wise, recently, that thrilled them?"
Beowulf by Banana Bag and Bodice.
If You See Something Say Something by Mike Daisy.
The Anderson Project by Robert Lepage.
Big 3rd Episode (happy/end)by the Superamas.
The Pandora Project by magician/actor/writer Christian Cagigal.
Gone by Charles Mee, produced by Crowded Fire, San Francisco
Have You Been Here Before? No. This is My First Time. A lecture/performance by Robert Wilson.
The Wilson performance especially - I could barely walk afterwards. I felt like my entire circuitry had been rerouted. People stood up in the Q & A and told him that the lecture had changed their lives, the way they perceived the world and how they wanted to engage with it. And these weren't theater people, they were people who'd never heard of Wilson and had no expectations (other than to see their idea of a lecture - and it was definitely not that). But how often does that happen? That your audience tells you that your words, the work you did on stage changed who they are as people and how they wanted to be in the world? I'm not saying that theater must only do that, but it so seldom does that when it happens it's truly remarkable.
None of these shows have much in common with each other in terms of style, form, or content. But they all told/created good stories in interesting/theatrical ways.
Hey Paul, I'm actually really down with the idea of creating a blog-inspired theater recommendation club, and creating a format by which a conversation like this could really take off, because yeah, we all want it to happen.
I also enjoy the idea of calling it the Oprah Bullcrap Theater Club. OBTC, baby.
Hooray for Tony!
"Truth is, most theater is crap and we all know it. Sometimes that crap is ours and who wants to admit to putting up crap and charging money? On the other hand, in our nostalgia-loving endearment of the "classics" we forget that the classics were produced in fields of crap themselves and the reason they are classics is that they rose out of the shit and endured."
I'd actually go one step further and say that our attachment to dusty old plays is killing the art form. I like the classics as much as the next guy, but it's a little simplistic to say that modern theater is "trivial" in its content. Especially since we never get to, like, see any.
Just wanted to add a thanks for this really decent, interesting, thought provoking, non-douchebag (both of the high brow and low brow variety) conversation about theatre. I've enjoyed it very much.
My half cent:
I agree there has always been crappy theatre. Always. I don't believe the change in times has led to a disintegration of the form, we merely mutate as we must.
And I absolutely agree that we cling to the classics with a death-grip. It is hard to assess the content of new theatre when it is so rarely seen on the same scale as our classics.
Having said that, I think it's impossible to kill theatre. You can kill science - science experiments need money to move on, to achieve their goals.
Not so much with theatre. Theatre changes, it gets smaller, sometimes this content we seem to need affects in valleys instead of mountains. In back rooms instead of arenas. In classrooms instead of on the stage. I see a lot of content in high school theatre and how that content can change lives. Plays change their lives, that's some wild concept.
(I see A LOT of crap too, eye stabbing crap. I have sat through High School Musical. Not pretty.)
Theatre is a survivor. That's why I love it so.
Modern plays can be just as good as classics!! Modern plays can be JUST AS GOOD!
Lindsay makes a terrific point. I think that the classics are considered to say things better than modern plays because the classics built on everything that had come before them, and pushed on, elevating the quality of their content to something previously unseen.
We could do the same thing today, if we are willing to constructively criticize ours and other peoples' content.
I love discussing the quality of the plays I see, but I've accidentally angered many people over the years who are unable to accept criticism of the shows they've put so much energy into, no matter how constructive I've tried to make it. And I've tried too.
I think it's much easier to simply talk about the technical aspects because it's so easy to see them as right or wrong. The tickets were handled right. The paperwork was filed right. The crowd control was done right.
Content is one huge shade of gray.
I'm spend more time in improv than in the theater community in Chicago, and improvisers are, if anything, worse. Improv requires a person to make themselves as open and transparent on stage as possible, and to discuss what was done right or wrong is to criticize their entire being.
Not an easy thing to do. And it makes discussing and elevating content a difficult thing to do.
But the people that go down in history as great are those that develop thick skin, and learn to take that criticism and develop better material for themselves. These are the people who find their content so important that they will sacrifice anything to raise it.
Such people are rare, and rightly so. It's much easier to put up a nice show for nice people to watch and then nicely talk about afterwards.
If we're just going to sit around and talk about how great theater was back in the day, we may as well get jobs as librarians. It pays a lot better.
Fascinating conversation, folks. Pop on over to our site www.bitter-lemons.com when you get a chance. Desperately trying to fan the fires over here in LA. It ain't easy. Tony, would love to be added to your blog roll if you would do me the honor? Keep up the good work. Best, Colin.
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