Threaded Order Chronological Order
| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Posted by: chrismpls 02:40 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
| In reply to: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - Delvino 11:42 am EST 12/20/22 | |
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| Maybe it's a "kill your darlings" thing, or the kind of self-consciousness that often creeps in when an actor has a line that contains the title of the play and you can tell they enjoy that just a hair too much? | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Posted by: lanky 07:01 am EST 12/23/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - chrismpls 02:40 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
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| Reminds me of a critique a teacher gave after I did a scene from Shafer's "The Private Ear." "The danger," she said, "is in having too much fun with the laugh lines. The character doesn't know what he says is funny." | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Posted by: Delvino 09:12 am EST 12/23/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - lanky 07:01 am EST 12/23/22 | |
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| I believe you just nailed it. Perfect. | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Posted by: Delvino 04:54 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - chrismpls 02:40 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
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| Ah. Well considered. Makes sense. More than Green’s oblique diagnosis. Thanks. | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Posted by: singleticket 12:42 pm EST 12/21/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - Delvino 04:54 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
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| What is oblique about Green's review other than the line you excerpted out of context? | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Last Edit: singleticket 01:25 pm EST 12/21/22 | |
| Posted by: singleticket 01:18 pm EST 12/21/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - singleticket 12:42 pm EST 12/21/22 | |
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| I agree with this from Green's review: Complications like that are unpleasant for absolutists; Guirgis’s needling of victimhood may please as few people on the left as his needling of Rudolph Giuliani may rile those on the right. Along with anyone who can’t tolerate profanity, which is basically the play’s linguistic glue, they will have a hard time warming to a playwright who isn’t interested in telling us what’s right. He only wants to show us what’s real. Whether Guirgis's representation of the characters' world is based on personal experience or entirely made up his refusal of both miserablism and finger-wagging in favor of a fond but unsparing comic tone makes the play's characters feel more real than most plays about people who are struggling economically under the effects of class and racism. |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Posted by: ryhog 10:37 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - Delvino 04:54 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
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| I sense that Jesse had something to say but obscured it because he hadn't quite figured out what that was. | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Last Edit: garyd 11:34 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
| Posted by: garyd 11:31 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - ryhog 10:37 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
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| You may be right. However, my take-away from reading that sentence is that Green sensed the actors, at times, but not continuously, and not to the detriment of the production as a whole, regressed, perhaps due to personal emotions regarding the thematic elements, to proseltyzing rather than allowing the characters being portrayed elucidate those elements. In other words, they wanted to make sure that the audience was "getting it". I don't know as I have yet to see the play but, if my interpretation of the sentence is correct, I think it is a valid critical observation by Green and one with which I may or not agree once I have. Actually, this is one of reasons I , in the past, made it a point not to read reviews of theatre I had every intention of seeing. Reading them afterwards is always much more fun. | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Posted by: ryhog 12:16 am EST 12/21/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - garyd 11:31 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
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| I think your reading is likely correct but I guess I would then ask, why did Green right it so vaguely. You did not seem to have much trouble articulating it. I've seen the play in both New York iterations. (I vaguely think I saw the original twice but I am too lazy to check.) I did not pick up on this sense personally but maybe that has something to do with what I brought with me to the current production. | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Last Edit: garyd 01:05 am EST 12/21/22 | |
| Posted by: garyd 12:59 am EST 12/21/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - ryhog 12:16 am EST 12/21/22 | |
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| I suppose I did not find it as vague as you and others and I may represent a singular minority. I simply see it as a comment on the acting and, possibly ,the direction. Of course, it could also be something that he brought to the production. We all bring, I think, certain predilections to art whether we realize it or not. Perhaps it is one of the tenets of art to challenge those predilections. I hope so. (Of course, in this case we are critiquing the critique, not the play, and that is okay as well. Criticism is an art form) | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Posted by: huskyital (huskyital@yahoo.con) 03:30 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - chrismpls 02:40 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
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| When I saw the show I thought all the actors were superb. I am 73 and I believe Jesse Green is the worst lead reviewer for the New York stage at the New York Times. They can do better. | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Posted by: MockingbirdGirl 04:13 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - huskyital 03:30 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
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| A charge that has been leveled at every lead reviewer the NYT has ever had! | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Last Edit: singleticket 12:46 pm EST 12/21/22 | |
| Posted by: singleticket 12:44 pm EST 12/21/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - MockingbirdGirl 04:13 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
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| Yes, that does seem to be a time honored tradition! | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Posted by: huskyital (huskyital@yahoo.com) 09:35 am EST 12/21/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - MockingbirdGirl 04:13 pm EST 12/20/22 | |
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| Bring back Walter Kerr. For anyone here who is really interested in theater criticism they should read his 1962 book the decline of pleasure which was required Reading in a drama course I took. Mr. Kerr received the Pulitzer Prize for criticism. I remember when hello Dolly opened he said that the audiences need not hold onto their hats because they will be throwing them up in the air anyway. | |
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| re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review | |
| Posted by: singleticket 12:45 pm EST 12/21/22 | |
| In reply to: re: A line in Green's "Riverside and Crazy" review - huskyital 09:35 am EST 12/21/22 | |
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| I had no idea that this book existed. I'm very curious to read it now. | |
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