It is a well-established, incontestable fact that playwrights may exert veto power over both casting and creative teams, too, for unlike film and TV, playwrights hold all the cards in the theater. I use the word “incontestable” very much on purpose, for the playwright, indeed, has a legal basis for that level of control, even if — as with those now accusing the estate of Edward Albee of being raging racists — we dislike the result. The question is to what degree the “scope” of a dramatic work legally extends beyond the experience and performance of the play.
Category: theatre
The True Power Of Theater: It’s Where We Come Together To Hear Stories
“The storytelling one encounters in the theater is found nowhere else in life. … These stories are how we come to an agreement about just what is this world is. To experience them together is to renew our shared understanding, and to give ourselves a common point around which to debate life’s big questions.”
Defending Chicago Theatre Critic Hedy Weiss
“As far as I know, Weiss has never bothered with political correctness. If a chorus line breaks with tradition by incorporating a variety of body types, she notices—as does everyone in the audience. If a play for young audiences glorifies vandalism in the form of graffiti, she objects. I’d argue that’s her greatest strength as a critic: she’s taking on the subject matter of the work, as any critic worth his or her salt should, and she’s not afraid to go out on a limb. You might not share her perspective, and that can make her a lightning rod, but it doesn’t automatically make her a bigot.”
Dinner After The Show With The Woman Who Disrupted ‘Julius Caesar’ In Central Park
Reporter Andrew Marantz: “[Laura] Loomer provided several rationales for her actions: that she had merely used words, whereas the left engages in actual violence; that she felt it was her patriotic duty to stop the play, which was ‘a form of terrorism’ that would ‘bring us closer to civil war’; that the Public Theatre is ‘aligned with ISIS, politically.’ The only incontrovertible fact was one that she never uttered aloud: that the stunt would do wonders for her personal brand.”
Forget ‘Julius Caesar’ – *This* Is The Shakespeare Play The Pro-Trump Folks Should Worry About
Susan Rella: “Now let me tell you about another play. It involves a king so bogged down by the personal and political conflicts of his staff of toadies that his ability to govern is utterly compromised. False narratives are spun on all sides until even the king doesn’t know what’s true. There are accusations of money laundering, of treason, of murder. While feigning innocence, the king stokes conflict by proposing a duel between the fighting factions, WWE-style … Come to find out, the king has not only depleted the royal coffers but he’s – get this – personally profiting off government business. …”
Toronto’s Biggest Theatre Company Sets Up Camp In New York For A Month
“Soulpepper Theater Company isn’t moving everything to New York for the month of July. Its theater in Toronto’s Distillery District will still be open, with six productions on two of its three main stages. But a dozen other Soulpepper shows are headed for Manhattan, and 65 artists are making the trip. Add support staff, and it’s quite a hefty operation.”
Charles Isherwood: It’ll Take More Than A Weak “Julius Caesar” To Critique Trump
“I attended a small rally supporting the Public Theater at Astor Place on Thursday, and then headed uptown to see the production about which so much digital ink has been spilled. I left in a state of some dejection. As many critics and Eustis himself have naturally pointed out, “Julius Caesar” is hardly a play that advocates the assassination of overweening political leaders. In turning to violent means, the assassins destroy themselves, and Rome’s already endangered democracy. Blood begets blood, and, as in many Shakespeare plays, the stage ends up littered with corpses of Romans noble and otherwise. But there is a bit of sophistry involved in critics’ defending the production on the basis of the complexity of Shakespeare’s play and the ideas about rulership and politics it embodies.”
Flap Over The Public’s “Julius Caesar” Shows We Have Even Bigger Problems
“On one level, the corporate corruption of the arts is obvious. There is inevitably pressure on stage companies to police what political dramas (if any) they will or will not stage. (Seen any plays that question the value of the unfettered free market lately?) But the corruption also takes a subtler, more soul-destroying form, which is being ignored or minimized. For example, mainstream commentators are, as usual, missing the more insidious point of the Julius Caesar fracas, wallowing in the surface issues, content to indulge in silly finger-pointing and self-serving postures of defiance.”
Turns Out Shakespeare’s Iambic Pentameter And Fantastical Characters Might Be Great For Students On The Autism Spectrum
The play that seems to work the best is The Tempest. “That particular play, McClatchy explains, ‘seemed to go right to the heart of the matter in a lot of ways, in terms of being locked on an island and feeling like ‘the other.’'”
In The Middle Of Pride Month, Reflecting On A Queer Middle School ‘Romeo And Juliet’
Turns out 12-year-olds may be the best-kept secret in the business. “I believe that middle schoolers want to do good theatre. I believe that middle schoolers want to do theatre that reflects their sensibilities. I believe middle schoolers want to do fun theatre. When given the opportunity to do something that hasn’t been done, middle schoolers want to do important theatre.”