Theatreforte

TheatreTube: Julie Taymor @ TED

2008-06-18T12:30:52Z

Julie Taymor gives some great talks. And TED hosts some great talks (check out the YouTube channel). And now, TED hosts one of Taymor's great talks, and puts it on the internet.

She makes some really beautiful statements about what's so great about theatre and says a few stunning things about watching media on screens. Even if you didn't cry at The Lion King, this one's definitely for you.

TheatreTube: Taylor Mac

2008-06-05T20:27:27Z

Taylor Mac needs no introduction around here, right?

Okay, okay, here's a bit from his bio ...

In 2007 the Village Voice, Time Out, and The New York Press named Taylor Mac one of New York's best.

... and his artistic statement ...

I consider myself a theatre artist working in the genre of pastiche (but isn't all theatre the genre of pastiche). This is a fancy way of saying I do a lot of different things. I'm a playwright, an actor, songwriter, director, visual artist, and activist. I create work for others that I don't perform in, perform in other artist's work, create performance art parties and huge theatrical extravaganzas (with at least a dozen performers, puppets, and musicians), perform solo, and sometimes squish all of these hats together and come up with what most people in academic circles would call a postmodern theatric.

Okay ... here's a video. (And you may need to have been in a NYC subway since 9/11 to get this, but hopefully that's enough of a clue to help out.)

Wasn't that great? See more here.

Also, that video is part of the HERE Arts Center's YouTube channel, which has lots more great stuff, and is here.

Live from the Cincy Fringe - Part 1

2008-05-30T20:12:55Z

Greetings, friends. Today we're reporting to you live from the Cincinnati Fringe Festival, where Available Light is performing then afetr water, our hit show by Canadian/Iowan playwright Jennifer Fawcett.

I'll be back to tell you more about my experiences as part of 4 of the 5 Cincinnati Fringe Festivals. For the moment, let Jeff Syroney, one of my favorite people in the world tell you why he "Won't Live In a City Without a Fringe Festival."

For more Fringe coverage, you can check out official coverage at The Conveyor, or tons of reviews at City Beat. (I wouldn't recommend our review, though. It ain't pretty.)

Vaclav Havel Returns

2008-05-30T16:32:49Z

Central Europe's most famous self-deprecating intellectual humanist is still capable of producing the absurdist vignettes that were his trademark long before he was thrust on to the world stage.

Rarely have I read such encouraging words.

Havel's new play, the title of which translates to Leaving, opened in Prague this past weekend. at Divadlo Archa. Kate Connolly reviewed it for the Guardian and had little but praise for the production, which received an enthusiastic response from the audience.

Here's hoping Havel continues to create the art that has made him so important to his country.

First impressions DO matter to LORT

2008-05-22T01:18:24Z

Well, whaddaya know. The League of Resident Theatres gave their website a much-needed face-lift recently. I wish I had taken a screen-capture of the old version for posterity. Looks like the content is still the same, but what a difference it makes to have a nice logo and a fresh color scheme to greet your visitors. Way to go, LORT!

Provincetown Playhouse is saved! Well, sorta...

2008-05-20T00:01:07Z

News from Variety:

The Provincetown Playhouse has gotten a last-minute reprieve. NYU had announced plans to demolish its MacDougal Street address, but public outcry over the decision spurred the school to revise its plans. Now, renovations will preserve the theater's facade and walls, but NYU will go ahead with the decision to bring down the rest of the building.

Gothamist:

The new proposal would redo the inside of the theater, while keeping the proportions and "integrating into the future plans relevant historical features" like the seats, which date back to the 1920s. The new building, slightly taller than the current structure, would be go up around it.

The NY Times:

Brad Hoylman, chairman of Community Board 2, which includes Greenwich Village, SoHo and Little Italy, said: "It represents that N.Y.U. is listening to the community, frankly. The theater will be restored and will be an active theater." He called the plan a "brilliant compromise." But Andrew Berman, the executive director of the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation, a group that gathered signatures asking for preservation of the building, said that questions remain.

American Theatre Wing's blog

2008-05-19T14:18:23Z

While the Tony Awards may not be living up to their full potential, the American Theatre Wing still maintains a pretty decent blog. It's mostly an opportunity for ATW to highlight their newest additions to the Working in Theatre roundtable seminars and the Downstage Center interviews. But the content in each is really great. Also cool: the research and information section at the Broadway League website, for those of you who are into number crunching.

Terry Teachout on the Unsurprising Tonys

2008-05-15T19:02:43Z

Terry's commentary for the Wall Street Journal is right on target.

The nominations for the 62nd annual Tony Awards were announced yesterday morning. They weren't surprising. They almost never are ... The Tony nominations, in short, have become an exercise in ratifying the obvious--and how could they be anything else? Broadway consists of 39 houses, four of which are run by Lincoln Center Theater, the Manhattan Theatre Club and the Roundabout Theatre Company, a trio of non-profit outfits that are marginally more adventurous than their commercial counterparts. As for the remaining 35, they're so costly to operate that anyone who dares to bring a new show into one of them is all but begging to throw his money away ... All this explains why the Tonys have grown so lackluster in recent years: Their unsurprising nature merely reflects the safety-first institutional culture of Broadway....

Didn't I vow to ignore the Tonys? Maybe I didn't actually go through with publishing that post.

Can anyone out there tell me why the Tonys are at all relevant to me? And don't tell me it's because they drive attendance to the winners, cause that's been disproved as a significant economic force.

Are they gonna be on TV again? Wanna start a pool on how low attendance will get this year?

Wow. Lots of negativity. I guess I really hate the Tonys, huh? And you know why? It's not just because they are so silly and limiting and ridiculously out-of-touch. It's also because they could be a chance for the entire country to get in touch with the theatre industry and see what's happening, what's interesting, and what's worth hearing about. They could take that quickly fading television contract and turn it into a force for good. Instead, they'll just spend more money talking about shows that've done little more this year than throw good money after bad.

But, who am I to judge. Have fun, go see Xanadu if that's your kinda thing.

TheatreTube: Waiting for Elmo

2008-05-12T04:04:36Z

Click here for more Monsterpiece Theatre.

Have I Told You Lately That Your Works Sucks?

2008-05-10T12:46:43Z

"How do I tell you your work sucks nicely?" asks Don Hall, "Is there a civil way to say 'Man. That was very genuine, heartfelt horseshit'?"

He continues ...

More so, if I am considered a friend and think you're show sucks, is it more friendly to politely keep it to myself or tell you it sucks? If I tell you your show blows and I hated it, am I now less a friend? For myself, I prefer friends who are honest enough with me to tell me the truth. Even if it pisses me off or hurts my feelings. Oh - and btw - there is a difference between "You're ugly" and "Your show stunk up the place." The first is personal; the second is about my work.

How many times have you walked out of a show, trying to figure out what the one little bright spot was that you can highlight in your comments to your implicated friends? Have you said to the director, "What a great cast" or to the actors "I loved that one bit" or to the anyone "That must have been really hard to pull off" ... ? I feel your pain, Don. I'm often so sick of lying that I don't even go to the shows.

Of course the flip side of this is that I now I'm worrying how many of my friends have actually hated my work. Well, I guess that group probably includes the ones who don't come anymore. Oh well.

And isn't it hard listening to your friends' comments at all? They say, "Great work, man," and you're thinking "He said great work. He didn't have to say great. Maybe he really did like it."

I guess it'd be easier to just do without friends at all, right?

TheatreTube: Sandy Meisner

2008-05-09T00:44:14Z

Portfolio careers

2008-05-09T00:15:03Z

Here's a buzzy term I picked up the other day: Portfolio career. Just because 88% of Equity members are unemployed at any given time, doesn't mean they're all standing in line at the local soup kitchen. Most artists, including actors, put together multiple part-time and contractual jobs to assemble full-time employment. So maybe they do an Equity show, they do some voice-over work through AFTRA, they do a couple of walk-on film roles through SAG, they teach a Meisner class twice a week at a friend's studio, etc, etc. They have a career, it just requires some assembly into a "portfolio." In other words, if you consider Equity's statistics in isolation, it gives the impression that the life of a working actor is awfully grim. Not saying that it's all roses and sunshine, either; only that "unemployed with Equity" doesn't mean the same thing as "unemployed actor."

The Doctor is Out

2008-05-07T20:44:22Z

I feel like a guy I kinda knew and always wanted to know better just moved away.

Or something like that.

Scott Walters has posted a "closed" sign on his Theatre Ideas blog. Read the following, then head over to his blogspot to pay your respects.

I have used this blog, especially during the past five months, to develop my ideas about theatre tribes. I have floated the first drafts of ideas to see what needed to be clarified, fine-tuned, or scrapped entirely. It is now time to truly focus on the development of those ideas. It does not serve my purpose to continue scrapping with the usual bloggers about whether the theatre tribe idea will work -- I know it will work; or whether it is worthwhile -- I know it is worthwhile. I am wasting my time, and I don't have any to waste.
Despite being filled with progressive minds, theatre is currently a conservative art form -- conservative in the traditional sense of clinging to the past and resisting the siren call of the new. We currently have centralized theatrical power in a few places, and we know from other situations that those with power rarely give it up freely. While I have nothing against New York or Chicago, I believe the future of the theatre lies in geographical diversity, sustainable values, and a local focus, and the need to constantly address those two cities on this blog is wresting my focus from where it ought to be.

The good doctor will be continuing his work on a Ning-site called Theatre Tribe.

I 'll seeya there.

Mike Daisey Runs New York

2008-05-05T11:56:15Z

Well ... not yet. We can hope and dream, though.

Matthew Freeman pointed us to this great interview with Mr. Daisey in the Gothamist. Let's find a couple of choice cuts.

The principal issue is that the theatrical establishment in America has lost sight of the values that led to the establishment of regional theaters, and in its place are institutions that value buildings over artists, isolation over engagement, and corporate growth over artistic development.

I think I'm gonna put that on a t-shirt.

... it would require the development people to sell a new bill of goods: to tell the donors and funders that an ensemble, with artists in the building, will yield better work on the stages over time, more continuity for the audiences, a stronger voice for the institution artistically, and the real potential of new work and new programs at the theater growing out of the energy of having actual artists there, working, all year long.

Near the end of the article, the Gothamist asks Mr. Daisey about his decision to perform at Joe's Pub. Interesting, especially since How Theater Failed America is getting ready to transfer to the Barrow Street Theater for a six-week engagement.

Just as exciting is Mr. Daisey's plan to expand the scope of the show by holding a roundtable discussion after each Sunday performance. In an email, Mike said he already had commitments from Robert Brustein, Eric Bogosian, Jim Nicola, Gideon Lester, James Bundy, Richard Nelson, Mark Russell, John Clancy, and Lisa Kron. More details at 11 ... er, at Parabasis.]]> Mike Daisey's blog:

How Theater Failed America - On Stage - OregonLive.com:
Is Daisey being naive? Pining for some bygone era when small communities of crafts persons grew their own food and performed Shakespeare?
Uh...no, not pining for that. Yikes!
6:44 PM

Who's your city... for theater?

2008-05-02T18:56:50Z

Pop-geographer Richard Florida - author of the wildly successful Rise of the Creative Class - released a new book recently, strangely titled Who's Your City? I guess some people out there still demand to know "Who's your daddy?" at, I don't know, mud volleyball tournaments or something. How, exactly, this phrase connects with geography is tenuous, at best. The book, in a nutshell, proposes that there are three big decisions a person must make in life. 1) Choose a career. 2) Choose a spouse/partner. 3) Choose a place to live. Florida's assertion is that choosing a good fit with regards to no. 3 can not only help you lead a happier and more satisfying life, but it can help you find a good fit for nos. 1 and 2, as well. Yes, it's a little self-helpy, but whatever. How does this idea intersect with theater? Obviously, any professional must decide at some point whether it makes sense to move to a big showbiz town, namely New York or Los Angeles. Not to discount Scott Walters' lengthy discussions about the decentralization of theater, but Florida emphasizes a significant trend toward the clustering of industries in particular metro areas. In fact, he says, the big story of the last 30 years or so has been that of cities "sorting themselves out," gaining greater distinction and specialization in various industries. Here's a smattering of Florida's urban specializations:]]> Cato Unbound editor Will Wilkinson (p. 102):

I actually think it's important to know this in order to realize how important it might be for ambitious people to move someplace they wouldn't otherwise find satisfying... You love acting but you hate LA, New York, D.C., and Chicago? Tough luck: Suck it up or resign yourself to dinner theater in Biloxi.

Later in the chapter, Florida engages in a discussion of "scenes" (p. 123):

Scenes are vehicles for producing, consuming, and improving products - and they're responsible for creating experiences, too. They represent "modes of organizing cultural production and consumption," according to Daniel Silver, Terry Clark, and Lawrence Rothfield, leading students of the subject at the University of Chicago. Scenes are many and varied. There's the music scene in Nashville, the theater scene in New York, the nightlife scene in Miami, and LA's film scene. But, the authors ask, "What makes these scenes 'scenes'?" What makes a collection of theaters on Broadway in New York City different from theaters anywhere else? A scene is defined, the authors note, by the opportunities it gives you to "look at other people and be looked at by them." It is "total entertainment culture that pushes work out of mind." The key, they argue, lies in the way "collections of amenities and people serve to foster certain shared values and tastes, certain ways of relating to one another and legitimating what one is doing or not doing." Scenes provide a key lens into why work continues to cluster today.

After reading this, it's tempting to think that all one has to do to achieve success is to simply move to where your desired scene is. Florida never comes out and says it quite that way, but he does suggest that professionals of all disciplines will have more frequent and more meaningful opportunities for success if they pursue the industrial cluster and engage the scene that suits them best.