The dark side of reviews

I don't mind a bad review.

Really. I don't. Even if it's harsh. But I do ask that it be well-written and logical, and that the author be knowledgable about his subject.

And that is where this review falls apart.

For simplicity, let's go through line by line.

Theater review: Lead on, Macduff; someone should at Shoe Box

Ok. I should start here at the title, but it's too easy. I'll save it for later. But can you identify the egregeous error here?

'Macbeth' - The director at Northwest Classical Theatre Company takes liberties
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
COLIN MANNEX

The only problem I have here is that Mr. Mannex never gets around to explaining what liberties I'm taking, but more of that anon.

The folks at Northwest Classical Theatre Company have staked a strong claim at making big, canonical plays popularly accessible while keeping great textual integrity. As cultural purists, they've shied from the spectacular, relying on directorial ingenuity to cram parlor scenes and battlegrounds into the intimate Shoe Box Theater.

I know I've only been here a year, but I've never heard the NWCTC say anything about making plays popularly accessible. They do say "[We are] placing the emphasis on text and authorial intention rather than directorial conception." and "By cutting back on stage pyrotechnics and limiting our use of set and costume, we focus the attention on the word and story that we try to tell. Our company motto is “Content over Concept!” " So yes - they shy away from the spectacular. But then again, this is Macbeth - and some spectacle is necessary. So we have some fog, some lights, a strobe, some swordfights and some blood. But it's hardly excessive. It's in the text.

Their use of space is always impressive: You're not likely to find a more cozy and confrontational theater experience in Portland. But they've long fallen prey to a loophole in the accuracy of their "classical" productions: Too often their stage directions are confabulatory nonsense.

From what the artistic director has told me, Mr. Mannex only took over reviewing NWCTC shows this year - in fact, I believe his first review was Henry V. So unless he'd been spending time at NWCTC shows before that, how can he speak to how "often" they do anything?

Hm. I have a pretty big vocabulary, but let's look up confabulatory.

"1. the act of confabulating; conversation; discussion. "

That's no help.

"2. Psychiatry. the replacement of a gap in a person's memory by a falsification that he or she believes to be true. "

So....I think he's trying to say that our "stage directions" are nonsensical because we replace Shakespeare's lack of stage directions with falsifications.

I think.

So he's saying that NWCTC does this as a rule? I can't speak to that so well - I have only been involved with or seen four productions there - and I can't think of an occasion where I saw something that seemed like "confabulatory nonsense." Grant is kind of the opposite of that, really, and I'm pretty much a purist, too.

And, you know, examples would be nice. When teaching students to review plays, I generally don't let them get away with making a statement without backing it up with examples. Let's read on and see what more he's got to say.

Granted, Shakespeare never indicated much more than the traffic of entrances, exits, hiding places and essential points between sparring partners. Any production requires an interpretive leap to animate the language. But in his current production of "Macbeth," director Brian Allard has egregiously misused this license.

Ok, we clearly have some disagreement here. It's true that Shakespeare never indicated WITH STAGE DIRECTIONS much more than those things, but to say that he didn't indicate them at all shows a complete lack of Shakespearian knowledge.

If you've studied Shakespeare beyond high school, you know that he gives us all sorts of clues. If you gone in depth at all, you would know that Shakespeare indicates actions through dialogue. He gives us the blocking through the simple precept of "cross to the person to whom you are speaking: if you don't know to whom you are speaking, cross to the person who gave you your cue." This is a basic tenet of first folio technique, which we followed, and which I expressly mentioned in my directors notes, which were in both the program and the press packet. I'm guessing Mr. Mannex failed to look into this, and clearly had no foreknowledge of such things.

Shakespeare requires an interpretive leap to animate the language? I don't think I buy that statement, but I'm assuming Mr. Mannex means that when the text says "they fight" it's my job (well, Kendall's, really) to decide how that's going to take place. And he's right. I had to decide what type of candle Lady Macbeth would carry, too.

And then he finishes by saying I've egregeously misused this license. That's a pretty serious accusation. But he doesn't say how I've done this, or give any examples. Maybe he will later. Lets move on.

True to the text, it's a throbbing, bloody and lascivious engagement.

Damn straight! And thanks. I agree wholeheartedly. Shame you didn't stop there.

And it's a shame you spend the rest of the article refuting your own statement.

I wouldn't accept that from a student. And I'm not happy to see it published in our local paper.

However, the grisly bits are almost never employed to the service of the central story.

Really? How so? Hm...grisly bits.... you mean when Banquo is murdered in cold blood? Yeah, that doesn't serve the story. Or when Macbeth dies on a battleground at the hand of a desperate man who's had his entire family ripped away by the tyrant? How does that not serve the story (other than as it's climax?)

You need to explain yourself, Mr. Mannex. Maybe you will.

Lady Macbeth (Allison Anderson) shows great "ambition" in wrapping her legs around her husband and her doctor, but there's no impetus for further action.

There isn't? You didn't latch on to the fact that she manipulates her husband through sex? That she belittles his manhood when he shies away from murdering Duncan? That she refuses him physical contact until he does it? Were you THAT distracted by the negligee?

And in the doctor scene, was it unclear to you that in her madness she thought the doctor was Macbeth? I really thought that was clear...

Macbeth (Paul Angelo) wields his "barren scepter" with rightful outrage, but he affects hollow deference to the spectral forces that guide him.

"Rightful outrage?" Where on earth do you get the idea, Mr. Mannex, that Macbeth has any RIGHTFUL outrage? This is a man who killed his king, took his throne, had his best friend murdered, massacred the family of an innocent man....what is rightful about Macbeth? Have you read the play? Do you know anything about the play?

And the hollow deference line has me rather confused. Does he think that Macbeth should show sincere deference to the witches and spirits? I'm not sure where that would be found in the text. He mocks them at first, then uses the prophecy as an excuse, then it becomes a source of worry for him, then he goes to them again, and within one scene both praises and curses them (and this is when he is well on his way to madness, anyway) - I'm not clear on what you want here, Mr. Mannex.

Some fine dramatic moments come with Dan Ruiz Salvatura as Ross and director Allard as Macduff.

Uh, thanks. Maybe you could spell the character names right. We're using a first folio text (I might have mentioned that.) It's Rosse and Macduffe. You'll find that in the program.

But for the most part, if the action doesn't involve thrusting, it suffers a complete lack of directorial attention.

That's going a bit far. A complete lack of directorial attention? So, what - I just told the actors to go onstage and fuck around in the scenes that weren't sex or combat based? Was I asleep? Um - the secene that you just praised, the one with Rosse and I? That didn't have any thrusting. (And frankly, got less directorial attention than most scenes - I was in it, so I couldn't watch it. If you had criticized me for that, I would have taken my lumps with humbleness.)

Ask Lisa about how much attention I paid to each scene. She knows. I talked about the play incessantly, and not just the "thrusting" scenes. We spent ages on the banquet scene - and it was a rather fresh staging, I thought. But no, I forgot, it was directorially ignored.

Allard describes his approach to Shakespeare as a return to "popular -- not elitist -- entertainment." He would have done well to make more of the verbal play ("Remember the Porter") and less of the stage combat.

Well, that's kind of a misquote, which is funny, since you had it written down. I didn't say that was my approach. I said "In Shakespeare's day, his plays were popular (not elitist) entertainment."

"Remember the Porter" what? That's a line in the play. When the Porter asks for money. What's your point? Are you saying you didn't like the Porter scene? Strange, on opening night the audience nearly fell out of their seats in hysterics. What "verbal play?" This isn't Romeo and Juliet, there aren't a lot of jesting/punning/joking around scenes. Are you criticizing our use of text? Cause I thought the actors did a fine job with the text - and Lisa (among others) has pointed out the Porter scene in specific as one that "felt like he was speaking modern English, it was so clear."

What's your problem with stage combat? It's says "they fight" in the text. Would you rather we had just done some namby-pamby-three-moves-and-you're-dead fight scene? Would that have served the text? Do you think they did it that way at the Globe? (Fact is, we have lots of evidence that implies they had much more complex fights than we do - but of course they had more space.)

Shakespeare never shirked from lewdness or violence,

Nope. You're right there.

And that kind of kills your whole argument. Your grade goes down again.

but "Macbeth" needn't suffer these emendations to capture a modern audience.

Emendations? WHAT emendations? You have given no examples of emendations. Reading into your article, you seem to dislike the sex and the fights, though you've said twice now that Shakespeare intended those things. So what are the emendations you're upset about?

And who is trying to capture a "modern" audience? I never said in any of my notes, comments, or in causal conversation that I was trying to capture a "modern" audience. I said I was trying to go back and do this thing the way Shakespeare himself would have.

What makes you think a modern audience is any different from an Elizabethan one? I don't. Shakespeare put blood and sex in the play because people have always liked that on stage. I'm just trying my best to fulfill the author's intent.

So don't you go calling me a sensationalist.

And don't you go telling me about emendations either, not if you can't even give me an example. (I know there are some - we extended the Lady MacDuffe fight a bit, but it showed a side of Seyton that I felt was important to see. We cut some scenes and combined some characters to cut time and cast size. But he doesn't seem to have an issue with that.)

I don't mind a bad review.

I do mind a badly written review. If a student turned this in, I'd probably give it a D+. None of his arguments are supported, and it appears he did no research into the play, or the methods being used by the director.

Oh, and about the headline? To be fair, I know a lot of times the headlines are added by editors, so this may not be the fault of Mr. Mannex.

But the line is "Lay on, Macduffe." Macbeth is inviting him to a fight, not to go for a stroll in the park. I know you were going for a (labored) pun or something, but get the damn line right, or put it in quotes or something.

Well.

That was therapeutic.

At least he left the cast alone. I'd rather he go after me than them. They're brilliant, and if you think this article made me mad, just try attacking them.

You'd regret it.

And Lisa assures me that this is the sort of review that will actually make people curious to see the show. And she's right. I just don't like being called a sensationalist. And I shudder at the idea I would get the reputation of one. I am not Darren Nicols from "Slings and Arrows," dammit. I'm Geoffrey Tennant, I hope. At least no one is accusing me of being Oliver Welles.

Sadly, Mr. Mannex has a larger readership than I. But I'm a better writer.

I hope.