Rage against the critics
Be a part of the whatever's happening
Hey, folks! It's spring! It's time for you to rouse yourself from your winter's slumber and stagger off bleary-eyed into the greening world. Well, it's time for you to do that. I, on the other hand, have been sick all weekend, and so my contribution will have to be merely encouraging you to get out there. But, do not despair for me. I will soldier on, bravely sitting in front of my computer, doing as little work as possible, giving you suggestions like the following:
Maybe you'd like to brush up on your technical skills? The Technical Tools of the Trade program just announced a new round of workshops. Do you like QLab? Do you even know what that is? Now you can!
Ever thought about being in film, but don't know where to start? Why not sign up for the Twin Cities Actors Expo, which is being held not in St. Paul, not in Minneapolis, but in Hopkins! Have you been to Hopkins lately? Now you can!
Did you ever make it down to the Jon Hassler Theater in Plainview before it closed in 2014? Now all of the equipment of the theater is being auctioned off. Did you ever want to own a hundred theater seats? Now you can!
Did you hear that Joe Dowling is leaving the Guthrie? You didn't? Where the hell were you? Seriously, man, try to keep up. Anyway, ol' smiling Joe will be sitting down for a public interview with New York critic and theater writer Michael Riedel, who has been "controversial" (or "tipsy") from time to time. Did you ever see an interview where the interviewer was probably more interesting than the interviewee? Now you can!
City Pages just rolled out the voting for its Best of the Twin Cities Reader's Choice. Sadly, there is only one category related to theater this year: Best Theater. Sure, you could vote for the Guthrie, the Jungle or the Orpheum, but how would you like to gamble on the motley band of improv people at or the innovative ARTshare program at the Southern? Now you can!
So, don't just sit there in front of your computer, wondering what to do with your life. Get out there! Get involved. Just not before reading the rest of my article, which I slaved over just for you, despite being on death's door. Well, maybe I'm a few doors down from death. I'm not sure. Google Maps just isn't working right.
So would you like me to shut up so you can get on with the rest of the article? Now you can!
Is this modern criticism?
This week, I wanted to talk about a very controversial subject that has been pressing a lot of people's buttons. No, I don't mean the New York Times article on sexual harassment in theater.
Over in Chicago, Steppenwolf recently unveiled the latest production in its "Steppenwolf for Young Adults" series, This Is Modern Art. This new work is based on a real incident in Chicago in 2010, where graffiti artists added a 50-foot long mural to the Modern Wing of the Art Institute of Chicago under the cover of darkness.
The Public Affairs Director of the museum, by the way, called it "A good use of color,” before the graffiti was sandblasted away.
Chicago Tribune reviewer Chris Jones and Chicago Sun-Times reviewer Hedy Weiss both wrote reviews excoriating This Is Modern Art for what they interpreted as glorifying an illegal act. As Jones put it, "Graffiti comes at a price. It can be invasive, self-important and disrespectful of the property of others". Weiss went further in her condemnation by saying the play "sends out a slew of profoundly misguided messages to its impressionable viewers. And no politically correct review to rationalize it will appear here.” (She also referred to graffiti artists as "urban terrorists", which I'm sure will anger no one ever.)
Then the floodgates opened. On social media, defenders of the show rushed to refute the reviews from the big papers. Kevin Coval, one of the authors of the play, said "What I'm not surprised about is old white people, critics for these dying papers, don't want to celebrate stories about youth culture who have been systematically denied agency." Opinion pieces have flourished claiming that the reviewers cannot possibly be good judges of this work due to their age, race and socio-economic status.
Steppenwolf admits that they hoped the play would start a discussion about a controversial topic, but I am sure they never expected it to snowball into such a huge blowup over race, class and privilege.
Now, not having seen the play or read the script, I can't very well wade into the issues presented above (and seeing the vitriole and personal attacks that are flying around social media, why would I want to?); but in his blog, Howard Sherman does a sort of review of the reviews that left me wondering: what (or whose) purpose do old school reviews at big papers serve?
On Steppenwolf's website, their list of "reviews" touting the show do not actually list any publications, major or minor. Instead, the reviews are all feedback through Twitter and other social media from young people who saw the show, even though there are positive reviews out there. Newspapers used to exercise a broad gatekeeping authority when it came to reviewing work. A bad review from a professional critic could very easily sink a show. However, Steppendwolf's intended audience for this show, young people, *gasp* don't read newspapers, and are much more likely to trust the word of a friend of a friend on Twitter than they are a big publication, anyway.
Today, with the axing of arts reporters and the rise of independent bloggers, newspaper reviews are quickly becoming just one other voice in the babble. Here in the Twin Cities, even the Guthrie is just as likely to quote from an amateur reviewer like Cherry and Spoon as they are from the paid guys at the Star Tribune or the Pioneer Press. In this light, it's hard for me to be mad at anything a professional reviewer has to say, since I can pop over to any number of other websites and find the opinion on a show that I want to find. As Howard Sherman said, "Since all perception of what’s being said on any subject in social media is mediated by who you ‘follow’ and who you ‘friend’ and what you like and retweet, I can’t possibly tell you what the prevailing sentiments are overall."
That's the beauty and the bane of the internet. There aren't really gatekeepers anymore. I almost feel like the anger bubbling over at Jones and Weiss is as outdated as the cultural bias that is perceived in their writing. Soon enough, it won't really matter what "professional" reviewers have to say, because there will be no distinction in prestige or utility between their writing and anyone else with a keyboard and an opinion.
In the meantime, if I was running things at Steppenwolf, I would be pleased as punch. Nothing gets a group of young people more motivated than being angry at old people. They couldn't have earned better cred with their intended audience if they had been the ones to personally tag the Art Institute five years ago. (Though, now that I think about it, the crew that did that was never actually caught…) And that is pretty vital to making theater relevant to the coming generations again. As the "controversial" Michael Riedel said, "I'd like to see the theater become part of contemporary culture again. I think that it's a real problem for the theater, and these shows. You see that they are not tapping into anything that's going on in the world today."
In the meantime, my question is: how long before someone ironically tags Steppenwolf's walls?
