Superfluities Redux
A Theatre Surrounds a City:
Vienna's Burgtheater
Superfluities Redux |
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Wednesday, 27 January 2010 Books: Outrageous Fortune
The book is a gift to the blogosphere too, which will I'm sure parcel
out selected chapters of the book for further discussion in the coming
weeks. There are chapters on diversity (check), New York centrism and the
use of theatre in "community building," whatever that is (check), and new
play development programs (check). Among the findings are that a profound
conceptual disconnect between artistic directors and playwrights about new
work exists; that it's impossible to make a living as a playwright in
America; that boards, funding agencies and audiences are all primarily
responsible for what the study calls "premieritis," in which first
productions of new plays are frequent and second productions almost
non- Anecdotes prove nothing, and you can prove anything you want with statistics, but it's hard to quibble with the conclusions of the report when accompanied by the best that can pass for hard evidence. Its purpose was to provide as objective as possible a "snapshot" of the current professional status of the living dramatist in America, and dim it is; TDF hopes to promote conversation about this picture and the ways in which it might be changed for the better of not only playwrights but the art of theatre as well. In this I have no doubt it will succeed. "One of the clearest messages I've received throughout the course of this study," writes TDF's executive director Victoria Bailey in the introduction to the book, "is that language is failing us" — harsh words, so to speak, for a profession that prides itself on the use of language. One of the places in which language is failing us, clearly, is in the use of the word "risk," not to mention "community" and "audience" (the definition and participation of which in the process of theatremaking receives a chapter all its own). It is not the fault of the book that it fails to define "risk" (risk of aesthetic form or content, risk of financial health, risk of losing audiences — these are harder to quantify); the study's authors examined attitudes to the word, not its definition. But it's difficult to see how any future conversation based on this study will be able to avoid it. And the issue does arise, here and there, in various comments from both playwrights and artistic directors. Some address it specifically. One artistic director (all of the study's participants quoted in the book remain anonymous — no risk there) says:
And No Man's Land is one of those four- There are other words that are problematic as well, and have to do with the aesthetic form and content discussion that is beyond the purview of this study. Chief among them is "relevance." The same example may serve: Quills may have a better chance of reaching this artistic director's stage than No Man's Land, but which is more relevant? Few audience members practice any of de Sade's formal sexual innovations, no doubt, but more may be titillated by them; Pinter's play, about the vagaries of memory and power as well as their dissipation in the face of mortality, could be said to be relevant for any living man or woman. The study's authors are fond of lists of questions, so I'll offer my own on this topic: What does it mean to call a play "relevant" or "risky"? In whose eyes and by what standards? When one writes for an audience (any audience, really, but specificially a young audience, the demographic which according to the study seems to be disappearing from institutional theatres), is there a line between "writing for" that audience and pandering to its interests and experience, both aesthetic and personal? How thin is that line, and where does it lie? Should playwrights cater to that ideal or to Sarah Kane's: "I've only ever written for myself" — a sentiment which led to one of the most innovative and influential bodies of work of the 1990s, but almost entirely absent from this study? In the recent online imbroglio about Edward Albee's dedication to the written play as central to the health of the theatre, Albee was castigated for his aesthetic egocentrism and stubbornness, but he might have had a point. A second theme to emerge from the study was the contemporary playwright's belief that the text is no longer at the center of the production process, but remains to be fulfilled by the work of others: there is some evidence presented in the first chapter of the book that some playwrights deliberately leave their plays in an "unfinished" state, to make them more palatable and attractive to development programs and directors. Said another participant, in regard to sharing out the future profits of an untried play:
If, in the opinion of directors, artistic directors and even many playwrights themselves, the theatre is no longer about the voice of the playwright, it's very difficult to make an argument that the playwrights' (and the study's) call for an equitable financial return on a written play has much validity to begin with. Playwrights who see themselves as little more than a necessary evil have little ground to stand on when pressing for greater economic return for their work; for ultimately, who then needs them? Finally, one weakness of the book is its lack of reference to
self- All that said, other bloggers will no doubt take it from here. (Mind
you, there's little sympathy for what we might write. One commenter is
quoted as calling Internet critics "anonymous fools," and one literary
agent says: "The playwrights read [online reviews and blogs], and it
affects them. A play's in previews and you call your clients and hear it
in their voices. The playwrights don't listen to the subscribers, yet
they'll listen to some little fifteen- Additional notes on the book here and here. Posted in /Books |
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