Read Online The Critics Say...: 57 Theater Reviewers in New York and Beyond Discuss Their Craft and Its Future by Matt Windman - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Matt Windman
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frustrations of the profession.
David Rooney: I fell into journalism almost accidentally. I studied film and had a lifetime interest in theater. During my high school years in Australia, I got involved with theater companies. I flirted with the idea of becoming an actor, but I made bad choices with my audition pieces for the National Institute of Dramatic Art. Everybody said, “Don’t do Tennessee Williams,” and I did Tom in The Glass Menagerie . Everybody said, “For your Shakespeare piece, don’t do Romeo,” which is exactly what I did. It wasn’t to be, and now I’m relieved that it didn’t happen. It’s too much of a struggle.
When I first left Australia, I traveled around the United States for a year. I spent six months in New York and discovered the city’s wonderful theater landscape. Then I moved to Europe and spent 20 years there. I had friends working in theater, so I saw pretty much everything in the West End and beyond. I came to New York once a year during those two decades and caught as much as I could.
After I moved to Italy in 1990, I started working for Variety as a freelancer. I took over as the Rome bureau chief in 1993. I had little journalistic experience prior to that. I had written a handful of book reviews for Time Out while I was in London and some pieces for an Australian independent film publication. I started covering European and North American film festivals. After 14 years there, I was looking to leave Italy, and Peter Bart, the editor-in-chief at Variety at the time, offered me a transfer to New York as a film reporter and reviewer. A year later, Charles Isherwood left Variety to go to the New York Times . Peter knew I had a passionate interest in theater and liked my reviewing style, so I became the chief theater critic and theater editor.
David Cote: I was an actor doing experimental plays at venues such as La MaMa, P.S. 122, and the Ontological-Hysteric Theater at St. Mark’s Church. While I was doing that, I became angry about the lack of media coverage of Off Off Broadway, so I co-founded a self-produced pre-blog called OFF . That was in 1996. It was basically manifests and reviews, photocopied and stapled and left for free at downtown theaters. In 2000, a position opened up at Time Out New York for a theater writer. Jason Zinoman knew me from Off Off Broadway, and that’s how he contacted me. I had never written a formal theater review before. I learned the journalism ropes at Time Out .
David Sheward: I wanted to be an actor, so I got a job at Backstage , thinking that I could find out about audition notices. I started doing reviews there, and then I became an editor, and that gradually became the focus on my attention. I was at Backstage for over 20 years.
Michael Dale: I became a critic totally by accident. About three months after starting a blog about attending theater, I got an email from the editor-in-chief of a brand new web site, BroadwayWorld.com . He offered me the chance to write about pretty much whatever I wanted. I started writing humorous essays, but then we started getting invited to review Off Off Broadway plays. I had never thought much about reviewing, but I started taking assignments. Eventually, the website was accepted by the Broadway League’s press list, and I was named chief critic.
Zachary Stewart: I really did just fall into it. When I began working as the listings editor at TheaterMania.com in 2008 I would request to review shows I was interested in but weren’t being covered by any of the regular reviewers (stuff like haunted houses, novelty gay musicals, and Off Off Off Broadway). By 2012, I started reviewing four or five shows a month. And in 2013, I became the chief critic at TheaterMania .
I had previously directed several shows in the city, and I never really had any intention of becoming a critic, but I’ve discovered that I like being a part of the conversation without having to make the personal sacrifices (lots of travel,
David Rooney: I fell into journalism almost accidentally. I studied film and had a lifetime interest in theater. During my high school years in Australia, I got involved with theater companies. I flirted with the idea of becoming an actor, but I made bad choices with my audition pieces for the National Institute of Dramatic Art. Everybody said, “Don’t do Tennessee Williams,” and I did Tom in The Glass Menagerie . Everybody said, “For your Shakespeare piece, don’t do Romeo,” which is exactly what I did. It wasn’t to be, and now I’m relieved that it didn’t happen. It’s too much of a struggle.
When I first left Australia, I traveled around the United States for a year. I spent six months in New York and discovered the city’s wonderful theater landscape. Then I moved to Europe and spent 20 years there. I had friends working in theater, so I saw pretty much everything in the West End and beyond. I came to New York once a year during those two decades and caught as much as I could.
After I moved to Italy in 1990, I started working for Variety as a freelancer. I took over as the Rome bureau chief in 1993. I had little journalistic experience prior to that. I had written a handful of book reviews for Time Out while I was in London and some pieces for an Australian independent film publication. I started covering European and North American film festivals. After 14 years there, I was looking to leave Italy, and Peter Bart, the editor-in-chief at Variety at the time, offered me a transfer to New York as a film reporter and reviewer. A year later, Charles Isherwood left Variety to go to the New York Times . Peter knew I had a passionate interest in theater and liked my reviewing style, so I became the chief theater critic and theater editor.
David Cote: I was an actor doing experimental plays at venues such as La MaMa, P.S. 122, and the Ontological-Hysteric Theater at St. Mark’s Church. While I was doing that, I became angry about the lack of media coverage of Off Off Broadway, so I co-founded a self-produced pre-blog called OFF . That was in 1996. It was basically manifests and reviews, photocopied and stapled and left for free at downtown theaters. In 2000, a position opened up at Time Out New York for a theater writer. Jason Zinoman knew me from Off Off Broadway, and that’s how he contacted me. I had never written a formal theater review before. I learned the journalism ropes at Time Out .
David Sheward: I wanted to be an actor, so I got a job at Backstage , thinking that I could find out about audition notices. I started doing reviews there, and then I became an editor, and that gradually became the focus on my attention. I was at Backstage for over 20 years.
Michael Dale: I became a critic totally by accident. About three months after starting a blog about attending theater, I got an email from the editor-in-chief of a brand new web site, BroadwayWorld.com . He offered me the chance to write about pretty much whatever I wanted. I started writing humorous essays, but then we started getting invited to review Off Off Broadway plays. I had never thought much about reviewing, but I started taking assignments. Eventually, the website was accepted by the Broadway League’s press list, and I was named chief critic.
Zachary Stewart: I really did just fall into it. When I began working as the listings editor at TheaterMania.com in 2008 I would request to review shows I was interested in but weren’t being covered by any of the regular reviewers (stuff like haunted houses, novelty gay musicals, and Off Off Off Broadway). By 2012, I started reviewing four or five shows a month. And in 2013, I became the chief critic at TheaterMania .
I had previously directed several shows in the city, and I never really had any intention of becoming a critic, but I’ve discovered that I like being a part of the conversation without having to make the personal sacrifices (lots of travel,
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