[darkmage]

Warning: x-posted to BFE and back again

Here's an article from Phoenix's major newspaper about this week's run of cats. Not only was macavity.org/forum mentioned, so were a few of you.

http://www.azcentral.com/ent/arts/articles/0504cats0504.html

While I can understand why he doesn't like Cats (although I don't agree), I'm lost on why he waxed lyrical about the uber-cheapass Marc Robin production a couple years ago. Sheesh. Makes me wonder about his *ahem* objectivity...

[MsJellicle]

Oh. Yet another critic who doesn't like CATS. Doesn't he know that saying anything and everything negative about CATS is just so.....90's? How boring. Why does he bother writing reviews? Oh, because people read them? I don't know why they would. His reviews have no plot. Oh, people like to be entertained....that's why. Course, the only entertainment in his article is the fact that it's so unimaginative. But wait! He actually took the time to google some websites. Oh my! This is new. But..... still boring. More criticisms and sarcasm. Oh joy. I find his lack of originality fairly "numbing".

On the other hand, I think I found a cure for my late night sleeplessness. *Bookmarks article*

~MsJ

[Swan]

Now, now, MsJ, let's be fair...

The style of that article is irritating indeed, but as for "why he writes reviews", I'd answer "because it's his job and he is (hopefully) paid for that", and as for "his reviews have no plot", I'd answer "reviews are not supposed to have plots". I am a journalist myself (it's one of my jobs), I do write reviews quite often, and I hate it when someone is sarcastic about my job because they don't like what I write.

That said, I do see a few poor points in that critic's article about Cats. For example:

- he implicitly labels as freaks the members of Cats forums, just because some of them use Cats-related nicknames (BTW, this implies he has no idea about what a cultural community is... which for a journalist isn't very flattering);

- he spreads sarcasm everywhere, which of course is useless and not an example of good journalism;

- he finds it's a problem that Cats was one of the first musicals with loads of merchandising, but this hasn't got anything do to with the show itself, more with RUG and Mackintosh etc etc;

- he says nothing at all about the quality of this production, which is definitely not helpful for his readers who might need a review to get an idea about the production and the performers, possibly in order to decide if they'd like to see it or not (this IMO is the biggest fault of the review);

- he finds a relation between the oingoing success of "old" shows such as Cats, Phantom, Les Mis, etc, and the difficulties of other shows such as Urinetown or The Light in Piazza, forgetting that this happens in EVERY cultural field (classical books are always more sold than "experimental" ones; Beethoven, Mozart and Chopin are always more listened that Stravinskij, Satie or Schonberg) - yes, people do like what they already know, or what they can understand without too much effort - where's the news about that?

- the way he mentions Batman and Catwoman makes me think he has never read "The Dark Knight Returns" or "Batman: Year One" (if you are a serious journalist, and if you really have to mention Batman and Catwoman in an article, at least please try to know what you're talking about, reading the probably two main works ever written about these two characters).

Uhm, enough to say I don't like the article as well, of course. Oh, one more thing... the critic says his name will be dog in all of the Cats forums on the web.
I don't see why. I personally wouldn't waste my time writing his name... better to just forget it.

Swan

[darkmage]

That's his style for you. It's one of the reasons I don't particularly like the guy.

Swan, you raise a bunch of good points. What I found disturbing is the 'ooh, they're going to talk about ME online now!!' attitude that a teenage drama queen would pull. Makes me wonder why he's writing articles--is he doing it to actually promote theatre as an art form, or simply to get his name in print?

EDIT: and the reason he didn't review the performance is because it hasn't happened yet. The local run starts on the 8th (tomorrow) and runs through Thursday, the 10th. I have Thursday night tix and will post a trip report after I see it.

[Rumblepurr]

He wrote the review BEFORE the performance??? This tactic sounds like tagging graffiti on everything in sight because you enjoy using spray cans. And this guy 'thinks' fans of CATS will come back at him? Someone send him the to the Homer Simpson School of Journalism...

MsJellicle is correct in this review being almost a carbon copy of every "Theatre Critic" who does not like the show. Any "Theatre Critic" worth their salt observes the production, and then produces both strong and weak points on the production before judging it. This particular one decided that websites and morgue copies justified his review, and he did not have to go to the theatre... If he wanted to used the internet to research the play, perhaps he should have checked out the interviews with Trevor Nunn, John Napier, Gillian Lynne as well as Andrew Lloyd Webber. Maybe, he should have gone a bit further with TS Eliot, for that matters. But, I forgot... he would rather sleep through it... And TS Eliot's poems about "Practical Cats" are boring... The reason he missed the concept of a "minimal" plot is because he did NOT read Trevor Nunn's interview. And the Cat Poems of TSE are not the only ones used by the show. He mentioned some other works of TSE, and did not realize that Trevor Nunn and Richard Stilgoe USED poems outside "Practical Cats" to create Memory and some of the other related lines/songs in the musical...

And he asks the universal question of "Why?" when he writes about the musical's popularity. I always love this response... If you want to know "Why?" - research it! Ask people... Interview the performers... Talk with the production staff... Be a (ready for this?) Journalist or a reporter and find out...

Someone get this guy back into writing obits - he is a natural for putting down people with minimal research...

Rumblepurr
The Writer Cat.

[Moongewl]

He's really not treading any original ground here.
"I found the poems boring when I read them in college." Pfft. A college student finds a children's book of poetry boring. That's SUCH an insult. And then he compares Old Possum's to The Waste Land. Dude, you really missed the part where The Waste Land was for adults and is both deep and boring and talks about sex in a canoe.
Hmm, can you bring a lawsuit against someone for using your screen name without permission? (Probably not, but I'd love to send him a few threatening emails about it.)
And I just love how people take Cats as a personal insult. "Like, dude! It's about cats! How can it still be around after a quarter of a century?"
It's called "different people like different things." Some people don't care too much about plot. I love comic book movies because they're visually appealing--and couldn't care less about the plot half the time.

[Swan]

[darkmage]

^Yep, that's about right.

Seeing as Cats sells out or nearly so every time it comes through town (last visit was Sun City back in September, before that it was at Gammage in Tempe last week of December) I don't think a whole hell of a lot of people listen to him. Thank God.

We'll see what the critics have to say--if anything--after the show. If I find anything in the local papers I'll post the link(s).

[abbeycat]

ironically, the 'reviewers' of shows that slate them have occupied a seat. That seat couldn't be sold that performance to a real fan, and thus they had to choose another performance date.

Thus prolonging the run of the show and ensuring another ticket sale.

ha ha ha!

however I am glad he didn't go to see it, as if I was in the theatre at the same time I probably would have stabbed him with the staples in my brochure.

[darkmage]

Nice.

And if he was *really* paying attention he'd have noticed (no offence to Carb) that macavity.org/forum seems to be on serious life support these days...