Critical Impact
No offense, but David Cote’s exercise (“Critical Juncture,” Nov. ’11) isn’t all that useful to us rubes in the hinterlands, primarily because we tend to consume theatre criticism locally. So, living in Portland, Ore., I know Misha Berson’s work, and I read the New York Times so I can disagree with your assessment of Isherwood vs. Brantley. But no one else has any observable effect on theatre (or theatre writing) here—other than Portland critics, of course.
What would be more interesting? A look at the different “ecologies of criticism” in various cities and the extent to which they manage to engage their communities in intelligent and provocative discussion about theatre, which leads to…more intelligent and provocative theatre, ultimately. We’d assume that Chicago and New York are denser with critics than most places, and that those critics arrange themselves in various categories, and I’d love to read that sort of analysis. Even here in Portland, we have an ecology of theatre criticism that includes the daily critics and freelancers, the weekly critics, and various bloggers and other sites devoted to theatre.
So, I disagree about the “last man standing” point: These may be the last critics standing at daily newspapers, but we know there will be other platforms for criticism. We just don’t know how they’ll be funded!
Barry Johnson
Portland, Ore.
Choices and Challenges
I’d like to learn more about the choices and challenges these critics face; they surely love theatre, but as their papers are slashing budgets, they have to make choices about what they cover. Don Aucoin, by and large, has chosen to cover New England’s regional theatres (Trinity, Hartford, Yale, Berkshires, etc.) over the Boston Fringe scene that really could use the media exposure. It’s his call (or his editor’s), but we sure could use him. And Boston’s major alternative paper, the Phoenix, covers the same metro-area large theatres that the Globe does, so they have sadly not chosen to fill the gap. This is why I appreciate someone like Thomas Garvey, author of the Hub Review blog. He covers the small and up-and-coming groups as well as covering fine arts, opera, dance and major theatres.
John Geoffreon
Boston, Mass.
Teachout on Tour
I wish David Cote had included Terry Teachout of the Wall Street Journal, largely because he’s one of the few from a nationally read paper who makes a habit of regularly making a tour of what is going on in the rest of the country. I wonder if there is another current critic who has visited as many theatres in as many towns?
Jeffrey Sweet
New York City
High Callings
I say this respectfully, but J. Grant’s letter (Nov. ’11) criticizing American Theatre as “a political, clubhouse journal” is a misfire that borders on hideous embarrassment. The writer offers a strenuously reactionary, old-space take on what nonprofit theatres are supposed to be doing with taxpayers’ money, which the writer implies is being funneled into a covert sympathy with the Far Left. Gosh, no one in his or her right mind would remotely count on Fox News, or its sickly leitmotif of being “fair and balanced,” for point-blank hits, when it is led by pit-bull reactionaries ruthlessly poised to take vicious bites out of civility. Come on!
Most major American regional theatres are attempting to build a body of work with their respective communities in mind, which is a high calling. (Olivier said that a great theatre is an outer sign of an inward culture.) They are in the business of evolving fantastical, meaningful theatrical contexts. AT’s job is to cast daylight upon the magic of this creation, and I submit that they do it with an uncluttered (but passionate) generosity and ardor. The magazine does not deserve the patronizing argot of J. Grant’s misguided numbskull naïveté.
Henry Hoffman
Gretna, La.
Still a Contender
In my November article about Tampa Bay Area theatre (“Fast Times in Tampa Bay”), I said that prior to the arrival of freeFall Theatre, American Stage “was the most prominent regional theatre in the area.” I didn’t mean to suggest that American Stage had fallen from that prominence—only that now there was a serious contender for the top position. I regret if I caused any distress to American Stage’s legitimately passionate supporters.
Mark E. Leib
Tampa, Fla.
Corrections
In David Cote’s survey of influential theatre critics (“Critical Juncture,” Nov. ’11), the mini-profile of Robert Hurwitt incorrectly credited the critic with a degree in zoology (he had begun college as a zoology major, but graduated with his degree in English). He resides in Berkeley rather than San Francisco.
A Front & Center item on Pittsburgh Playhouse’s production of Lost Boy Found in Whole Foods (Oct. ’11) incorrectly used the term Sunni to refer to the Sudanese.
