Critical interview

Someone as acute as Dominic Papatola = someone as
svelte as Oprah Winfrey

bentg gets it right: A person who sees a lot of theater does not necessarily become an expert on theater. Exhibit A: Dominic, who has never in his career made an original observation or displayed any real insight into anything.

Theater people of the Twin Cities - stop sucking up to these idiots! You know you don't respect them; their vehicles (the daily newspapers) are dying; and it doesn't matter what they say about your shows, since they have no influence any more.

Why not tell these stupid assholes what you really think of them? People of the theater, unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains!

I was a little crestfallen to hear someone as acute as Dominic Papatola basically say that seeing a bunch of theatre equals knowing a bunch about theatre. If this was truly how the world worked, my fat-ass cousin would’ve won the Daytona 500 by now.

Gary Peterson, http://minnesotamist.blogspot.com

Interesting discussion.

The best writers or electronic communicators, whether of straight news or editorial content, are those who assume a high level of intelligence among their audience, and then direct their voices to that level within the contexts and constraints of the forum in which their work is expressed. That's much more rare than we hope it to be for any content in any forum, and readers, listeners, and viewers recognize and appreciate good communication when they encounter it.

There are 7 billion people on the planet and none of them are going to concern themselves with every communicator or utterance. My friend, Nick N., says we need to appreciate and encourage the effort of every artist, even if -- and especially if -- their work does not find a wide audience for 150 years. Same is true for every communicator.

Only in Minnesota (well, maybe North Dakota, too) would the video producers flash "Fight" on the screen before the last segment. That was no fight between Gray and Dom, but it was a good example of what is wrong with much of tv and video these days (and some of the arts?): the constant hype. "We" seem to be so uncertain of the value of what we are doing and its ability to engage people that we think it necessary to hype them to stay tuned for the next freaky attraction -- which ends up being not freaky at all.