#211003
WELCOME to the #TheatreClique Round Up — my (mostly) weekly newsletter dedicated to clicking on some of the most interesting, intriguing & noteworthy writing about drama, theatre & performance (at least, so says me)…
This Week's #TheatreClique-ing:
For this week’s opener, I lift this mini-manifesto from writer/performer/theorist David Byrne on the ways performance activates something like “collective effervescence” and underscores how being part of an audience meets the essential human need for gathering in social community…
And here is some what’s been clicking since my last newsletter…
The Dramatists Guild announced the creation of its first “Inclusion Rider” to support dramatists and theatrical producers seeking greater equity in future productions • the Instagram account “IATSE Stories” gathers testimony from film/entertainment workers • IndieWire’s Chris O'Falt and Chris Lindahl distill “what you need to know” about the IATSE strike authorization vote happening this weekend • BroadwayNews reports on how breakthrough Covid cases forced the closing of Broadway’s Aladdin the day after its reopening • and theatre advocate Victoria Cairl offers “five things theatre must do as we move on to a new stage”…
performer Roman Wellingon Banks offers “a little thread about taking up space” as a Black artist/collaborator in the theatre • Playbill’s Ryan McPhee reports on ThePublic’s decision to delay the first preview of its new musical The Visitor to allow for further collaborative conversation/reflection around how to “de-center whiteness” in the production • San Francsico Chronicle’s Lily Janiak considers the reverberations within Bay Area theatre after “a Facebook group [Bay Area Theater Folks] got two shows canceled” • at Backstage, Diep Tran reports on the announced investigations of Jagged Little Pill for workplace safety concerns • at the South Seattle Emerald, filmmaker Amy L. Piñon insists “I won’t be quiet about healing from non-profit harm” • Variety’s Rebecca Rubin reports on the DramaLeague’s vision and strategy for overhauling its prestigious director programs • and PBS Newshour reports on the historic opening of the new opera Fire Shut Up in My Bones at the Metropolitan Opera…
Roxanne Gay offers her review of Broadway’s Pass Over in the NYTimes • The Austin Chronicle’s Robert Faires — long one of the defining voices reflecting on the city’s dynamic cultural scene — offers his “last bow of an accidental critic” • The Queer Review’s James Kleinmann interviews trans trailblazer Alexandra Billings on the occasion of her debut as Mrs. Morrible in Wicked on Broadway • Billings offers reflects on her actual opening night experience on TikTok •Vanity Fair’s Chris Murphy (PU’15) talks to actor Riz Ahmed about his Blueprint for Muslim Inclusion Initiative • Religion News Service’s Kathryn Post reports on the 50th anniversary of the once-controversial musical Jesus Christ Superstar • and PBS Newshour reports the opening of Showstoppers!: Spectacular Costumes from Stage and Screen, an exhibit staged by The Costume Industry Coalition to benefit the many small businesses and artisans who create costumes for the entertainment industry…
...and — lest I forget — this week in Fornésiana: brings this enthusiastic review (sprinkling “a whole box of gold stars”) on Nichole Hamilton’s production of Fefu and Her Friends as staged by the Theatre Department at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces…
Definition Checks:
In which I offer resources in response to informational questions raised in last (or in anticipation of this) week's meeting of my Fall 2021 course “Movements for Diversity in American Theater”...
Q1: what is an “Inclusion Rider”?
Q2: what is the Dramatists Guild?
On This TheatreCliquer's Dance Card:
Wherein I shamelessly promote my own upcoming public events.
As part of the Lights Up Festival (produced by Sally Root PU’22) — a celebration of theatrical arts and an opportunity to learn how to re-enter the theater space safely in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic — I will be performing an in-person reading of Virgina Grise’s Your Healing is Killing Me on Friday, October 8. The following afternoon, I will also be joining the playwright Virginia Grise in conversation. (Hit me up through the usual channels if you would like to zoom in to either event and I’ll see what I can do.)
And in the latest episode of On TAP, I gab with Sarah Bay-Cheng and Kareem Khubchandani about Trevor Boffone’s new book Renegades, about the pandemic’s continuing reverberations in Theatre & Performance Studies programs/organizations, and about the Netflix series The Chair. Listen below (or wherever you stream your favorite podcasts)…
What I’ve Been Reading This Week:
No — I don’t organize my weekly reading list alphabetically. But, having somehow read each of them since the last newsletter, it is striking to me how much these three very different titles share in common. Each is a relatively short work of scholarly non-fiction written with a general audience in mind. Each was written during and in response to the pandemic realities of the last two years. Each is by a white writer reflexively engaging their deepening analysis of how their own (privileged) identities inflect how they do what they do. And each is an example of someone with a PhD exploring how their specialized expertise and tools of analysis might be deployed in service of a greater (or more general) understanding of the myriad changes currently roiling US culture and life. I was drawn to each book for idiosyncratically personal reasons. Mary Trump’s 2020 book about her family’s history offered me a peculiar balm of clarity during a very tense time; Trevor Boffone is a friend and a colleague whose accomplishment in developing, writing and publishing this pathbreaking book is simply a marvel to me; and, though I’ve only ever known Anne-Marie Slaughter vaguely by reputation, my interest was piqued by an excerpt published somewhere about her experience confronting her failures leading an organization ostensibly committed to equity, inclusion and social transformation. Each is worth a read (though only one has my actual recommendation — hear my exuberant thoughts on the Boffone book in the podcast episode linked above) but, reading them all in quick succession, now has me wondering whether these books might offer early glimpses into how the imperatives of anti-racism, equity and accessibility will continue to inflect smartypants non-fiction writing for some while...
Did You Request YOUR FREE BOOK Yet?!?
Another big bunch of book bundles just yesterday went out to a motley literate crew of striving artists, ambitious academics, greedy bookfiends and inquisitive researchers. And it’s just gotten me even more excited to give away my books. For more on why I want to give YOU a free book & how it all works — click HERE (or on the image above) to be routed to the bookmobile-page…
Until next time, dear #TheatreClique, please share this newsletter with those friends, colleagues and students who might appreciate the opportunity to encounter the many voices gathered in each week’s edition. Errors and oversights published in the newsletter will be corrected in the archival versions. And, in the meantime, keep clicking those links — good writing needs good readers and our theatre clicks count!