The Critics Say...: 57 Theater Reviewers in New York and Beyond Discuss Their Craft and Its Future (29 page)

David Cote:
If it is abstract, nonlinear, or multimedia-based, you have to find new ways to describe it. There is no notational language for avant-garde performance. We have no popular vocabulary or shorthand for deconstruction, intertextuality, or metatheatricality. You can simply describe what is happening, or you can try to interpret it.

Frank Rizzo:
I remember when I saw a play by Will Eno for the first time. His use of language is so unusual, beautiful, and quirky, but sometimes it’s really hard to fathom. It was a really challenging review to write. I didn’t know what to make of it, other than that I loved it. I had to articulate why I thought it was wonderful when I didn’t know just yet why it was so wonderful. I really had to think that one through.

Helen Shaw:
I find it very helpful to turn deeply inward.

Alexis Soloski:
In the case of more experimental work, it can be incredibly stylized, but it should be appropriate to the world of the play. I look for a complete vision of the world, whether it’s naturalistic or heavily abstracted. I look for the unity of the effort.

Zachary Stewart:
A critic can note the theatrical pedigree of an experimental work (and I often do), but that usually has little bearing on a work’s ability to connect with an audience beyond a certain snob appeal.

MATT WINDMAN
: Should ticket price be taken into consideration in a review?

Charles Isherwood:
I don’t see how a critic can take ticket price into consideration. Do you start grading on a curve? If a ticket to a play is only $20 and you moderately enjoyed it, do you therefore scale up your enthusiasm because it’s cheap? If it’s an exceptional case, like when they were charging whatever the hell they were charging for
Young Frankenstein
, you can take note of the ticket price in a reportorial context. I don’t think the expense of a ticket has ever influenced my opinion. Your opinion is what it is. The fact is that we don’t pay for any of our tickets. Very often, we’re not even aware of the ticket price. We just know that Broadway is expensive and Off Broadway is slightly less expensive.

Elisabeth Vincentelli:
I try to keep it in mind. I mentioned the ticket price in a review I just filed of
The Muscles in Our Toes
, an Off Broadway production by Labyrinth Theater Company. It wasn’t a good show, but there were interesting things about it, there was a really great performance in it, and the tickets were only $20 each. So I thought, Do you want to see a really great performance in a not-very-good show for $20? A show like that could be interesting, especially if the subject speaks to you, so I thought the price was relevant.

Ticket price also becomes a concern when you get into the really expensive stuff. It’s like $160 a ticket on Broadway now—and that’s just for a regular seat, not even for a premium ticket. I brought the price up when Lincoln Center Festival sold tickets to Genet’s
The Maids
with Cate Blanchett for $360.

Frank Scheck:
I try not to let price be too influential. But if we’re talking a big Broadway musical and it’s bad, I might be a little more inclined to warn people against it.

Zachary Stewart:
A lot of shows on Broadway are fun, but not $150 worth of fun.

Leonard Jacobs:
I don’t think ticket price has anything to do with anything. I know that a lot of people don’t necessarily agree with me on this point, and they’re all wrong. Paying $100 for a ticket probably doesn’t mean all that much to someone who’s making $250,000 a year. It’s different for someone making $30,000 a year as a temp. But who am I to decide whether a show is worth the money or not? Someone making just $30,000 a year may think a particular show is the most amazing thing in the history of the world, and that it’s worth eating ramen noodles for weeks to save up the money to see it.

Michael Dale:
The creative artists don’t determine the ticket price, so their work shouldn’t be held responsible for it.

Peter Filichia:
Ticket price absolutely should be taken into consideration. Many in our society think, If I’m paying this much, I should get so much entertainment for that money.

Terry Teachout:
I have said on occasion, “This really wasn’t worth a hundred dollars.” But since the price of a ticket is a given, I’m not sure it makes a whole lot of sense to talk about it in a review.

MATT WINDMAN
: What do you look for from actors?

Hilton Als:
Truth, humor, and heart.

Michael Dale:
Details, details, details.

Adam Feldman:
Acting is very hard to define. It’s like the Supreme Court on pornography: “You know it when you see it.” It involves the extent to which the actor can transform himself or herself while also being alert to how that transformation plays out in front of an audience. Some actors make the mistake of being overly interior, of not finding successful ways to communicate their feelings to an audience in a theatrical way. And there are actors who make the other kind of mistake, where it looks too stagey, and you don’t get a sense of the investment that will bring you along as an audience member into sharing their world. You only get the exterior signs of that investment.

For me, the most exciting performances tend to be the ones in which the actor is making strong and smart choices that illuminate the character and is taking risks with those choices. Strong choices are risky because if you fail, you fail big. A lot of very bad acting comes from big choices that aren’t pulled off. But when a big choice is pulled off, it’s genuinely exciting. As an audience member, there’s a sense of danger involved. The bigger the risk, the more potentially rewarding it can be.

Marilyn Stasio:
How do you judge an actor? You can’t see their process, so you look for them in the characters they play. They have to understand their characters so well that it feels natural to be in their skins. I’m thinking of Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart in
Waiting for Godot
. They were so into those characters. They understood them. They’d been living with them. They loved them. They responded to them. They were not acting the characters. They were thoroughly in their skin. That’s the best kind of acting.

John Simon:
It is very hard to answer that. It’s like asking what you consider poetry—although perhaps it’s easier with poetry. There are some obvious things. I like good elocution. That’s what’s so wonderful about British actors when they do Shakespeare—not so much when they do other work. They have the most beautiful diction. Every syllable comes off crisp and unmistakable. When American actors do Shakespeare, it often gets murmured and mumbled.

It’s also important to know how to move. British actors spend a lot of time learning how to move properly. I don’t think American actors spend such time. Of course, if an actor is playing a lowdown, Bowery bum, he wouldn’t want to move as if he was playing King Lear, but elegant movement is a lovely thing to have.

I also think looks matter a lot, especially for actresses, and even for actors. As you know, this is where I get attacked. You’re sort of in love with heterosexual actors or actresses. You want them to be charming or beautiful or delightful in one way or another. They don’t necessarily have to be beautiful, although it helps. You want them to have some kind of physical presence which is pleasing. A good-looking person can always play down his or her looks, but a bad-looking person cannot play up his or her bad looks. This gets people riled up, I guess because most people are insecure about their own looks. They somehow think that you, as a critic, are reviewing something that they absolutely don’t have, so therefore it should not matter. I would not judge people at a cocktail party the way I do in a play, but that is something they do not understand.

Michael Portantiere:
I don’t think it’s appropriate to comment on an actor’s appearance unless it has something to do with the actor’s specific role. One should be very careful when suggesting that a person is not attractive enough or too heavy for a role. Early on, I made some mistakes in that way.

Helen Shaw:
There are a few things that jump out, like if someone can’t project or perform in a big house, but most of the time you are looking at people living in roles.

Zachary Stewart:
I look for actors to convey the playwright’s work in a clear, compelling, and truthful way.

Chris Jones:
I look for truth and vulnerability. Over the years, I’ve found that the most interesting actors are vulnerable. Many famous actors are incapable of vulnerability. Can you show me how you really are? Can you show me how life really is? In Chicago, ensemble acting is privileged in a big way. I’ve come to greatly admire the ability to be subsumed by a role and disappear into an ensemble.

Perez Hilton:
I look for clear, discernible talent—where you look at a person onstage and say, “Wow, they’re so talented.”

Ben Brantley:
Above all, I look for freshness in acting, no matter what kind of acting it is, and how much it steers away from clichés. If it’s a naturalistic play, I look for how much real emotional conviction there is, and how much you feel in the moment with the actor. Of course, a lot of it has to do with casting.

Michael Sommers:
I’d like to be able to hear what they’re saying and see what they’re doing. Besides that, I want clarity.

Alexis Soloski:
Acting is flexible. I’ve seen terrible performances that are incredibly moving. Sometimes there is a great poetry from a bad actor, from the chasm between what the actor performs and what the role requires. You see the role in incredibly stark relief when the actor is failing so miserably. I certainly enjoy when there is a close mimetic relationship between the actor and the character. But when there is no relationship at all, that can be fascinating, too. As a failed actor, I’m very impressed by—and jealous of—actors who have remarkable emotional access.

Christine Dolen:
I watch the choices the actor makes and figure out whether they’re effective in the context of the play. If it’s an actor I’ve seen over and over again, and they’re doing the kind of the same performance they usually do (no matter what the play is), they should be called out on it.

David Cote:
I look for spontaneity—somebody who makes you forget that they are speaking lines in a theater. I look for someone who has charisma, who has magnetism, who is mysterious. I like people who are unique and who achieve the greatest effects with the greatest economy of movement and vocal intensity.

David Sheward:
In the theater, you need to have this combination of presentation and representation. You have to be believable, but also larger-than-life to a certain extent. You need to have both in balance. It also depends on the role. If it’s a musical, broadness is acceptable. The recent
Twelfth Night
and
Richard III
from London’s Globe had amazing acting from Mark Rylance. He said the lines as if they had never been said before. All too often with Shakespeare and the other classics that have been done hundreds of times, you feel like the actors are just reciting the lines, particularly the very famous ones, and not really saying them because they are so familiar. But with Mark Rylance, it was like hearing those lines for the first time because of the way he delivered them.

Don Aucoin:
Ideally, there should be a sort of reality to the performances. Does this actor really seem to understand his or her character? After seeing a performance, can I envision the character’s life before and after he or she took the stage? If an actor or actress is performing Shakespeare, are they speaking Shakespeare’s language as if it’s everyday language? Does it flow naturally from their mouths, or are they declaiming it in an obviously stagy way?

Elisabeth Vincentelli:
It depends on what’s appropriate for the material. The acting has to be consistent with what the material requires or the director’s vision. Sometimes I like a very naturalistic performance, and sometimes I like a very showy, hammy performance. I didn’t care at all for Richard Nelson’s
The Apple Family Plays
at the Public Theater. I thought they were completely overrated, but I really liked the super-naturalistic acting in them. At the other end of the spectrum, I can enjoy the acting in a stylized Robert Wilson production.

Michael Musto:
I look for immersion in the character from moment to moment, and not just in the lines.

Richard Zoglin:
I just want it to be true. Sometimes I feel like I’m watching actors who are more interested in getting a Tony nomination or a standing ovation, and are really overdoing it at the expense of the play. I much prefer good ensemble acting that is in the service of the play instead of the actor.

Rob Weinert-Kendt:
I don’t want to see acting. You know what I mean? I want to see behavior—and I’m not just talking about super-naturalistic behavior, like watching somebody on their couch. The best forms of acting that I’ve seen have a life of their own. The actors really look like they just walked into the theater, like that’s who they really are. That’s not acting—that’s being. I’m thinking of Taylor Mac in
Good
Person of Szechwan
. There was a reality to that performance that was right down to the bone. It was this crazy, Brechtian musical theater piece, but it was so emotionally true.

I think actors have the hardest job. They’re the ones on the line, doing and embodying all those things. They’re the ones we’re staring at the whole time. I don’t mind an actor who can do technically proficient things, like Tony Shalhoub in
Act One
and all of what he did in that performance, but it would all be for nothing if there wasn’t an emotional truth behind it. I don’t think anyone can fake that.

I think we’re living in a golden age of acting, especially in musical theater. When I think about Kelli O’Hara, Sutton Foster, and Audra McDonald, I can’t think of better actors in any era or any medium. They are not capable of having a false moment on stage, even if they’re in stuff that’s not all that great.