As theatre addresses more of things like mass shootings and sexual assaults, the warnings have arrived. “The phenomenon has led to searching discussions at theaters large and small, pitting a traditional impulse — to preserve art’s ability to surprise, shock and stir — against a modern desire to accommodate sensitivities and not alienate paying customers.”
Category: theatre
A Playwright Who Keeps The Wolves At Bay With Instagram Glamour (And Hard Work)
Patricia Ione Lloyd is acutely aware both of image and of the limits of what image can do in a world that’s not as kind as it should be to queer women of color. “The stories that people tell themselves about black women or black queer women or poor women, those are myths, but people still hold onto them. I’m really trying to tell myself different stories about myself that can help me move through the world in a more powerful way.”
American Theatre Criticism Is Finally Beginning To Bounce Back, And To Get More Diverse
Howard Sherman surveys the current landscape, where experienced critics discarded by legacy publications are now turning up at high-quality websites, and, though an imbalance remains, a few of those legacy outlets have hired younger female and nonwhite writers. (Sherman seems to have forgotten about Hilton Als, though.)
Main Funder Of National Theatre Wales Gives Warning In Debate About Company’s Level Of Welshness
With more than 200 Welsh actors having joined 40 of its playwrights in making public complaints about how little actual theatre the company is making and how few Welsh artists are being employed to make it, the chief executive of the Arts Council of Wales — which gives NTW £1.6 million each year — has issued a statement observing pointedly that “to be ‘national’ is a privilege, not a right.”
London’s Old Vic Theatre Tries Crowdfunding More Women’s Lavatories
The £100,000 public fundraising campaign to double the number of ladies’ loos in the building is fronted by a video featuring actresses Joanna Lumley, Bertie Carvel, and a ferocious-looking Glenda Jackson reading tweets from audience members on the subject.
Man Disrupts “Fiddler On The Roof” Performance With Nazi Shouts
The man, who had been seated in the balcony, began shouting “Heil Hitler, Heil Trump.” Immediately after that, “People started running,” audience member Rich Scherr said. “I’ll be honest, I was waiting to hear a gunshot. I thought, ‘Here we go.’ ”The man was escorted out a few minutes later and the show continued.
Cellphone Addicts In The Theater? Here’s One Broadway Star Who Calls Them Out Right From The Stage
Fortunately, Mike Birbiglia doesn’t do it quite the way Patti LuPone does. And he’s playing himself in his one-man Broadway show, The New One, so he can talk to offending audience members directly without breaking character. Here, with audio of recent examples, he explains how and why he does it.
How Will Students Know About Shakespeare If They Never Go To A Play?
If Shakespeare is the only named author on the national curriculum, how is it that 31% of those surveyed failed to recognise the playwright’s name? That only 53% had been on a school trip to a theatre is equally depressing, but the two stats might be related…After all, why should they know of him as a playwright if they have never experienced his plays as ‘play’?
The Show Must Go On? Really? Always?
Lyn Gardner: “Nobody thinks accountants should always put accountancy before everything else, so why is the ‘show must go on’ mentality, whatever the cost, so pervasive in theatre? In part, it is because jobs are hard to come by, and nobody wants to get a reputation for unreliability, but most of all I suspect it is because holding it together whatever the stress you are operating under is seen as a badge of honour, part of being a trouper. No wonder so many deal with the stress by self-medicating with alcohol.”
Arkansas’s Largest Theater Back In Business After Near-Shutdown
“The Arkansas Repertory Theatre on Tuesday announced it will offer a four-show season to spearhead its attempt to return from the brink of nonexistence. … The board had declared April 24 that it was suspending operations, canceling the final production of the 2017-18 season and the entire 2018-19 season because of critical cash-flow problems.”