Whenever anybody ever tells me a story, I know right away I’m being lied to, at least a little bit. It’s not that the person speaking to me is intentionally misrepresenting the truth or conveying a falsehood: it’s that all stories are lies. Stories want us to believe that human lives follow graceful character arcs; […]
I Don’t Trust Stories Read More »
We need to re-frame the debate about NEA funding. The culturally-conservative far right wing of the Republican party has been challenging the very notion that the United States government should in any way be funding the arts. As the estimable Travis Bedard tweeted the other day — I’m paraphrasing here — the right has outsourced
NEA Funding: Re-Framing the Debate Read More »
Let it be known now and for all time that in the debate about whether to spell the word “theater” or “theatre,” I side with the former, for what are largely emotional and esoteric reasons. Let it be known that while I respect those who prefer “theatre,” and that I understand how they prefer to
Theater vs. Theatre Read More »
Yesterday’s post about theater-as-service inspired quite a lively discussion on the 2AM Theatre Twitter stream. Some folks heard what I was saying about audience-centric theater and seemed to connect with the same impulse. In time, most of us settled into a comfortable middle ground, which I tried to summarize in 140 or fewer characters thusly:
The Failures of the Diva Paradigm Read More »
For whom do you make theater? It has begun to seem to me as if there are four primary ways in which theaters orient themselves. There are theaters that are mission-centric… or perhaps the correct term would be issue-centric. These theaters have a set of core beliefs or ideals or a mission statement that inspires
Serve Yourself? No. Read More »
