Welcome to Partial (Re)View, my latest blog attempt and project. If you are reading this, you most likely know me. Whether you do or not, you undoubtedly have questions -- what is this blog? How is it different than Gilli’s last blog endeavor (updated a whopping two times!)? Why should I read it? The answers are simple and straightforward. As an aspiring actress and academic, I appreciate theatre on many levels, and have been frustrated for some time with some highly scrutinizing reviews of the Broadway and New York stage at large. There comes a point when criticism is no longer constructive, but indulgent. I can’t bring myself to read another of these reviews, especially after watching audiences firsthand leave a theatre more than satisfied.
A few weeks ago I saw a preview of the new musical “9 to 5” Unless we’re talking about the Pirate Queen (which for me held its weight in the amount my best friend and I laughed), I just don’t see the purpose in shredding a shows to bits. I will not stand for it! I will do what any other self-respecting, 20-year-old Ivy Leaguer would do -- a letter to the New York Times editor you say? Pish. I will create a blog! It is the only way.
I am not claiming to replace the New York Times or even the Columbia Daily Spectator (for which I wrote a Dance Review once upon a freshman year…ah, I was still looking for my college niche then). No, I have a different objective in mind.
A couple of summers ago, I read a book called Garlic and Sapphires by Ruth Reichl, former Food Editor of the New York Times and current Editor in Chief of Gourmet Magazine. This was not the most fun choice of material to read in Tanzania, where I was working at the time and under strict precautionary diet rules that prevented me from eating vegetables. Reading Reichl’s accounts of 5-star dining was difficult in that setting. But that is far from my point in mentioning the book! In Sapphires, Reichl reviews New York restaurants twice -- once as herself, an acclaimed food critic, and once in elaborate, costumed disguises as a number of more “ordinary” diners. Needless to say, the experiences of Ruth and those of her guised personas were at times radically different, reflected in two opposing reviews for the same restaurant.
In Partial (Re)View, I intend to embark on some kind of theatrical version of Ruth’s experiment -- no, I will not be dressing up in a fat suit and fanny pack a la Tyra Banks to analyze the cultural significance (did I mention I’m an Anthropology major?) of the tourist’s perspective of the Broadway musical versus the jaded New Yorker’s. Not my idea at all. Simply, I aim to report my impressions of the New York stage (and maybe even reflect on the 50 Muscovite productions I saw last fall while abroad at the Moscow Art Theater. That is, if you’re in the mood for Chekhov! And honestly, who ISN’T?) as a young writer who has much to learn and does not think she knows it all -- all from the perspective of an humble audience member. Yes, I report to you, my blog, from the “cheap seats,” not the house orchestra seats on press night. No, fellow proletariats and groundlings, I will report to you from the obscured heights of Partial View Seating (which is a feat for me, with my astigmatic vision), the perils of Standing Room Only that beg to compete with the aches and pains I glean at my restaurant hostessing job, and the spontaneity of a seat purchased through Student Rush (and THAT ID is not fake). Better to have seen the show and lose some of it than to not have seen it at all is how a similar saying goes...
I will willingly make a concession: this blog will be FULL of caveats. It will undoubtedly be entangled with extraneous information and anecdotes from my personal life, devoid of any specific structure (I apologize, Columbia Spec, for misplacing the worksheet that outlined the classic formula for good and bad reviews. I expect it might reappear to some degree in my memory). And it will definitely, definitely, be dripping with bias (but not grammatical or spelling errors). But don’t say you weren’t warned. I do not have a schedule for the shows I will see. I expect there will be weeks at a time during which I won’t have the time or money to see a show. But in my head, there is a long, long list of shows I would love to see this summer.
This is my first summer staying in New York City. In between interning at the Museum of Natural History and juggling some other jobs, I hope to devote some time to seeing and then thinking and writing about good, bad, and even mediocre theatre, in a manner that I hope will not alienate readers in the way I have been lately.
Whether you are interested in theatre or not, I hope you enjoy! If not, you should definitely check out that book Garlic and Sapphires; I highly recommend it.
Stay tuned for some reviews!
-G
