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News & ArtsWednesday, February 4, 2009
Theater Why I Go
Posted by Brendan Kiley on Wed, Feb 4, 2009 at 3:55 PM
Once again this week, I review a show I skipped out on during intermission and certain people are fuming. A non-fuming comment from a discussion about said review on Facebook:
As a Theatre Educator, I understand the importance of the critic. I think it is important that artists have some one to keep them honest. This is an important duty. But I do think that with this duty comes responsibility. The words you say will have great impact, you owe it to the artist to judge their work as a whole, to understand the nature of the intent and respond accordingly. The theme of a play can not be reccognized if you have not witnessed the denoument. By all means, be honest, but you can not accurately evaluate if you have not witnessed all the elements that have gone into the creation of a production.
In the hundreds and hundreds of bad productions I've sat through, "Theatre Educator," a good second act has never, ever redeemed an execrable first act. Never. But you have a point: It's not 100% fair to review half a show.
I've toyed with arguments to justify walking out on bad plays (would you force a food critic to eat the entirety of a meal she found repulsive?) but, ultimately, reason has nothing to do with it—sometimes I have to leave because I just cannot stand it.
The truly bad play inspires a cross between a panic attack and claustrophobia: I squirm, I sweat, I think desperate thoughts, my muscles feel twitchy and my skin feels raw and oversensitive. It takes everything I have not to jump up and run across the stage on my way to the exit.
My walking-out isn't a reasoned decision, or even a causal one. It's a visceral reaction.
For the record, my rules (as they currently stand) for walking out of shows:
1. Always admit to it in the review so people know they're only reading about half of a show.
2. Don't walk out on world premieres. New playwrights deserve a break.
You can read a short, trying-not-to-be-cruel review of the first half of the really extra-bad show—a production of Garcia Lorca's Blood Wedding—here.
And read David Schmader's manifesto for intermission escape artists (which applies more to paying audience members than critics) here.
A sample:
For theatergoers who find themselves staring at shameless crap, intermission exits are a perfectly legitimate response. If intermission doesn't come soon enough or not at all (is there a phrase with more potential for terror than "performed without an intermission"?), don't fret about slipping out mid-show, even if you have to cross the stage to do so. Extreme times call for extreme measures. And if alleged theater artists refuse to justify the attention they've demanded, audiences shouldn't feel bad about withdrawing it.
2
I would say, if you have a pure visceral bad reaction to any piece of art, and you have to leave before witnessing the whole thing, it's fine to leave. But, if you are getting in free because you are going to review it, you have an obligation to stay through the whole thing, because at that point it's your job. If you leave, you should pay the entrance fee, and NOT review it. That would be a good compromise to your situation I think.
3
I'm thinking sort of along the lines of @2. It is your job to review the play, like it or not. I don't get to just walk out of a meeting at my job, even if it's so maddening that I'm about to rip my eyeballs out. If you can't stay, then don't review the play.
4
As I recall from reading it, Blood Wedding gets crazy weird in Act II. You should have stayed just to see bad go to batshit.
6
Plus, the food critic analogy is a terrible one -- even if the appetizer is god awful, food critics will always stay for an entree.
A theatre critic walking out in the middle of a show and still reviewing it is more akin to an art critic seeing only half of the pieces in an exhibit and still reviewing it. Would you be okay if Jen Graves only saw a few of the pieces in the next show she reviews?
A theatre critic walking out in the middle of a show and still reviewing it is more akin to an art critic seeing only half of the pieces in an exhibit and still reviewing it. Would you be okay if Jen Graves only saw a few of the pieces in the next show she reviews?
7
Yeah, I'll third that sentiment. If you paid to get in, leave when you please. If you're paid to be there, you should stay. God, I wish I got to do my job half-assed when I felt like it and still stay employed.
8
It's not denoument, its dénouement. If you're going to be pretentious, please learn to spell it correctly.
9
A play reviewer reviews plays -- not parts of plays. If you really can't stay in your seat through everything, you're in the wrong business and you're not doing your job. As others have noted, why do you get to walk away just because it's not fun anymore? The rest of us can do that, but you're PAID to be there.
10
I have an obligation to warn people away from bad theater—a deeper obligation than I have to personally sit through bad theater—so I'm going to keep reviewing the first halves of truly miserable productions.
Sorry, everybody.
Sorry, everybody.
11
Review it any way you want, as long as your boss is cool with it. God knows if I got a third of the way through one of your reviews and started to squirm or nod off I sure as hell wouldn't read through to the end regardless of whether whether I was getting paid for it. You're under no obligation to piss away your precious moments on this earth for any reason, including to fulfill an actor's expectation of what your job entails. Life's too fucking short.
12
"sometimes I have to leave because I just cannot stand it."
Or, because your girlfriend wants to have sex.
Or, because your girlfriend wants to have sex.
13
@10
Wrong way to think about it. A review that says "it was bad" is pretty lazy and meaningless. I have gleaned literally no information from that review other than "the reviewer didn't like it". If you tell me why you didn't like, I can choose between "he's right. what a piece of shit" and "he's an idiot, it sounds like I might actually like that". A review is not a rating.
Wrong way to think about it. A review that says "it was bad" is pretty lazy and meaningless. I have gleaned literally no information from that review other than "the reviewer didn't like it". If you tell me why you didn't like, I can choose between "he's right. what a piece of shit" and "he's an idiot, it sounds like I might actually like that". A review is not a rating.
14
You should always walk out of a crappy play and a crappy movie, and admitting it in your review is essential. I agree with your approach 100%. If you see umpteen plays a year, you just don't have time to waste on the bad ones, and you know within 20 minutes if a play has been done well or not.
16
Isn't seeing a bad play as a theater critic just an occupational hazard, like occasionally having to fish a turd out of the pool if you're a lifeguard?
Seriously though, I wish I had your job. "Hey boss, I didn't like the second half of my work today so I thought I'd just leave. But I admitted it, so it's somehow OK, right?"
Seriously though, I wish I had your job. "Hey boss, I didn't like the second half of my work today so I thought I'd just leave. But I admitted it, so it's somehow OK, right?"
17
I wouldn't trust a reviewer who didn't have the sense to leave a bad play in the middle. Basic common sense is a valuable and all too uncommon trait in artists and critics alike.
18
No one's asking you to do what's right, Brendan, some of us are just pointing out the obvious fact that what you're doing is wrong. This is The Stranger, after all. If you wanted to be a real theatre reviewer, you wouldn't be reviewing theatre here. It is weird that you've chosen a job that you confess you're not suited for, but it's not at all weird that you don't care that you have. I don't think anybody saw this as a big ethical dilemma for you.
I'm not a part of Seattle theatre on either side of the stage, so it doesn't matter to me.
I'm not a part of Seattle theatre on either side of the stage, so it doesn't matter to me.
19
Brendan, you're obviously free to do whatever you like, as long as your employer's okay with it. But, walking out on a show is just not a terribly professional thing to do (which is why you won't see critics at larger papers doing it -- if they did, people would be outraged).
If you don't care about that, fine, but it does reflect on you as a critic. And, this is coming from someone who is not an actor/artist, only a theater-goer (and review reader).
If you don't care about that, fine, but it does reflect on you as a critic. And, this is coming from someone who is not an actor/artist, only a theater-goer (and review reader).
20
Yes, I also have to point out that I'm not involved in theater. I am a musician, but I think it applies to all art forms. And, yes, I agree that you can really do whatever the Stranger lets you do, but I would say it's not the appropriate choice to leave a play half way through and then review it, even if you give full disclosure. As #4 stated, it sounds like the second half was quite different, so contextually, you really did not see the thing as a whole. (even if it still might have sucked)
21
Well, speaking as someone who is part of local theatre - as much as possible, anyway - all I can say is that reading the column really made me want to go see End Days. (Lindy West's review of it was just below Brendan's review of Blood Wedding.)
22
Isn't, "I walked out at intermission" enough of a review? I am heavily involved in local theater and I really don't see the big deal. In fact, it seems like it would be better if Brendan walks out at intermission ( and admits so) because that way you can counter his bad review by saying he didn't see the whole thing.
Sure, it sucks to have a show the critic walks out on because said critic can't stand it. Critics do not owe us artists anything. We do not pay them. Reviews are not written for us (and if they are that is sort of incestuous isn't it?). I think it is a really low, low bar for anything theatrical production is to keep people in the theater until after intermission.
If anyone leaves a play at intermission, the work has been already been judged and it has not been judged favorably. If a production has only moved a member of it's audience to leave the building, what could possibly happen after intermission? If basketball game is 75-13 at halftime, the 13 point team is not going to win. They have proved in the first half that they can't.
Brendan cannot save your play. And I believe he would if he could.
Sure, it sucks to have a show the critic walks out on because said critic can't stand it. Critics do not owe us artists anything. We do not pay them. Reviews are not written for us (and if they are that is sort of incestuous isn't it?). I think it is a really low, low bar for anything theatrical production is to keep people in the theater until after intermission.
If anyone leaves a play at intermission, the work has been already been judged and it has not been judged favorably. If a production has only moved a member of it's audience to leave the building, what could possibly happen after intermission? If basketball game is 75-13 at halftime, the 13 point team is not going to win. They have proved in the first half that they can't.
Brendan cannot save your play. And I believe he would if he could.
23
#22
The game analogy is not a good one. Basketball is purely quantitative. If the losing team scores 50 in the 4th quarter, they still lose. If the play's 3rd act is an improvement on the first 2, I think it's worth noting. And it can also inform the way you perceive the 1st and 2nd act as well.
And it's not about the critic "owing" anything to the artist at all. It's about him finishing the job he set out to do, if he decides he's going to do a proper review. You can counter it by saying he acknowledges it's incomplete, but that doesn't make the review any more legit.
It's really not that big of a deal, and he probably would have still hated the play. But it's worth debating I think. If Brendan has an obligation to "warn people away from bad theater," he also has a deeper obligation to know exactly what it was he was reviewing.
The game analogy is not a good one. Basketball is purely quantitative. If the losing team scores 50 in the 4th quarter, they still lose. If the play's 3rd act is an improvement on the first 2, I think it's worth noting. And it can also inform the way you perceive the 1st and 2nd act as well.
And it's not about the critic "owing" anything to the artist at all. It's about him finishing the job he set out to do, if he decides he's going to do a proper review. You can counter it by saying he acknowledges it's incomplete, but that doesn't make the review any more legit.
It's really not that big of a deal, and he probably would have still hated the play. But it's worth debating I think. If Brendan has an obligation to "warn people away from bad theater," he also has a deeper obligation to know exactly what it was he was reviewing.
24
I don't take issue so much with audience members walking out of plays at intermission (in the middle of a show, in front of other audience members who might not hold the same opinion, is, however, just being boorish), since they've paid their money and that's their right. Goodness knows, I've done it a few times myself in some 30-odd years of viewing theatre; although not as often as one might think, given the number of shows I've seen.
I'm a little more ambivalent about reviewers walking out, mainly because, in the instances I've seen it occur, the subsequent review has essentially mislead the reader into thinking the reviewer saw the entire production. So, I do give Brendan props for at least being honest about it when he does so.
What I find more problematic, however, is, given the fact the reviewer has exited early, why do they bother writing a review at all? If they don't feel obligated to sit through the entire play, why, on the other hand, do they feel obligated to spend inordinate amounts of time and page space writing about something that obviously impressed them so little they couldn't see it in its entirety? Why not just say, as @22 above suggests, "The reviewer left at intermission", and leave it at that? I mean really, if the production was truly THAT execrable, why even bother trying to rationalize the decision?
That being said, from a reader's perspective, writing a review of half a show is B.S.; if the reviewer's time was so valuable they couldn't be bothered to stay until the end, why should MY time be any less valuable that I should have to waste it reading half a review?
I'm a little more ambivalent about reviewers walking out, mainly because, in the instances I've seen it occur, the subsequent review has essentially mislead the reader into thinking the reviewer saw the entire production. So, I do give Brendan props for at least being honest about it when he does so.
What I find more problematic, however, is, given the fact the reviewer has exited early, why do they bother writing a review at all? If they don't feel obligated to sit through the entire play, why, on the other hand, do they feel obligated to spend inordinate amounts of time and page space writing about something that obviously impressed them so little they couldn't see it in its entirety? Why not just say, as @22 above suggests, "The reviewer left at intermission", and leave it at that? I mean really, if the production was truly THAT execrable, why even bother trying to rationalize the decision?
That being said, from a reader's perspective, writing a review of half a show is B.S.; if the reviewer's time was so valuable they couldn't be bothered to stay until the end, why should MY time be any less valuable that I should have to waste it reading half a review?
25
I don't think you have to waste anyone's time. I'm not your therapist and you're not mine nor some terrible play's. The ante has has to hit the kitty from the get-go.
26
COMTE - incidental timing on the segue. The "you" I mean is the reviewer's. I agree on the "left at intermission"; no big deal. Everybody keeps about their business.
27
Brendan Kiley's reviews are gasbag attempts at sounding like an actual theater critic. He sees half a play, huffs and puffs, struts around with his chest stuck out, and then tosses up a "review". Now, I got super bored halfway through his post, and so didn't read the end, or find out how he justifies his behavior. But nevermind. That doesn't matter. What matters is that I got bored halfway through his post, and here I am commenting on it. As long as I tell you, other commenters, that I gave up halfway through his post, it's okay, because Brendan Kiley says it's okay to just give up on something halfway through and then review it anyway, as long as I state that I gave up halfway through. So here's my review of Brendan's post: Brendan is a self-righteous gasbag. He writes "reviews" of things that he hasn't actually sat through, which makes me never ever ever actually read any of his reviews. He also tends to make a big fuss about things that he's written which other people criticize, and then issues a non-pology. Basically he's a big fucking baby that has no business reviewing anything except his own shitty diaper. However, since I didn't read the rest of his post, I don't know what he actually said, but as long as I state here that I didn't read his entire post, I can review it.
28
I have an obligation to warn people away from Brendan's posts —a deeper obligation than I have to personally sit through Erica's posts —so I'm going to keep reviewing the first halves of Brendan's truly miserable posts.
Sorry, everybody.
Sorry, everybody.
29
funny...you guys will blow a WET production up without ever having seen it (btw...blah blah blah bang sucked), but you won't sit through other productions in order to give them a fair review - meaning you've seen the entire production. it's your job, suck it up like the rest of us and live through your crappy days. if it's bad theater, then give us all the reasons, not half.
30
I'm tempted to side with the folks who've said it's Brendan's job to sit through the whole thing. But in the end it doesn't matter much. What's weird is when something that gets shitty reviews sells a lot of tickets. And full disclosure: I'm a theater hobbyist who's been in a play Brendan walked out on. Oh wait. Two. Yeah, it stings, but so what? Theater reviewers, and theater, too, are endangered species, anyway. They should be protected.
31
I get really depressed when I think about the many hours of bad theater I've sat through in Seattle over the years. I stopped going some time ago and have not regretted my decision for one minute. I think Mr. Kiley is a brave soul to try to ferret out the occasional tolerable productions for you cretins to sit through and am dismayed that you have no appreciation for his sacrifice.
33
Brendan is the next ECB... pretty soon he'll be reviewing plays based simply on the name of the production or the photo on the cover of the handbill.
Lesson to Seattle theaters- feature Hillary Clinton heavily if you really give a fuck about the review printed in The Stranger.
And Brendan, as many pointed out earlier, there are theater critics begging for jobs... you might want to up the ante!
Lesson to Seattle theaters- feature Hillary Clinton heavily if you really give a fuck about the review printed in The Stranger.
And Brendan, as many pointed out earlier, there are theater critics begging for jobs... you might want to up the ante!
34
Wow Brendan... I hate to write this, because I liked your coverage of the RNC in St Paul.
Others said it better, but I'm amazed at your half-assed rationalization for your lack of professionialism. You get PAID to do this shit, and you still can't follow through?
Here's a better analogy: What would you write about a performer who quits a show halfway through because the audience (or reviewer) sucked? Think about your answer.
If you're are going to call yourself a journalist, it would behoove you to actually, you know, try to emulate REAL journalists.
Oh wait, I forgot... y'all don't actually consider yourselves 'journalists' do you?
Sorry, my bad. I'll stop reading yer blog.
Others said it better, but I'm amazed at your half-assed rationalization for your lack of professionialism. You get PAID to do this shit, and you still can't follow through?
Here's a better analogy: What would you write about a performer who quits a show halfway through because the audience (or reviewer) sucked? Think about your answer.
If you're are going to call yourself a journalist, it would behoove you to actually, you know, try to emulate REAL journalists.
Oh wait, I forgot... y'all don't actually consider yourselves 'journalists' do you?
Sorry, my bad. I'll stop reading yer blog.
35
If I were your boss, I'd fire you. I'm sure I can find a reasonable good theatre critic who's willing to sit through even the worst play to the end. I can probably even find one who'll do it for less money.
Plenty of people would do it just for the free tickets.
Plenty of people would do it just for the free tickets.
36
If your boss has enough confidence in you to be judicious, he or she is probably glad to have you bringing quality instead of crap. Polishing a turd isn't a good habit for anyone to get into.
37
You are all getting upset over something ridiculous.
First, if a production is terrible, and someone who DOES see theatre for their JOB every week recognizes this fact, they may be right...or they may be wrong. We've all disagreed with Brendan's reviews before, right? What makes this one so different?
Second, your job depends on what you do, not how long you're there. Obviously, Brendan had accomplished what he needed to accomplish for the night, and he was done. It's called efficiency....most of our bosses would like us to have MORE of it, and yet we're criticizing Brendan for exercising it. He didn't waste his time, or our time.
Third, Even if he had stayed for the 2nd half of the show...and it was AWESOME, would you have gone to see it? Imagine the review: "Before intermission, I was bored out of my mind, wanted to die, etc....but the second act was good. It's almost as though they spent their entire rehearsal period on the second act, etc." If I based my opinions of shows on what Brendan says, I STILL wouldn't go see this show, because honestly...just like Brendan, I don't want to sit through a bad first act just to get to what might be a better second.
I see nothing wrong with critics walking out at intermission. As long as you don't do it at any show I'm involved with.
First, if a production is terrible, and someone who DOES see theatre for their JOB every week recognizes this fact, they may be right...or they may be wrong. We've all disagreed with Brendan's reviews before, right? What makes this one so different?
Second, your job depends on what you do, not how long you're there. Obviously, Brendan had accomplished what he needed to accomplish for the night, and he was done. It's called efficiency....most of our bosses would like us to have MORE of it, and yet we're criticizing Brendan for exercising it. He didn't waste his time, or our time.
Third, Even if he had stayed for the 2nd half of the show...and it was AWESOME, would you have gone to see it? Imagine the review: "Before intermission, I was bored out of my mind, wanted to die, etc....but the second act was good. It's almost as though they spent their entire rehearsal period on the second act, etc." If I based my opinions of shows on what Brendan says, I STILL wouldn't go see this show, because honestly...just like Brendan, I don't want to sit through a bad first act just to get to what might be a better second.
I see nothing wrong with critics walking out at intermission. As long as you don't do it at any show I'm involved with.
38
The issue here is a matter of degree. You (and I) will leave a bad show at intermission because it's convenient, because you can slip out unnoticed without all that pesky judgment from your fellow theatergoers. Let's say you could leave without impunity whenever you wanted. If the first 5 minutes of a play were shitty, would you leave then? And would you still write a review of those first 5 minutes?
39
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