YOUR KNIGHTS MIGHT BE NICE BOYS BUT SADLY WE'RE ALL GOYS: Rumors of its death strike me as a shade exaggerated, but some folks at Time Out New York (perhaps the third best weekly magazine about goings-on in the big city) have offered up some suggestions as to how to fix Broadway.
Some of them are spot on: More dancing. Less Sondheim. Forget about the canned music. Get ushers actively involved in the exit process (please oh please!). Keep an eye on summer theatre festivals to find the next Urinetown. Some are at least interesting: Create a National Theatre. Offer more opportunities for press contact with directors and designers to create a more educated public. Enough with the countless winks and nods that have become de rigueur for Broadway metatheatre. (Urinetown has a Les Miz number -- or ten. Spamalot needs more Jews to succeed on Broadway. And so forth. Broadway has been all about Broadway for an awfully long time, so this isn't exactly new news.) And some are head scratchers: Hire more dramaturgs. (I have never understood what the purpose of a dramaturg is, and I feel no more enlightened after reading TONY's plea for more of them.) Avoid songs like Wicked's sole showstopper, "Defying Gravity," at all costs.
Whatever you think of the merits of the authors' suggestions, it's nice to see Broadway being covered in a manner that is neither gushy nor too-high-falutin'-for-words.
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