Scene4 Magazine | letters to the editor

I enjoy your magazine immensely and I follow many of your writers every month, especially Mr. Michael Bettencourt. This column is another one of his penetrating and very well-written articles. He is as good an article-writer as I see anywhere including here in London. But I must strongly disagree with him, this time, when he admonishes playwrights to forego character descriptions in their plays. A good drama can be a good piece of literature and a good drama can be as good a reading experience as a good book of fiction. I know that William Shakespeare did not include "character descriptions" in his plays but no one knows for sure if he did and, after all, he wrote his plays for his own actors and he managed them. George Bernard Shaw never shied away from detailed character descriptions which is why his plays remain the wonderful reading experience that they are and are of great assistance to actors who take on his plays. I was born in Asia and educated there and in America and in Europe. I am an avid theatre-goer and I even have some experience working in the theatre myself. I think that European playwrights tend to be writers first and "scripters" second and American playwrights tend to be "scripters" first and maybe writers second. read the column

Anee S. Waterson

How refreshing! A theater that values its community, and a community that values its theater! This review showcases an organization with a special mission. Bravo!
Shoshana Wolfe
read Ned Bobkoff's article

To answer Nathan Thomas' question: I've been reading Scene4 for many years and I especially like Nathan's column because of his personal one-on-one style and off-beat insights. All of the columns and articles are good and follow a course of interesting, informative and enjoyable journalism.
Martin Moore, Producer
read Nathan Thomas' column

Nathan Thomas article brought the words "community theater" into a more enlightened context than the one usually associated with the words "community" and "theater". His broadening of the scope of community, suggests a broader landscape for theater artists to work with. In the August, 2007 issue of Scene4, titled "Homeown Grown Theater", I wrote about the efforts of the 4TH Line Theater in a Canadian rural community, developing stories that frequently leap frog over parochial concerns, into a shared and cognizant sense of the overall human community. For the most part, Community theatre in the United States simply copies what has succeeded elsewhere in order to appear up to date and "professional" with the right kind of recipe. I am not talking about merely exploring the "experimental" aspects of theater; that has been done to death and has limited appeal. I am talking about rediscovering community theatre from the ground floor up, where the real demand for a fresh approach needs to succeed.
Ned Bobkoff
read Nathan Thomas' article

I have been an avid reader of the magazine since its inception and I've always look forward to Nathan Thomas' commentary.
Anee S. Waterson, Writer, Director-UK

Actor
Tim Forman

Playwright and actor-US
Mary Scott-Raines

Theatre lover and community theatre participant
Pearl Berg

Actor and Poet-Denmark
Karl Mendik

I love the arts, especially theater and opera
Suzanne Seibring

Filmmaker
Peter Johns

Producer, Director-US
Toro Sanchez

Just an arts lover and reader
Karen Moreland

read Nathan Thomas' article

Nice review--makes one want to rush out and see it. Does anyone know how one can see this spectacle without making the pilgrimage to Vegasland and pay the exhorbitant ticket prices?
Will
read Karren Alenier's article

Fantastic review of Cirque Du Soleil's "O". I recently forked out the dough earlier this year to see this show and while it was well worth the price, your article captured the experience for those folks who either can't or won't make it to Vegas for this show.
Lia Beachy
read Karren Alenier's article

Karren Alenier takes us to another time, another era, another life, another appetite we did not know before. And let us have more.
Grace Cavalieri
read Karren Alenier's article

It seems to me that actors in movies spoke a lot better years ago than those today. I suppose in the "Golden Age" of talkies during the big studio system, there was a lot of training including in speech. Then along came the mumble guys and you're so right - the difference between English and American actors is like the difference between people who can sing songs and the ones who can only scream and shout.
Melanie Spyren
read Lia Beachy's article

I agree entirely. A recent poll named Marlon Brando as the greatest ever movie actor, yet I could barely understand a word the man said in any of his movies! Nowadays it is mainly American movies and TV series with which I have issues, though I have experienced similar problems with British shows, including theatre performances. There seems to be a tendency for many actors (and, presumably, their directors) to think that in order to maintain "pace" the lines have to be delivered at high speed. The resultant cacophony of mangled vowels and stifled consonants is not pleasant on the ears of the audience, who are left baffled as to what is being said (or should I say "mumbled"). "Pace" is about picking up cues (with due consideration of the demands and effects of the dramatic pause) and keeping the action moving, but not at the expense of presenting the dialogue in an understandable form of the language. It is perhaps indicative of the times in which we live, that in our regular lives we perceive that no-one has the time to listen to what we are saying, as we anticipate (and are all too often vindicated in that anticipation) that we will be interrupted before we reach the end of our sentence if we take so much as half a beat to grab a breath. Is it any wonder, then, that people gabble their words in order to circumvent the premature termination of their sentence by the expected rude interruption? The gabbling actor will simply claim that he is being "true to life" in his high-speed delivery of the lines. How many excellent writers, having agonised over their choice of words, and crafted their works with great skill and wit, are then sold short by this slovenly speech pattern which defies comprehension? Actors are supposed to be the interpreters of a story, and we need that story told with understandable dialogue as well as meaningful action.
Geoff Goble
read Lia Beachy's article

Thanks for this fine look at this fine actor. He's what theater is all about.
J.J.
read Carole Levine's article

And hope the revolution comes soon, indeed! Bravo Mr. Bettencourt, lead the charge.
Stein
read Michael Bettencourt's article

Bravo, Mr. Thomas! Insightful commentary about our times (and theatre)! If only more people allowed live plays to wash over them rather than re-runs of Desperate Housewives.

Lia Beachy

read Nathan Thomas' article

Love has no tangible definition, elucidated meaning or solid recognition. It is an inescapable feeling that can cause a series of emotions, be it unsought, in one's life. Modern day love cannot compare to Love in the past. Today, unfortunately, people have grown to be selfish, inconsiderate, and at many times oblivious to reality. "True Love" stays candid and ingenuous through hardships, misunderstandings, distance and time. Characteristics that we lack and all of which are rare in today's society. Society in whole has decreased their expectations in order to be able to adapt to what they think love is. We find ourselves settling for someone second best and having to compromise and disregard things that should not have to be dealt with in that manner. Additionally, many are just in love with being in love and have no true emotional connection to their "significant other." So how do we distinguish love from lust and infatuation?

Mariya

read Eric Eberwein's play

Do I need you? Do I need to be an audience? I have television. I have alcohol. I have a job, perhaps a vocation with no ambition in the arts, and no theatrical ass to kiss. Sounds like a suicide note. Of course we need each other. I need you like I need to read, think, dream, and have a reason to live.

Kenneth Boe

read Iri Kopal's play

I concur with everything that the author said in her story. I saw Graham Greene in those two plays in September and he was awesome!
Lana Boldi

read Carole Levine's article

Graham Greene is the most under-appreciated actor I have ever met. Those of us who have been his long time fans have watched his excellence in his craft get little recognition or few greatly admired alocades. As for those of us who recognized his immense talent in Dances with Wolves, we have had nothing but wonderful preformances time and time again. He has been worth every ounce of praise we have given him.
AngelofLight
read Carole Levine's article

I like your perspective on the subject. You may enjoy my blog at worldscape.blogspot.com
Ronn Parker

read Michael Bettencourt's article

Oh how I sympathize (empathize?) with you. You get it and you get it so right especially when you deal with the nightmare on stage. Makes one want to go bald and just use wigs and hairpieces. It's all about staying strong and being yourself, right? That's how I get it.
Ms T.B.
read Claudine Jones' article

I read riveted, then intrigued as the smile on my face emerged. Many thanks to Ned Bobkoff for a concise, articulate, entertaining and insightful story of the playwright's dilemma.
Sandra Hughes
read Ned Bobkoff's article

A "Lofty" article, Ned.
Chuck Cobb
read Ned Bobkoff's article

I wonder if also that there were some who didn't want to have this indictment of the prison system at that time. I know that there have been a number of movies that were hard-hitting on the subject but I wonder if yours was just too hard. It sounds like the play-story is just too overwhelming and as you say too unrelieved. I hope we get to see it some day.
rjs
read Arthur Meiselman's article

Arthur Meiselman carefully elicits the dilemnas a playwright goes through when he or she tries to get beyond the tried and true, or the acceptable "experimental play". How the playwright "sees" the world of his or her creation is essential to the truth and power of a work on stage. I also agree that dramaturgs, literary managers and the rest of the mess are calibrating, to some extent, what goes on in the regional theatre. Operation MFA is in full swing. As to whether these arbiters of what works have enough life experience under their belt is another story altogether. Being inside a theatre in an office all day long is frequently gratuitous to head on, knuckle down and do it experience. A pox on these mouse traps!
Ned Bobkoff
read Arthur Meiselman's article

For sure, this is the answer to the everlasting misery and misunderstanding and lack of respect for the writer, especially the playwright. Cardboard cutouts with words coming through their frozen faces and hardly moving worth a damn. But wait a minute, we already have it. It's called--a Hollywood movie!
David F.
read Ned Bobkoff's article

Michael Bettencourt great article! It's great when people take a chance and bring your work to life. I'd like to read your Emma Goldman piece or better yet see it. Is there a link to this mysterious risk-taking playwrights forum?
Conan Moats
read Michael Bettencourt's article

Your comments about what it feels like to be an "unknown playwright" hit home. I've been lucky to have three of my plays done here in Denver, Colorado, but two of them are readings, and the group that is working on "new scripts" here is now committed to doing only readings, and it is very unsatisfying to me as the author. I know what it sounds like; I want to see what it LOOKS like! The feedback that one gets from a reading is valuable, but a play is so much more than the sound of a script; it's what motivates the characters to do the role, it's what the real sounds and sights are. I must get together with this group in Tennessee to see if they are remotely interested. Thank you for being on my side of the fence, even if we're often standing in something in this particular field that we're, well, standing in. Thank you.
Gary Webster
read Michael Bettencourt's article

It's a shame that most people only see great acting artists often in inconsequential movies and never see them as the shining stars they are and at their most brilliant on stage, in the theatre. Maggie Smith is as bright as they come and as magnificent as any who have ever trod the boards. I love her.

Orin Richards

read Lia Beachy's article

Well written, Thank you. Artist to artist, I must admit that some of the most talented people I've ever known, cut hair, drive cabs, bar-tend and wait tables. We cannot afford to live within the "starving artist" niche of glory days past. We eat, sleep, drink, dream and prepare for our art of choice, before work. Most do not have the monetary support to realise their dreams, due to life as it is. I believe if you love your art, in your soul and feel you may die without doing it, you are an artist.

Dione Emerson

read Lia Beachy's column

Thank you for your insightful article. Mary Zimmerman is a genius plain and simple.

Tadya Korin

read Catherine Conway Honig's article

This display of the photography of Kfir Bolotin is beautiful. I realize that the lighting and poses are already present on stage, but the eye of the photographer is amazing especially the composition of the second photograph called, "psychosis-cr." I would really like to know what theatre production it comes from.

Shelley Hazig

view Kfir Bolotin's images

Many thanks for your compliments. You've touched a long-discussed issue in photography by highlighting the existence of the subject versus its new representation by the photographer. The phrasing of your comment hints to the problem arising from the fact that the camera simply records what is in front of it, and if all pre-exists and is simply mirrored - is it really re-presented and contributed to by the photographer? You said yes and I naturally agree, though it is true that in stage photography much more of the image pre-exists than in other fields of photography. The photo you asked about is from the play 4.48 Psychosis, and photographed here is the Polish theatre company 'TR Warszawa', directed by Grzegorz Jarzyna, as they performed in the 2008 Edinburgh Festival, Scotland.

Kfir Bolotin

view Kfir Bolotin's images

Indeed the play is the thing and Nathan is the great purveyor of what remains good in theatre. Many, many thanks.

Burton Rubens

read Nathan Thomas' column

Beautifuly written response to the production, both informative and evocative.

Frank Kuhn

read Ned Bobkoff's article

Trying to get inside another's poet's pain is probably one of the hardest and most courageous acts a reader can perform, especially when the poet has prevented you from ever learning whether you've grasped the meaning of the pain that caused the stuffing of rags into the windows......the sweet gas and killing sleep that Sylvia Path finally found. Mr. Bobkoff took his conversation with the dead poet to a new depth, when he tried to learn the meaning of it through a playwright's efforts. His own sensitivity to the reasons behind the suicide of a beautiful and gifted person seems heightened by what he has probably gone through in living with his own conversation with his brother's suicide.
The interplay of Ned's conversation with Sylvia Plath, his own family pain and what he learned through the action of an actress finishing out the puzzle of Plath's enormous reluctance to live out her story is told with great sensitivity. What a shame Ted Hughes didn't take the time to do more than profit from the poetry of a life lived too briefly, and too publicly.

June Zaner

read Ned Bobkoff's article

Bobkoff, groping for the right handle into Plath's life and suicide, engages in a piercing conversation with Ms Plath: reality is not at all the "nebulous" thing she is quoted as saying. For Bobkoff, it is the piercing bullet, the lung-clutching gasp, that gives the truth to her life, and his words. What a powerful statement he gives, powerful and arrow-straight to the heart. Thanks, Ned, for this; it will live for a long time.

Richard Zaner

read Ned Bobkoff's article

Ned Bobkoff has the rare quality of writing very much as he speaks. His is such a natural, easy-reading style, almost ingenuous. Ned's review of EDGE, the play about Sylvia Plath, makes me wish the production would come to Portland, Oregon where we have some good theater, but not enough experimental theater. Well done, Ned!

Gordon Magill

read Ned Bobkoff's article

Thank you Ned for that article -- right on! And thanks for mentioning a new theater in Rochester I hadn't heard about as yet. I will definitely be checking it out.

Joy Bennett

read Ned Bobkoff's article

If it were up to you, I would be barred from acting at all because I don't even meet half of your requirements. But my success as an actor is not based on your damn elite requirements-it is based on what my audience wants, sees and appreciates. I suppose you will become "she, who's name may not be spoken" and create an "artsy" theatre art-form instead of the wonderful open entertainment that it is. I'm glad that will never happen.

Pier Harrington

read Arthur Meiselman's article

No, "she" would not tolerate that. After all, "she" is "she"! What "she" might grant me is to be the Commissioner of LCD (lowest common denominator) and in that exalted position I would gladly grant you a license to be wonderful, open and entertaining (along with everyone else and their mothers).

Arthur Meiselman

read his article

If speaking well and moving well and having a literate mind are considered "artsy" and "elite requirements" for being an actor, then so be it. Ring the bell, close the book and quench the candle. Acting as an artform has officially lost its soul.

On another note... does it not strike a chord with anyone else that when the word "artsy" is used, it has the same implied dirty derogative connotation that "socialism" or "feminism" or "liberal" has taken on by "those who shall remain nameless"?

Lia Beachy

read Arthur Meiselman's article

I can't find the answer to what I think is a pretty basic question. After I've completed my play, how can I estimate how much time it will require to stage it? Thank You!

Tomas DeMoss

Having worked with Ned for many years, I am thrilled he has put his life in theater on paper. Stay tuned eveybody!

David Casiano

read Ned Bobkoff's article

As a fellow writer for Scene4 Magazine I always found Nathan Thomas' articles pleasing and to the point. "One Tramp in Dirt Time" was especially direct and touchingly straightforward in its insights regarding big time corporation abuse of democracy. Thanks Nathan.

Ned Bobkoff

read Nathan Thomas' article

Somehow I get the strong impression that Mr. Meiselman doesn't like James Cameron and likes "Avatar" even less. Cameron is truly an "Animating Life Giver" and "Avatar" is a g*d-like creation that is creating g*d-like billions of dollars. Isn't that a miracle?

Perry Silverstein

read Arthur Meiselman's article

No, it's not a miracle, it's a wonder, a brilliantly merchandised video game. I don't dislike James Cameron. How could I? He's going to bring God on to the stage of my next production. It's called: "Time Out for Ginger" and it all takes place in an IPhone.

Mr. Meiselman

I appreciate reading Ned's history before we worked together. I understand now the awakening of his passion for truth in everything we did, everytime we did it. The respect and thoughtful listening to young actors challenged us to grow.

Marianne Giardini

read Ned Bobkoff's article

Who said "the simpler a work of art becomes, the more beautiful it is"? I'm glad someone still recognizes cinema at its purest and simplest. Thank you for that.

Aaron Klein

read Arthur Meiselman' column

You won't be impressed for long, I promise, when you put on those glasses. The effect is no big deal; less impressive than the I-Max next door -- at least in Avatar. The effect is that one gets used to it so fast it's hardly worth losing ink over it. The weirdness of foreground distortion reminds you every now and then, oh yes, this is 3-D, isn't it? Clumsy. Like filming a puppet stage and getting hit by the flat cardboard bushes at the stage edge. Bob Wilson on the theater stage used it (sparingly!) to much better effect than Cameron did. Anyway: Very enjoyable article on Oscar contenders and acting. I wonder if you would find Polanski's new Ghostwriter more adult (in the European way) and find some acting in it, too? I did.

Renate Stendhal

read Arthur Meiselman's column

I found Ned's reminiscences remarkable. His recollections of the names of plays and the actors who performed them, after all these years, is impressive. Having experienced Ned as a director and friend, I find his memoirs refreshing as well as nostalgic.

Richard Dolce

read Ned Bobkoff's memoir

What a hoot and at the same time kind of sad and scary. Thanks. I'll stick to watching.

Rad Bennett

read Les Marcott's column

I have thoroughly enjoyed reading Ned's memoirs. Although, I have not been lucky enough to meet the great writer, director, producer and educator, I am immensely grateful to him for his support and positive influence on new, young writers, such as myself.

James Dimelow

read Ned Bobkoff's memoir

Ned Bobkoff was my very first director - in MacBird - and I suppose he sparked my interest in an acting career, which has now spanned over 40 years. Most of my work has been done in the United Kingdom, where I now live, but I'll always remember Ned and his vitality and creative energy. If it hadn't been for him, I probably wouldn't have been an actor. I developed a writing career alongside the acting, and now most of my energies are spent producing books. But Ned - Houston - those were the days. Back in the 60s, both of us fighting in the civil rights struggle, producing bizarre, surreal adventures which are scarcely believable these days. Hats off to Ned and all he's given to the theatre, along with his enthusiastic encouragement of his actors. Perhaps few know he is himself a fine actor capable of transmitting 100 watt energy to many roles. Be well, Ned. And long may you continue.

Bill Bailey

read Ned Bobkoff's memoir

Michael, I suggest you look at other dying forms for guidance on how to make a living as a playwright. Opera has been dead for over 50 years, so creaters of "new music theater" have been experimenting with new business models - one's that have nothing to do with the traditional roles of composer/librettist submitting work to artistic director/opera company in the hopes of workshop/production. Granted, theater has a longer tradition of devotion to contemporary work, but so many works are, like new music theater, being developed in collectives, now, and I am amazed that you, this late in the game, would still seek that brass ring of "legitimate theater" validation. So, the point is not so much to self-produce, as to collaborate with others, to form a company in which the hat of "playwright" is not so explicitly defined. If you give up that dream and that ego, you may get more chances to play in the theatre, and see your plays become reality.

Barry Drogin

read Michael Bettencourt's column

Audacious to call great sports great theatre? Not in the least. It has everything: entertainment, players, and the art of the playing. Along with theatrical performances, some of the most "dramatic" experiences I've ever had have come from a sporting event. And I too would like to be in an audience that cheers and whoops and leaves me achingly moved the way it once was in our, ahem, "polite" English-style theatre and the way it still is in many other parts of the world. I'll see you there.

Murray Gissin

read Martin Challis' column

...and see his other commentary in the Scene4 Archives

Great sports as great theatre--one of the greatest was Bobby Thomson's "shot heard round the world" in baseball, his playoff winning homerun in 1951 against the Brooklyn Dodgers. As dramatic as they come. There are lots of others in lots of other sports. As he said, it's all entertainment and the art is in the playing.

Bernie Hoffman

read Martin Challis' column

I agree wholeheartedly with Nathan Thomas and his lament in "Thinking Outside the Box." But I am willing to go one step further and say I despise the Black Box. Not for it's origins or intentions, but for what it is now. There are rare, and I mean, rare exceptions, but in general, and especially in Los Angeles, the people who run and/or rent Black Boxes have no right to call them theaters and the productions they do in them theatre. Besides the lack of color and design, there is no thought to fixing all the small flaws such as dangling cords, crappy sound systems, faded paint, worn-out bathrooms or lobby carpeting. Too often actors are in the lobby talking to their friends right before the show starts. And the front of house staff is dressed in their worst just-rolled-out-of-bed duds and their best coat of apathy. There is no suspension of disbelief created for the patrons once they step through the front doors. And this is reflected in the fairly lame and not very daring productions themselves. I place much of the blame for this laid-back, amateur approach firmly at the worn-out, sad floors of the tiny black box. There is definitely crap being done in grander spaces, but more often than not, they require the people who use them to rise to the occasion. And at least they know how hide the loose cables.

Lia Beachy

read Nathan Thomas' column

Ned Bobkoff's deep humanity and theatrical intelligence illuminate the essential elements of this production. Although I have not seen the performance - and travel distance makes it impossible - I can almost taste it from Ned's passionate description and his inevitable kindness and understanding of theatrical performance art. Highly recommended!

Bill Bailey

read Ned Bobkoff's article

You can't do better than have Ned Bobkoff review your plays! His comments bristle with theatrical accuracy. Many years ago Ned's enthusiasm and amazing creativity inspired me into a sucessful acting career in London. Since then I haven't had the pleasure of working with him again, but - believe me - I've read hundreds and hundreds of other reviews. No one compares with the acuity, passion and sheer humanity of Ned's reviews. He writes about the PLAY, the ACTORS and the combustible tension of the DRAMA itself. He highlights the theatrical event, rather than just dribbling out a brief description of the plot, unpleasant comments about the acting and a tiresome opinion. His words are vital, like the man himself. His love of theatre pervades every observation. Hats off. This is a tip-top review, and it makes me dearly regret that I missed seeing the production.

Bill Bailey

read Ned Bobkoff's review

A work of uplifting beauty! Kudos to Rosalie Jones for her spectacular vision and to Ned Bobkoff for transmitting the sensation to Scene4 readers.

Arthur Kanegis

read Ned Bobkoff's article

...and check the Archives for more of his articles!

What a fine coverage of a play no one seemed to report accurately enough for my taste before.

Grace Cavalieri

read Karren Alenier's review

This is a wierd and wonderful play. Has it been produced somewhere? If not, I hope it will be. David Alpaugh is "not" a wierd but "is" a wonderful poet.

Marjorie Thome-Luntz

read David Alpaugh's play

First, I feel incredibly pleased and gratified by Renate Stendhal's kind and generous letter about my reviews. To receive such praise from a writer of her stature is an honor indeed. Second, I loved Nathan Thomas' appreciation of the great Sir Derek Jacobi. I hope Mr. Thomas enjoyed Sir Derek's performance as Lear (I can't imagine otherwise). I myself have been fortunate enough to see Sir Derek four times in the flesh: on stage in "Cyrano de Bergerac," "Breaking the Code," and "A Voyage Round My Father," and as himself at a speaking engagement at The National Press Club. Sir Derek was as charming, witty and self-deprecating as one could wish. He spoke of just barely losing the role of Hannibal Lecter in "The Silence of the Lambs" to Anthony Hopkins: "Tony was brilliant, damn him, but I should have liked to have a go at it!" He also told the tale of being approached meanicngly by an extremely intimidating U.S. Customs official. The official's demand? "Show us your limp!"

Miles David Moore

read Nathan Thomas' article

Okay... let me ask you this. Can I rewrite some of your dialogue, here and there? Can I delete some of your dialogue and add mine instead? Can I rewrite most of the play and put my name on it, maybe with a tinge-of-guilt disclaimer that this is " based in part on a play by M. Bettencourt"? Can I copy your website and substitute my name for yours?

Arthur Meiselman

read Michael Bettencourt's article

You still have controls over your work and permissions to others to use it.  As it says on CC website about this license:
 
This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work even for commercial purposes, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms. This license is often compared to "copyleft" free and open source software licenses. All new works based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also allow commercial use. This is the license used by Wikipedia, and is recommended for materials that would benefit from incorporating content from Wikipedia and similarly licensed projects.
 
A Creative Commons license is based on copyright. CC licenses apply to works that are protected by copyright law. The kinds of works that are protected by copyright law are books, websites, blogs, photographs, films, videos, songs and other audio & visual recordings, for example. Software programs are also protected by copyright but, as explained below, we do not recommend that you apply a Creative Commons license to software code.
 
Creative Commons licenses give you the ability to dictate how others may exercise your copyright rights--such as the right of others to copy your work, make derivative works or adaptations of your work, to distribute your work and/or make money from your work. They do not give you the ability to restrict anything that is otherwise permitted by exceptions or limitations to copyright--including, importantly, fair use or fair dealing--nor do they give you the ability to control anything that is not protected by copyright law, such as facts and ideas.
 
We'll see how it works.

Michael Bettencourt

read Michael Bettencourt's article

The commanding operative is: "We'll see how it works."

As I'm sure you're well aware... put it on the internet, make it downloadable, and there is no license!

The mechanics of all of this doesn't trouble me. Disrespect, misuse, and outright stealing has been a fact of publishing since before Gutenberg. It's the principle... it's the implication of "work by committee". And in the theatre, it's the 'facebook' of workshopping and the rise of the chief 'tweeter", the Dramaturg.

My pre-luddite stride is--I write for readers and the actors and their audience. Change not a word without me. I'd rather burn it.

Arthur Meiselman

read Michael Bettencourt's article

You had me at the "chief tweeter, the dramaturg" -- I was at a reading the other night at the Public Theatre, and the literary manager came out to introduce the piece -- she had to be older than 18, but not by much, and all I could think was, "I'm screwed."  She and I live in different universes, she of the Facebook workshop, which is not for me.  I understand the Luddite feeling completely.

Michael Bettencourt

read Michael Bettencourt's article

Michael,
I understand the necessity and depth of your feeling regarding copyrights of your work, yet your offer to let people use your work whenever they want to without financial remittance, is a giveaway that works against your own best interests. Passing around your work to theater people you know, or even those you don't know out of trust or admiration is one thing. Yet an open door policy for all comers sets you up as either a flunky or a desperate writer without credibility. I wish you the best in your efforts for recognition.

Ned Bobkoff

read Michael Bettencourt's article

The problem is that Edith Stein died and Gertrude Stein hasn't. Edith Stein was a "saint" before the Poppa in Rome made her one. She was a special woman who was at the wrong place at the wrong time. Her "specialness" is what makes her amazing and perplexing life and what she did with it so important, so meaningful. She has been an influence to women everywhere even though so many of them are unaware of it.
Gertrude Stein was in the right place at the right time. She was a mean, self-indulgent keeper and user of other artists work, an accomplished self-promoter who sold her clumsy, deconstructed writing as if she were the scribe of the gods. Today generations of buyers revel in her self-made image and keep her alive. It's a paradox.

Stephanie Anschel

read Renate Stendhal's article and Celine Nally's play

Luddites unite! All you have to lose is your place in a digitized world!

Laird

read Michael Bettencourt's article

Kudos and bravos to Ms Renaud on a wonderful review of this wonderful event. I was so happy that she took me along with her. Her writing is so expressive and the details are so rich that I felt as if I were carrying her luggage. There doesn't seem to be anything quite like that festival anywhere else in the world and if there is I'm sure she will be there and ought to be there. She has the perception and the words and the good humour to capture the width and breadth of this colossal kind of arts event. I hope to "travel" with her again.
Once more bravo and thank you.

Peter B. Wenzel

read Lissa Tyler Renaud's article

Congratulations and good luck. You can't even get actors to respect other actors by showing up on time, so I don't know how you can expect audiences to be any better. Being late isn't just being rude, it's the sign of a small mind running backwards.

Laird

read Arthur Meiselman's column

Add to your list, Paul Muni in Inherit the Wind. Muni was a prime example of a major acting talent who was nurtured and developed by what is historically the oldest, most productive acting training "method" -- working in rehearsal and on stage with successful actors and directors. He had no formal training, never took a class nor set foot in a studio. He learned from anyone who would talk to him, show him, work with him. Beginning as a child-actor in New York's Yiddish Theatre, Muni went on to become a "star" on Broadway and in Hollywood. He earned many awards including an Oscar. He was admired for his self-developed discipline and detailed character preparation and a strong influence on many other actors including Marlon Brando, who had one of his earliest stage experiences with Muni. For a "star", Muni was incredibly introverted and shy. He rarely gave an interview and was reputed to have never seen his performances on the screen for fear that he would lose his internal acting p.o.v. Inherit the Wind was a culminating performance in Muni's theatrical career. After the play's successful launch in 1955, Muni was forced out because of a cancerous tumor in his eye. Melvyn Douglas replaced him. Muni's eye was removed and the cancer stopped, and later in 1955, he returned to the Broadway hit. That night, when he first appeared on stage, the audience rose in unison as if rehearsed in a chorus of applause and cheering. Muni stopped at his entrance, looked at the audience, turned away, and delivered his first line. It was a stunning moment. Never to be forgotten, since I had the good fortune to be in the audience on that night.

Arthur Meiselman

read Nathan Thomas' column

Alan Bates in the title role of Simon Gray's BUTLEY turns in one of the greatest performances I've ever had the pleasure to view. I did not see Bates onstage in London or New York (where Clive Barnes called his 1972 performance "perhaps the single greatest he had ever seen on stage"). Fortunately, Ely Landau's American Film Theatre adapted it to film in 1974 (with Harold Pinter directing) and though unavailable for many years, it was released on DVD in 2003 and is now available on Netflix. I've watched it with awe a half dozen times. Bates, who said Ben Butley was a more demanding role than Hamlet, manages to play this charismatic English Professor, whose career, marriage, friendships are all crumbling, with wit, anger, pathos, and vindictiveness that one would think more appropriate to larger than life figures like Hamlet, Antony, or King Lear. I'm not sure how Gray's play would fare with any other actor; Bates brings it as close to tragedy as any 20th century drama I've seen.

David Alpaugh

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Arthur's story of the great Paul Muni reminded me of an important omission -- the Marx Brothers. They honed their skills out on the vaudeville circuit and then wowed audiences in "I'll Say She Is," The Cocoanuts," and "Animal Crackers." Evidently to see them live was far funnier than seeing them on the screen. And more than that, they took ethnic humor out of the tenement and into the mainstream that led to, among other folks, Woody Allen's films.

Nathan Thomas

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Thank you for this interesting article. I don't disagree with you at all, but surely there is also an issue about simply making our speech clear and understandable to an audience on stage. When characters in a play speak with a particular regional dialect, perhaps we need to "cheat" that dialect slightly in the direction of a "standard" speech ("generalized Iowan": is that how you put it?) in order to ensure that the whole audience can understand the speech; while hopefully retaining the quality and character of the dialect.

Michael Elliott

read Nathan Thomas' column

I don't know if this is drama or poetry or as Kopal calls it: a self-dispossessed illusion (great phrase!). What I do know is it kept me up last night!

Laird

read Iri Kopal's writing

It's almost as if O'Neill wrote this play last year. His indictment of the military-industrial complex and corporate politics is scathing and so very timely. It would make a blockbuster movie today. I also agree with the writer's opening indictments of our "dumb" presidents but I love Bob Dylan. He is the great poet of the 20th century.

Maria Einhorn (truthsayer)

read Arthur Meiselman's column

A couple of points--there was a rise of the kind of musical theatre that you and Barker seem to endorse alongside the rise of the Nazis in Germany in the 1920's and 1930's, a glorious and provocative rise of the form that attracted large audiences along with the marvelous Voksbuhne (People's Theatre) in Berlin. If it hadn't been exterminated by the Nazis, the musical theatre in the post-war U.S. would have been markedly different even for Agnes deMille and her groundbreaking "Oklahoma!"

Your citing of Sondheim--a second-rate composer and second-rate lyricist who egged his way into the vacuum left by the demise of Leonard Bernstein and Jerome Robbins. His success and popularity is a stinging example of what happens when the press adulates and creates an idol, just like Lady Gaga.

Michael Aptrow

read Michael Bettencourt's column

One point--you talk about touring as a "young person's game". It's truly an "actor's game" young and old. The bus&truck, the roving Band of Players, even the circus and carnivals--these marvelous adventures for both performers and audiences have been lost in the U.S. not just because of the swamp of mall-entertainment but also because of the overreach of unions and the tax-man. You should advise your young actors--if you want to tour and tour you should, go to Europe, go to Canada, even Australia. It's still there!

Michael Aptrow

read Nathan Thomas' column

I can't begin to tell you how important Nathan Thomas' words are regarding the gender-stricken "Method". Since acting and the creations of acting on the stage and on the screen have such a profound effect and influence on the behavior of persons and what they do with their lives and the lives of others,Thomas gets to the heart and core of it and opens it up. It needs to be dug into deeper and further.

Michael Aptrow

read Nathan Thomas' column