tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16876687.post112727282344736324..comments2024-02-27T16:59:54.089-05:00Comments on (The New) Theatre Ideas: RegionalitisUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16876687.post-1128349366289059402005-10-03T10:22:00.000-04:002005-10-03T10:22:00.000-04:00To suggest that artists cannot come from NYC to wo...To suggest that artists cannot come from NYC to work in other communities because we cannot understand how to speak to them is to encourage provincialism in the arts.<BR/><BR/>Actors and directors live in NYC because that is where we get work. <BR/><BR/>We are so dedicated to a life in the theater -- creating it, not teaching others how to do it -- that we need to be where the opportunities are, even if that means not getting to live in the bucolic mountains.<BR/><BR/>We also like to be around and learn from a truly diverse community, because that is how to really learn to make art.<BR/><BR/>To suggest that we all insulate ourselves into small communities and only perform for each other? Means that your student production of the Bronx-set Marisol should not exist. <BR/><BR/>You have a white woman playing Marisol, a fact which I'm sure would make Rivera cringe. Under your reasoning, you and the small, very white community in which you live and work could not possibly understand his work.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16876687.post-1127849167533521592005-09-27T15:26:00.000-04:002005-09-27T15:26:00.000-04:00Yes, the New York theatre can no longer (if it eve...Yes, the New York theatre can no longer (if it ever did) stand in for the sensibilities of a nation. Great post!<BR/><BR/>My only quibble is with that beleaguered NY premiere of "Kentuck Cycle," an important work, I agree. The problem with that, though, in my view was that it was on *Broadway*. Some producer's idea of an American Nicholas Nickelby. Of course it backfired. I'm sure if a loving and expert production were staged on one of our better nonprofit companies, NY audiences would have taken a chance and critics might have judged more as a work of art than a commercial property.Playgoerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02994724588504353485noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16876687.post-1127316208621765912005-09-21T11:23:00.000-04:002005-09-21T11:23:00.000-04:00While regional theater's can do without another ti...While regional theater's can do without another tired production of "Burn This", I think you should encourage playwrights not to write for a local, or national artist, but to write plays that speak to the human condition.<BR/><BR/>I was born in the South, and although I escaped to NYC, I still have an affection for parts of Virginia and Texas, not to mention North Cackalackey.<BR/><BR/>Perhaps I have become elitist. Nine years with the urban Yankess does that to a man. <BR/><BR/>Anyway, my point is: isn't encouraging regionalism asking playwrights to behave in the same insular way as Mr. New York Playwright Writing Something Pretensious and Urbane?<BR/><BR/> (I know the South, and it has other vibrations besides environmental harmony.)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com