tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post114556662794519732..comments2024-01-07T06:59:04.212-05:00Comments on The Playgoer: NYTW Panel #2 tonightPlaygoerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994724588504353485noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post-1145857578996860142006-04-24T01:46:00.000-04:002006-04-24T01:46:00.000-04:00all you anons, signed or unsigned,I don't want peo...all you anons, signed or unsigned,<BR/><BR/>I don't want people banned from here. And I wasn't referring to those who place their name at the bottom of their post. It IS frustrating to spend time trying to figure out which anonymous is replying to which other anonymous, though.<BR/><BR/>And, freespeechlover, Brian Lehrer's radio interviews and print article were seriously flawed journalism. I doubt Viner would accept a return invitation to be on his show.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post-1145648320962408402006-04-21T15:38:00.000-04:002006-04-21T15:38:00.000-04:00I'm sorry but Brian Lehrer is a pain. His intervi...I'm sorry but Brian Lehrer is a pain. His interview with Katherine Viner was aimed at outing Viner's politics, and ultimately proposed the arrogant idea of if it works for me it must work for you. What's good for general motors is good for America is not a persuasive argument in this case.freespeechloverhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17925986545953519952noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post-1145633409473457322006-04-21T11:30:00.000-04:002006-04-21T11:30:00.000-04:00Exactly. Spontaneous conversation actually does m...Exactly. Spontaneous conversation actually does more to foster real relations among people. I actually think people will get into real issues more deeply without structure than they will with structure. This blog is a good example of the way freedom facilitates not prevents interesting kinds of relationships to develop. <BR/><BR/>I have to think more about the social relations of a bar known for post-theater gathering vs. a theater cafe; there may not be much difference, except the alcohol.freespeechloverhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17925986545953519952noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post-1145630576455296252006-04-21T10:42:00.000-04:002006-04-21T10:42:00.000-04:00Quickly, on anonymity: Philip raises a fair point....Quickly, on anonymity: Philip raises a fair point. Altough I won't ban people from posting as "anon", for clarity's sake it would be nice to have at least pseudonyms. And I DO believe the Blogger program allows for that in Comments. You do not HAVE to provide a "website" (that's an optional field). Simply a name (or typed sequence) will do.<BR/><BR/>2nd, to Alisa's point:<BR/>Perhaps I misunderstood the true function of Ari Roth's Peace Cafe. It still may not be something I would partake in, but if others like it, fine. Now that we've had our giggles over the name I can appreciate the value.<BR/><BR/>And for the record--I definitely like the idea of an unstructured social space in a theatre--like the Public Lobby. I even notice little CSC has opened their lobby as a cafe all day long. Great! What's great about this is the possibilty of actually merging the theatre space WITH the outside world. In other words, the space succeeds most, ironically, if there are people coming in for coffee with no intention of going to a show. (If they check something out later on, all the better.) This is indeed different from cloistering your audience off from the real world in a controlled space to debate public issues related to your play on your terms.Playgoerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02994724588504353485noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post-1145625315915973502006-04-21T09:15:00.000-04:002006-04-21T09:15:00.000-04:00Two of the anonymous posts here are signed at the ...Two of the anonymous posts here are signed at the end, so they're not really anonymous. The options for "choose an identity" when you go to leave a comment are to give your blog site, your website, or sign in as anonymous. Not everyone has blogs or websites. Should they be banned from the conversation?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post-1145609075672171322006-04-21T04:44:00.000-04:002006-04-21T04:44:00.000-04:00playgoer,Between LOL and ROFL! I'm not about to m...playgoer,<BR/><BR/>Between LOL and ROFL! I'm not about to make a Peace Cafe comment, but find it increasingly humorous as this site documents the diminution of genuine interest in provocative theatre in the USA, how many "anonymouses" continue to show up. I suppose you can tell one from another, but we can't. Maybe you should make an additional rule that one has to at least pick a "nom de blog", rather than post anonymously here?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post-1145598596833632392006-04-21T01:49:00.000-04:002006-04-21T01:49:00.000-04:00I agree that unstructured, non-managed space for p...I agree that unstructured, non-managed space for people who want it is a good idea. When it's independent of the theater, and it's not coercive, who cares? As long as it doesn't turn into something more intrusive...Independent discussion is anathema to the NYTW. Lynn Moffat on the Democracy Now! interview made it clear that they "never" have unstructured discussion. That's too authoritarian for me; I don't want to be guided. I prefer open mikes, but I recognize that there are some people like my mother in law for whom the peace cafe would be an "interesting" evening. <BR/><BR/>There is something very American about the way "civics" matters are sort of ubiquitous. A namby pamby account of how wonderful our democracy is won't get at this. I don't think the British invoke fostering dialogue in the community as a goal of their theater. <BR/><BR/>Maybe that's one strand of where some misunderstanding came from with the Royal Court. Each theater certainly has a different emphasis on the art-civics continuum--now there's a clever concept. <BR/><BR/>I saw the MNRC workshop they did, and it was focused on writing memoir and autobiography. There may have been a timeline for the political conflict, I think, but that wasn't the focus. <BR/><BR/>I'm afraid I share playgoer's sense of humor. I confess that I too found the comment about blowing up the peace cafe hilarious. I'd like to think it's a sign of mental health in an age of too many managed experiences. And if the NSA is data mining, fuck off!freespeechloverhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17925986545953519952noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post-1145594142611072132006-04-21T00:35:00.000-04:002006-04-21T00:35:00.000-04:00Contextualizing bubble and managed discusssion; co...Contextualizing bubble and managed discusssion; coddled audiences and efforts to contain emotion, programs for "balancing" or "explaining" a play or otherwise watering down the experience: all bad and detrimental to the experience of art -- I agree, of course.<BR/><BR/>But that is not what I understood the "Peace Cafe" (despite its apparently oh-so-hilarious name) to be doing. I understood Roth to say it was providing space for discussion of Middle East issues INDEPENDENT of whatever play they might be doing and that it was not a MANAGED POST-PLAY discussion -- that even when it was structured, people talked in small groups, independent of any moderator or conversation controller. Here in many posts, "peace cafe" has become a generic term for a stupid and condescending effort of containment -- an unfair description of Roth's theater (as far as I could tell from his description). And certainly, there are ways to OPEN and EXTEND the issues that a play raises with different kinds of conversation. Anna Deavere Smith was investigating how to do that with her Institute on the Arts & Civic Dialogue, which you could argue didn't work, but you couldn't charge that it was meant to close down or envelope or somehow constrain or control audience response.<BR/><BR/>The question isn't whether a theater should provide public space for conversation -- why the hell not? (especially if there's good coffee or snacks in the offing) -- but to what extent it is manipulating that conversation to particular, contradictory (to art) ends. <BR/><BR/>AlisaAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post-1145587672747400622006-04-20T22:47:00.000-04:002006-04-20T22:47:00.000-04:00Okay, as much as I am guilty myself, I feel I have...Okay, as much as I am guilty myself, I feel I have to declare a moratorium on all Peace Cafe humor. The "blowing up the peace cafe" joke was the last straw. And also really made me laugh. <BR/><BR/>Sorry, I can be sick.<BR/><BR/>Alisa--Yes I guess I was getting a little off topic from the panel by launching into my beef with "context." I guess I'm anticipating that panel next week ON "can a work of art stand on its own." I might as well reveal here that I know Jayme Koszyn and respect her as a dramaturg. But I fundamentally disagree with her whole project here--which is the asserting of the role of the theatre to guide the audience in their responses to difficult material.<BR/><BR/>Yes, there's a difference between going to the bar with friends, and a structured conversation with strangers who may disagree. (Then again, some of my best post-theatre arguments have been with friends....Or should that read: some of my best friends are arguers?)<BR/><BR/>But here's a question I'm interested in that hasn't been raised: Who goes to the "Peace Cafe"? Again, not to pick on Ari's brainchild. I of course mean: who stays for the discussions, who partakes in the "context." Or more to the point: who is it aimed at? Are theatre "communitarians" (to try out a term) doing all this just for the self-selecting few--who have opinions and time to spare? If so, then none of this should be a big deal for either side.<BR/><BR/>Or, is the ideal to envelop everyone in the contextualizing bubble? To annex the context to the play inexoriably? (That sure seemed like what Jim & Jayme were envisioning for "Corrie".) Brian Lehrer complained on NYC that if the community symphony orchestra concert he appeared in could do outreach to its entire audience at a one-night performance, then why can't a theatre? Well duh--because a lot more people come to a play at NYTW--on several different nights--than to one night at a concert in a relatively small community in Westchester (or Long Island, I forget.)<BR/><BR/>I haven't honed a clear conclusion yet out of these points, but I'm getting there...Playgoerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02994724588504353485noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post-1145578692531694872006-04-20T20:18:00.000-04:002006-04-20T20:18:00.000-04:00I think the idea of the peace cafe actually deserv...I think the idea of the peace cafe actually deserves deeper critique. What is troubling is exactly what Playgoer writes -- the sense that a play is now an "experience" that must be managed by the producing organization, as if audiences are children who need lessons, educations, spaces made for dialogue... etc. What all this does is proscribe an experience, and to my mind this takes away from art's power and purpose. <BR/><BR/>Most theatres now do this kind of nonsense. As Playgoer says, it has not been necessary for thousands of years. It exists to blunt the disruptive power of art.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12657288.post-1145570031573416192006-04-20T17:53:00.000-04:002006-04-20T17:53:00.000-04:00HUH? What are you talking about, Playgoer? I atten...HUH? What are you talking about, Playgoer? I attended the panel and did not at all come away with the sense that everyone on the panel was calling for ways to make the audience comfortable with challenging work by providing "context." And really, you are misrepresenting the "peace cafe" at AJT which did not at all sound to me like a space for creating comfort nor for managing conversation. I mean, there is not a lot of public space left in this overly privatized culture of ours, and one that is also increasingly balkanized. People tend to go to the bar after the show with people they already know and maybe who think like them. Why not create a space for those who want to hang out and talk afterwards -- decidedly NOT in rows in the theater with conversation managers on the stage, but in a cafe. (One of the best things Joanne Akalaitis did when she took over at the Public, imho, was create that cafe space in the lobby -- and Frank Rich immediately made fun of her.)<BR/><BR/>As far as I could tell, the only person on that stage operating from "the underlying assumption that one can't or shouldn't put on politically provocative plays without some kind of outreach/healing/"dialogue" was Jayme Koszyn, the moderator and NYTW "consultant" who was very baldly trying to package the message, even to the point of reframing what Nicola was saying. I found her to be far and away the most troubling figure up there. But she did not in any way represent the prevailing point of view up there. <BR/><BR/>AlisaAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com