What Mark Blankenship Said

I don't share his love for Roger Ebert—I'm something of a Paulette myself, and Ebert's dismissal of Raising Arizona was what made me write him off years ago—but I do second Mark's wary optimism about the unfolding future of arts journalism (which very often looks more like an unraveling than an unfolding). Taking on a post by the senior critic conflating the death of print newspapers with the end of thoughtful criticism, Mark writes:

What surprises me is the sense of hopelessness in Ebert’s writing. Like many people who built careers in “old media,” he equates the death of newspapers with the death of thinking, as though people who don’t want to get their information in the traditional way are people who don’t want to think at all. For a man who pushed criticism into a new medium (television), I would expect him to see that American thoughtfulness isn’t dying but changing.

And the change is right there in Ebert’s hands. He wrote his essay on a blog, after all, and he even responds to some of the comments about it...So… what’s the problem, then? Ebert wrote a lovely, forceful essay. Even better, he’s discussing it with his readers. How exciting for them and for him! If you scroll through the comments, you find excellent arguments and counter-arguments, and you find Ebert clarifying his points. To my ears, the canary isn’t dying. It’s singing louder than before because it’s harmonizing with a flock of birds.

Yet Ebert makes a sour prognosis about the death of thought, and throughout the comments section he vehemently defines himself as a “newspaperman.” He’s one of many people who feel this way, but I’m singling him out because I’m surprised he doesn’t see how his own work is forging the path for the future.

Because really, newspapers may be familiar, but they aren’t necessary. There are many valid ways to think through problems and process information, and we’re simply in a transitional period toward a new model.

And again, this new model–the web–is helping criticism, not hurting it. It’s giving us more space to voice our thoughts and find our thinking challenged. On this very site, reader feedback has helped me evolve my outlook on several things, and the site’s limitless format has allowed me to dig deeper than any of the mainstream publications I write for.

So isn’t it time to stop bemoaning change? We’re building a new model at this very minute, so of course we haven’t perfected it yet, and of course it will be different than what has come before. But that’s okay. That’s vital.

I couldn't agree more.

Brother David

I'm pre-sold on anything Elvis Costello does—take it or leave it, the guy's work is like a family member in my life—so of course I tuned into Spectacle, his new Sundance talkfest. The premiere with Elton John was, for me, must-watch TV, even with Sir Elton's digressive ramblings and Elvis' professorial clucking, and musical performances that were decidedly ragged. If it doesn't quite promise to be the musical version of Inside the Actors Studio (and would we really want that?), with EC in charge it looks to be a warm and informed forum for musical advocacy, at least.

To wit, though I was happy to see the always-worth-plugging Leon Russell and Laura Nyro get due props, I was gobsmacked to witness the finale: A mini-tribute to the late, great David Ackles, a Leonard Cohen-ish singer/songwriter whom Costello has championed before and whose exposure on Spectacle this week, and endorsement by the likes of Sir Elton, may be the high watermark of his fame thus far.

One comment by Costello struck home bittersweetly for me: that with Ackles' acting and theatrical background (he had been a child actor), he might have had the kind of success in the theater that Sir Elton has had. This struck me in particular because I had the good fortune to meet Ackles years ago, before I knew of his pedigree or his famous fans, when we were both members of the Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop in Los Angeles (not affiliated with New York's BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop, and since renamed). That makes us sound more like colleagues than we really were; in fact, he served as a mentor on a troubled short musical of mine, and I'm sorry to say that the only real time I spent with him was a brief meeting at his ranch in Tujunga when, in his mentor role, he was on hand to mediate a dispute between my librettist and my lyricist, who weren't speaking to each other. As the composer caught between these two warring wrtiers, I was worried the project wouldn't happen at all. Ackles, with a singular empathy for all sides, defused the tension and graciously assured us all that the show would go on. And so it did.

I only recall hearing him present one song in the workshop—a wry, Randy Newman-ish tune from the point of view of William Randolph Hearst regarding the title subject of Ackles' musical, Sister Aimee, about the great L.A.-based preacher Aimee Semple McPherson.

I've learned some of this from a fan website for Ackles, who is much more known and loved in the U.K. than over here. Here's hoping that these two famous, bespectacled Brits will help put Ackles' distinctive work back on the map, and keep it from staying, as his moving, mysterious signature song has it, "Down river...locked away."

It's Critic-O-Meter Day!

A number of times over the past few years, I've been involved in some of the usual back-and-forth—in person and blogospherically—about the role of the critics, their relationship and responsibility (if any) to theatrical artists and consumers, the inordinate power of the Times, etc. I recalled that years ago on this blog I used to cull L.A. theater reviews into rough groupings and ranks, rating which shows had been reviewed best, worst, etc. I've enjoyed such features as Slate's Summary Judgment, which pithily sums up reviews of movies, and I often look at Metacritic to see a survey of critical opinions. (I also fondly remember Spy's "Review of Reviewers," but that's a horse of a slightly different color.)

You see where I'm going with this? When my esteemed colleague Isaac Butler of Parabasis linked approvingly to a proposal by 99seats.blogspot.com (apparently now a private blog) which posited the "theater Metacritic" idea in so many words, I contacted Isaac right away, and we talked about launching just such a site.

Long story short, I got some advice from Marc Doyle of Metacritic, who told me there have been proposals over the years to rate theater reviews there but the economics haven't worked out; for a while Isaac and I received help from James Marino of Broadwaystars, where we thought we might launch our site. In the end, we decided to just get it up and running in Blogger.

And so, without further ado, I present to you the official launch of CRITIC-O-METER. It doesn't include every show up in New York, and it doesn't include every review of every show up in New York, but that's essentially our goal (Nate Silver of 538 is also a sort of inspiration). I hope you enjoy it, and I hope you'll feel free to offer your suggestions and feedback.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to go check the latest reviews.

(Image: "The Art Critic" by Raoul Hausmann.)

The Crossover File

Toronto critic Kelly Nestruck recently found herself reviewing a director who's also a critical colleague of hers, and went on to muse on the ethics of such crossovers (h/t American Theatre Web, via Broadwaystars). As is often the case, the contrast is with the British model:

I used to think critics should keep their hands as clean as possible, but living in the UK for a couple of years really challenged my point of view on this issue. The critical culture over there is quite different, dating back to Bernard Shaw, who straddled the critic/artist divide, and newspapers seem less worried about pure objectivity - a fairly mythical concept anyway.

As one who's made the leap myself, both in NY and L.A., I do make a point of recusing myself from the work of close friends and/or people with whom I've worked in direct professional relationships (a play by Brian Parks, my assigning editor at the Village Voice, and a recent production at the Metropolitan Theatre, where I did the music for The Devil and Tom Walker last spring, are just two instances of shows I've chosen to opt out of reviewing). Most critics in the U.S. wouldn't go as far as I have, but check out the Brits' idea of fair game:

In recent years, Mail on Sunday critic Georgina Brown sat on the board of the Bristol Old Vic, but still reviewed shows there, and Evening Standard critic and alleged snoozer Nicholas de Jongh's play Plague Over England opened at the Finborough theatre. These are a couple of exceptional examples of potential conflicts of interest, but then there are the regular, everyday ones of critics hired to write program notes or paid by theatres to host post-show talkbacks.

Personally, I judge these issues on a case-by-case basis—and I do try to keep the cases to a minimum. For instance, some critics and editors don't think a reporter who's written a feature on a show—i.e., met and spoken to artists involved in a given production—ought to then put on his critic's hat and review the same show; others, like The New Yorker's John Lahr, often do both in the same story. Speaking for myself, I wouldn't have a freelance career to speak of if I couldn't transgress that line on occasion. For me, the important line-crossing questions are: Have I sought work as a composer or dramaturg (the two things for which I've received credits in New York) from the same artists I've reviewed? Have I—a bit thornier, this—ever reviewed the work of artists from whom I've sought employment? The truth is, not that I recall—and I think I'd recall.

I often feel that this dance can't go on forever—that eventually push will come to shove, and my two worlds will start to overlap too incestuously—but so far this balancing act has proven sustainable, and perhaps more importantly, it's kept me alert and interested in this mutable art form. I can't say it's made me a better critic, but it's made me a more engaged critic and observer.

Wait For It...

When I reviewed Douglas Carter Beane's The Little Dog Laughed Off-Broadway a few years ago (alas, this is all that's left online of the Broadway.com review--they've erased years of reviews from the site), Julie White's agent character had one line that stuck in my craw, as a longtime L.A. theater champion (who had in fact seen Julie White onstage in L.A.). It was about how they'd solved the problem of cellphones in the theater: "We've simply stopped doing theater altogether."

OK, fine--you can read this at the character's expense, if you choose, but I don't think that's how the line got its laughs. Now, more than two years later, White has brought the same gag to a stage in L.A. How does the joke play in the belly of its beastly target?

Leave it to the LA Weekly's Steven Leigh Morris, who already noted the diss in a piece last spring, to single it out in his review:

The agent makes a quip about how L.A. has solved the problems of cell phones in the theater by not doing theater. “Choices were made.” Big laugh. At what? A myth about L.A. that’s so false they don’t even believe it in New York anymore.

I was happy to note the review just below that one--my old Appalachian Twelfth Night colleagues, the Dancing Barefoot peeps, are staging Deb Pryor's Southern twister The Love Talker at Son of Semele. Yes, Virginia, they still do theater in L.A.

Best-Kept Secret

Chris Wells, ex-Actors' Gangster and fellow former Angeleno, is one of my favorite stage and/or cabaret performers, but I haven't seen him perform in quite a while--unless I can count his monthly "gig" leading a secular artist's service called The Secret City, which he began hosting a little over a year ago, and which I've profiled in a brief piece in this month's American Theatre (the story's not online; get thee to a newsstand).

As someone who's been going to the theatre almost as long as I've been going to churches, I'm especially appreciative of the Sunday morning sanctuary that Chris has created, though he's taken pains not to call what he does a "church." As he puts it:

“It doesn’t have baggage for me, but I’m very mindful that the word ‘church’ is really loaded for people,” Wells concedes. For him, the reason worship makes such a natural fit with theatre has nothing to do with belief systems.

“One of the reasons that fundamentalism appeals so much to some people is the feeling of belonging,” says Wells. “And it occurred to me that artists have suffered what I’ve referred to as a diaspora—I really feel that for a number of reasons artists have been exploded out of any feeling of being central to the civilization. Not to sound too political or paranoid, but that is how you disempower people—separate them from other like people.

“So my desire was to re-gather those people and say, ‘Not only do we have a purpose, but we actually have maybe the greatest calling there is.’ ”

Can I get an amen? The Secret City will hold a cabaret benefit this weekend at the space, Theatrelab, 137 W. 14th St., Sat. Dec. 6 at 7 & 9:30 p.m., and Sun. Dec. 7 at 9 p.m. Info here.

Prop Culture

See more Jack Black videos at Funny or Die

Apologies for the light posting...been working a lot on this new venture (more on that anon). Meantime enjoy Shaiman's handiwork--a numbah even Scott Eckern could enjoy.