Scene4 Magazine | the readers blog

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

I read this interview and remembered why I love Amir.
Vicky
read Andrea Carvalho Stark'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