More often than not, this blog has focussed on my own activities as an artist, only on occasion discussing larger issues or participating in a larger conversation. This is one of those occasions.
There has been an on-going conversation in the theatrical blogosphere about diversity in theatre. I don't intend to do a full survey, but I'll list off a few items of interest:
There was, of course, Emily Glassberg Sands' "Opening the Curtain on Playwright Gender: An Integrated Economic Analysis of Discrimination in American Theater" which while identifying a real problem also had some real flaws that Thomas Garvey suggests were introduced when others tried to co-opted her work to fit their professional and ideological agenda.
Somewhat facetiously, Isaac Butler suggests suing theatres that don't diversify. Of course, Butler's suggestion is so absurdly impractical that it comes across more as an Ayn Randian nightmare caricature of political correctness than anything a serious liberal or progressive would contribute to the discussion, but I link to it because Butler is supposed to be an important theatre-blogger, and I'm apparently banned from posting to his comments section for reasons that are unclear to me (I'm sure it's all a misunderstanding.)
The pseudonymous 99seats has addressed the issue of diversity frequently, noting the class issue of access to theatre programs, notably the MFA, if one happens to be a playwright, as well as the institutionalized racism that prevents minorities from having similar opportunities. Of course, the troublesome statistic from the Theatre Development Fund's report Outrageous Fortune: The Life and Times of thew New American Play that "seven schools account for almost nine out of ten of the study playwrights with advanced professional training" only raises more questions about the role the academic gatekeepers are having on our culture-- especially when we ask how many of our great living American playwrights actually attended one of these programs? (This is particularly disturbing considering the charges leveled earlier this fall at The O'Neill Theatre regarding their "open" submission policies.)
Now this gets to an important point, brought up by Garvey in his "Meanwhile, over on the theatrical version of Second Life..." that:
To me, of course, art is more important than politics, so what Butler calls "the quality problem" (!) matters a lot, as I think it should to any critic worth his or her salt. And let me say up front that if Butler and Walters had any particular playwright they were promoting, of any gender of race or ethnicity, whose work they claimed had been disadvantaged by the system, I would happily see that writer's work, and be an advocate for them if the quality was there. (As for the insulting idea that people in each ethnic group cannot perceive the excellence of works from other ethnic groups - please, tell it to Alvin Ailey.)Essentially, as I often heard growing up in a left-wing household: "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem" or as I wrote in the comments section:
But the diversity partisans never seem to be able to point to any actual work that they feel is being ignored. Add to that issue the troubling fact that the "quality problem" we have is often due to playwrights promoted by the academic-diversity crowd, and you have a situation that - well, does not actually inspire critical confidence.
Critics should champion the work of artists that they regard as underappreciated or even deliberately seek out new work? I'm not sure the academy would approve of such a radical notion, Thom.Garvey flattered me as "you mischievous Ian Thal" which, of course, only incites me to greater mischief.
The successful playwright pool is artificially limited largely to those graduates of elite MFA playwriting programs, who reflect certain class interests and address "diversity issues" primarily in academically fashionable ways. Indeed, if I am granted the opportunity to propose a hypothesis (which I freely admit is but a hunch): the current manner in which "diversity" is treated by the "diversity advocates" (and please note, I am speaking only about plays and playwrights) might actually be creating obstacles that prevent playwrights of diverse backgrounds from emerging.
Despite his frequent self-deprecation, my friend, Chris Rich, who writes about jazz on his blog, Brilliant Corners, has developed something of a reputation for discovering artists and being the first to write about them. Part of that comes from his hanging about Outpost 186, where so many great and oft ignored jazz musicians play. However he has another method as well: He surfs for musicians on MySpace Music where musicians without labels and without buzz post their music. He then uses his own knowledge of the music to sort out the good from the bad. It's that simple. He doesn't wait for a major label to tell him that this musician is important.
So now for my mischief: I challenge you critics, producers, and artistic directors who should be advocating for great theatre. Find an underappreciated, underproduced, perhaps unknown playwright who should be appreciated, produced and known. Better yet: find six, eight, ten, and advocate for them. You need only go to bushgreen.org, a social media platform supported by London's Bush Theatre, where hundreds, if not thousands, of playwrights have already posted their plays, irrespective of whether or not they have the MFA. I'm already there. If you see it as your mission to serve a specific community or constellation of communities, most of the playwrights have already tagged their plays with labels to help you narrow down your search. I'm sure you will find something worthy of your advocacy.
On the other hand, maybe that amounts to usurption of the academic gatekeepers, and we can't have that, can we?
[N.B.12/26/2009: I seem to have overestimated the number of playwrights and plays currently posted to bushgreen.org-- perhaps because I had to search around for that information. There appear to be ~120 playwrights and around 400+ plays.]
14 comments:
Ian, here's my two cents on this wintery morn. You make some valid points about access to production. Not to belabor an obviousness, but the grads from MFA programs, Yale especially, also NYU, and other places, start out with the connections and the support in spades. Unlike those of us who toil in the vineyards, they are already on the veranda being served beaujoulais by a community of dramatists and mentors who not only get to know their work and their "potential" but also help to tease out, coddle and workshop early efforts. Then there are the internships and the connections. Does one need to go this route? It sure the heck helps.
It also helps being the granddaughter of Elia Kazan... or Carrie Fischer who should not be on Broadway, Pez dispensers or no... but that's another story.
Plays do get discovered over the transom. Plays of quality and craft. You have to be a friend to have a friend, so it never hurts to get involved with a theatre, usher for them, stuff some envelopes, paint flats, show that you care. Some people expect to be discovered out of the ether without paying their dues.
Then again, it's a long row to hoe and frost will settle on your grapes whilst you toil... So enjoy the journey.
As far as discrimination, yes, there's an anti-female bias proved in blind studies. I really don't think there's an anti-minority bias; on the contrary, I'd say plays about genuine experiences that haven't been explored in the "mainstream" have a better chance of breaking through. But don't copy Terrance McNally or Wendy Wasserstein or Christopher Durang or Anna Devere Smith or or.
But look. There are simply a lot of bad plays, surely written by a diverse lot of people. I'm currently a reader for a well-established New York theatre group, which does a yeomen's job of putting together staged readings. We're extremely diligent about reading every submission thoroughly and completely (and trying to turn over the slush pile as quickly as possible -- some places take a year). This theatre is very open-minded about content, style, subject matter, language. We don't give a toss about the writer's background, only the quality of the experience you get from the play. Personally I give every single play I read the biggest break possible, knowing, as a writer, how much work has gone into it. But writing a play is a complex undertaking, and there are a lot of people who won't learn the craft and should realize that their most valuable role is in the audience. When you write a play with trite dialogue, full of convenient coincidences, where nothing happens and there's no payoff, or with huge chunks of exposition and a transparent political agenda, not to mention dolling up your cover page in 48 pt bold with pink hearts, etc etc, OK, be aware that maybe your mom is going to remain your biggest fan. Find someone who understands plays, who will be objective and clear with you, and either rewrite or put the thing in a drawer and start your next play.
OK, now I need a drink. Cheers.
Hi C.J.,
My basic point is that, at least on the theatrical blogosphere, whether justified or not, there is grousing about 1.) mediocrity in the new plays being produced; 2.) a lack of diversity with regards to gender and ethnicity of playwrights whose work is produced; 3.) and a disproportionate influence that MFA programs seem to have on which emerging playwrights are being produced despite 1.) and 2.).
Essentially, I am proposing that those grousers be part of the solution, by actively advocating on behalf of specific playwrights and plays that are being ignored due to the system as it now stands-- and suggesting at least one way that they can seek out the playwrights who deserve advocacy.
So perhaps every now and then some print journalist or high profile blogger might issue his or her own list of "ten unknown playwrights whose work I saw at a staged reading, or read off of bushgreen.org, whom my local theatres should be developing or producing, but aren't."
What's mischievous about that suggestion is that it evens the playing field, and undermines the authority of the academic gatekeepers.
G.L. Horton asked me to post this response to the comments section- I.T.:
Ian, I can't comment on your blog because Google cut off access to my Google account (and my Stagepage blog) when they bought Blogger. (long story of being out of town when they sent password change info to a non-functioning email account)
Here's what I intended to publish as comment: if you'll post it for me I'll be grateful.
I am SO in favor of the Bush project-- or anything similar that puts work by unknowns in a context where the reader who encounters it can compare the unknown's script directly with plays that have been vetted and credentialed, and make an individual personal judgment as to its quality.
I've already "published" most of my work on line. Lots of students, who don't know about credentials and gatekeepers, find it way they find other stuff they Google for, and they do perform my monologues and one acts. They also expect stuff from the Internet to be free: and usually I agree to let them do it without royalty. When I was in school, I was so poor that if I had a choice between directing a play I liked that was in the Public Domain and freely available in the library, and one I had to purchase and pay royalty for, I always chose the free one. And If I ever, as a naive kid "called" to play writing, expected to make any money from my work, 50 years of "submissions" have taught me that that was a foolish fantasy. The occasional royalty or prize never exceeds the postage and copying costs. I went to cheap schools for both my BA and MA. But even my playwright friend who went to Radcliffe and Harvard has no clout with today's gatekeepers. There were no MFA programs for playwrights 50 years ago, and what programs there were simply did not admit women. "Everybody knew" that there never had been and never would be a successful woman playwright. The advice was to marry a man with clout, a producer or writer or critic (eg Mary Kerr) and the Superior One would guide and promote you into becoming a facsimile of a "real" playwright (eg Lillian Hellman). She dealt with this by writing short stories, only returning to plays when in her 40s. Many of the talented women of my generation intended to write for the stage: Doris Lessing and A.S. Byatt turned to novels as their second choice when theatres were dismissive.
Currently, serious theatre people don't look for scripts via Google: they already have an abundance of scripts written by reputable people they know, or young people who have been recommended by reputable people they know. Nobody believes that a 70 year old female is going to "emerge" as the hot new genius. So why waste valuable time reading her stuff?
Every few months I get a fan letter from some powerless person who has read my work on line and does think I'm a genius. That's a comfort. But it doesn't put me any closer to my goal of seeing a professional production of at least one of my full length plays staged before I die. The Bush project just might help. Plus, if it works I expect it to provide me as an audience member with at least some examples of the kind of play I most enjoy: large-cast and intellectually ambitious. The English theatre does them, thanks to subsidy. Americans get to see them, once London has vetted them and the Gatekeeper is assured that even if the play fails they had strong evidence that it was well written and worth doing: no blame attached. The advice to American writers who admire Stoppard and Hare and early Churchill and Wertenbaker has been: move to England. But now it will be possible for theatres and directors who like that sort of play to find American examples on line.
My only comment is to ask "but who is a play speaking to?" It seems a bit of intellectual inbreeding where what is considered "quality" must be processed through this gauntlet of critics who may or may not share the experience of the playwrite. No MFA from Harvard (or where ever, I don't know Brown?) more likely then not has anything to tell me about conflict or real world experience because if they did they probably couldn't afford getting a risky degree in the fine arts. If the theater, and especially New York theater, wants to diversify it might have to suck it up and accept the manuscript with pink hearts on it.
Ian-
Hm. I feel many things about this post and proposal, some contradictory. I don't want to take up too much of your comments, but the basics are like this:
- In terms of "grousing," I actually don't see a lot of that, to be honest. I see a lot of people coming up with ideas (Isaac's facetious lawsuit, Scott's lottery, joshcon's facetious suggestion to put "MFA" on your resume whether you own one or not) and then having various stakeholders spend a lot of time grousing about those ideas and complaining about the loss of their privileges. Ideas are very much a part of this conversation. It's just that some people don't like the ideas that are being put forward.
- Many people, myself included, are a bit compromised in the ideas we put out because we're practitioners as well as bloggers. In a way, we're championing our own work, as well as others. I've been a bit circumspect because I've been trying to protect my identity, but others (Isaac, for one) is rarely shy about the work he likes. There are tons of champions of new work, of ideas that we like out there.
- Isaac highlighted the bush theatre's project. I haven't mostly because, well, I haven't had time with everything else going on. I think it's a fine idea. Let's see how it works.
- I appreciate your challenge to artistic directors and support it...but it's not the academic gatekeepers that are the problem. It's a bigger system than that. It's not like a bunch of college professors are deciding the future of theater. There's an interplay between the ADs, the program heads, the critics, the boards, a whole host of players that created this. And bloggers aren't part of that system. We're on the outside, too.
But other than those things: huzzah! I like proposals, modest and otherwise!
Ian,
Your post implies that I banned you from commenting on my site. I never did anything of the kind. I have no idea why you can't comment on my site. I've never banned anyone from commenting on it. I *do* know that typepad's comment filter blows (something I've written to them about frequently). On Boxing Day, I got, and I am not making this up, 26 identical spam comments on 26 different posts and had to spend an hour sorting that one out this morning.
If for some reason a comment of yours doesn't go through, please e-mail it to me at parabasisnyc at gmail dot com and I'll make sure to get it posted.
I should also point out that what you call an "immodest proposal" I call my directing career thus far.
Despite your assumption (as stated in your comment on Hub Review as well as in this post) that I only want to work with playwrights who are approved by the academy, I have directed only one play written by a playwright who had an MFA, and he got the MFA after we started our collaborative relationship.
Also, as far as I know I was, in fact, one of the first US theatre bloggers to post about Bush Green. I haven't needed to use it, because I actually have a backlog of very good and under appreciated writers whose work I'm already engaged in because I'm part of a very active new play community here in New York.
I don't spend a lot of time on my blog writing about these writers, that's true, perhaps I should do more of that, but I actually (you may have noticed) don't write about my own work that frequently on my blog except as a jumping off point for wider conversation.
99-
Just to be clear: "grousing" was simply a comment on the fact that, at least on the theatrical blogosphere, there is recognition that the current system is not working properly both with regards to presenting a diverse (in all senses of the word) artistic landscape, and ensuring that works of merit are properly recognized with productions.
I'm also a practitioner as well as a blogger, so I felt that, at the very least, any suggestion I made couldn't be seen as simply "why am I not being produced" so I thought best to synthesize some of what I've been reading over the past several months.
My point about "academic gatekeepers" was simply the awareness that much of the new writing presented on the stage has been filtered through MFA programs. It's simply naîve to imagine that the only thing the graduates are absorbing are skills and social networks. While I was in a completely different field, I did go to grad school, and I'm very much aware that there's a certain constellation of ideologies that one gets just for passing through academia in a given era.
The point is, of course, I know full well, that whatever mistakes I might make simply because I haven't had the MFA training prior to calling myself a "playwright" that some theatre staff are just going to toss my work simply because I don't own an MFA.
Isaac-
I had posted to your blog before (probably something about the O'Neill controversy) only to find that I was no longer allowed to post on subsequent visits.
I take you on your word that this is a technical issue outside of human hands.
I also apologize for implying that you only were interested in MFA writers when posting on Hub Review. I also missed your post about bushgreen.org though I have been a regular reader of parabasis for a few months.
There's been some recognition that bushgreen.org exists, but no one has really been attending to the more important issue, which is "what do we do with this thing other than submit our plays to The Bush Theatre?" I'm proposing something that can be done-- but it will mean usurping some authority.
And why shouldn't the critics and the theatre bloggers not be compiling lists of "10 plays or playwrights whom you've probably never heard of but should?" Music writers do that all the time with albums and bands. Obviously, it will take some effort on the part of the theatre writers (and bushgreen.org is only one of the possible tools they could use.)
I certainly can say that I was lucky, that as a first time non-MFA playwright, I was able to place well in a competition that did not automatically disqualify me for my lack of pedigree. I can even say that I am fortunate that Thom Garvey was kind enough to attend my first (DIY) staged readings and participated in the talk-back, only to then encourage people to attend my second reading. So I suppose for somebody who just decided to do-it-himself, I'm off to a good start-- but it doesn't mean that the system isn't quite what it can be (even working with current economic realities.)
Ian,
You say nothing in your comment that I disagree with! What I think is weird is that you talk about me like I'm supportive of the MFA system when in fact I have been a frequent and vocal *critic* of it.
That I like some of the playwrights that it has produced... many of whom went to brown and many of whom have work that might be described as (gulp!) "twee"... and that I might even defend said playwrights from scorn that I think is (a) undeserved, (b) overly personal and (c) sexist doesn't mean that I don't think the system is totally flawed.
Hi Ian
Thanks for writing about bushgreen, the site has been live for almost two months now and we hope that it will attract more interest from the USA, so it’s great to see playwrights spreading the word.
I just wanted to make a few comments and one correction. At the time of writing there are just over 1400 members of the site and over 600 of these have identified themselves as playwrights. You’re right, there are about 450 plays on bushpress that any member can purchase and read and about 300 plays have been submitted to the Bush through the site.
I also wanted to respond to Isaac’s post about what to do on the site. There are currently three sections on bushgreen. The Green is the social networking part of the site; it contains user profiles and a number of messaging services. Bushpress is where playwrights can publish their work and theatre practitioners can read it. From here you can also submit your plays directly to the Bush though it should be noted that writers have the choice to do both of these things or either one. The Editorial section looks at a theatre practitioner weekly. Shortly, we will also be launching an events section where members will be able to let the community know about opportunities and productions.
We hope that bushgreen will connect playwrights with theatre practitioners, plays with producers and to lead and inspire best practice in the putting on of new plays.
At the Bush, we believe that playwrights develop through having their work produced. Every year we read many plays that deserve a production and meet a lot of playwrights in need of good collaborators. There is more work and artists than our small team have the resources and the reach to serve. We created bushgreen to bring together playwrights, practitioners and producers. A website where playwrights could publish their work and it work accessible to all.
In response to Ian’s suggestion that industry leader should start advocating for underappreciated playwrights I thought I should point out the top plays function. Every member of bushgreen has a profile and the chance to add their three top plays. These can be anything from classics to unproduced work on the site. Hopefully this is one way members of the bushgreen community will start advocated for the work of unknown playwrights.
Anthea
Associate Director bushfutures
Isaac-
You are absolutely correct that any assertion on my part that you were supportive of the MFA system was unfair, and factually unjustified. Alas, I did type those words, so I can't assign blame anywhere else. My apologies. I stand corrected.
How had I never heard of Bush Green? It's an awesome idea. My one quibble is that the site isn't user friendly. A little more admin work could make it awesome though.
I've had my plays on my website for years. I know that Chuck Mee has his plays on his site as well.
As near as I can tell, Josh, bushgreen.org was only officially launched on December 1st (which is why the word is still getting around about its existence.) I agree that more can be done with regards to the user interface, but the banner states that it's still in beta.
I doubt it's the cure-all for the problems faced by the "emerging" playwright; but it does seem to have some potential to even the playing field. While that might not amount to an affirmative action plan with regards to the diversity issues that have discussed (that's really going to demand attending to the structural problems of society as a whole), evening the playing field will mean one less obstacle towards diversity.
Ian,
I appreciate the correction! Thanks!
I think the Bush Green project has the potential to be something important. ALthough it may be that someone else looks at that and gets all second gen on it, and copy cats but improves on it and that that's when it finally catches on
I feel like there's interesting movement in the new play front. Todd London's study... Arena's New Play Development project... Bush Greene... there's interesting stuff afoot.
I've posted a follow-up:
http://ianthal.blogspot.com/2009/12/modest-proposal-2.html
Post a Comment