On being a critic

Reviewing is necessary to elevate Tulsa art

Recently, a bolt of energy shot through Tulsa’s theater community in the wake of a highly critical review by the Tulsa World’s James Watts of the Tulsa Project Theatre production of “Billy Elliot.” Watts opened a conversation on Facebook a few days before his review about whether community theater should be reviewed “honestly,” and a productive and interesting discussion followed, with several local actors and directors chiming in with an unequivocal “yes, please.” Many expressed support for my comment that there was no way the quality of local theater would ever improve if everyone always only said “good job, dear” after every show. 

That idea is based on the assumption that local companies and performers want to improve. Whether or not one identifies as “an artist,” the fact remains: if you’re onstage, you’re offering yourself up to be seen and judged. The critic has the platform and the guts and the commitment to what you’re giving to do it out loud. Pride in one’s work is one thing; a refusal to entertain the notion that one might do better is something different. 

Professional reviewing comes with expectations, too. The job requires research, nuance, and specificity, standards drawn from the whole history of art, and an acknowledgement of one’s own limited perspective, no matter how many performances one has seen. There’s a reason there aren’t many people willing to do it.

I believe a critic’s job is not to criticize, as the word is conventionally understood; nor to be a publicity machine; nor to pretend to be an all-knowing uber-viewer in an audience of foggy-minded dolts. The task is to see and help others see with more clarity, more discernment, more breadth of knowledge. It’s to cultivate an audience that has more room and skill in its imagination to absorb, reflect, and carry into life what has been given in performance. 

I’m not interested in hyper-analyzing this particular Watts/TPT skirmish (though I would like to draw attention to the pitfalls, for everyone, of having only one or two paid arts critics in a city this bustling — for instance, a serious lack of diversity in tastes and viewpoints, and a serious threat of burnout). But I will say that Tulsa’s lack of toughness in general often frustrates me. 

In 2003, after working in New York City as a writer for the Village Voice and other publications, I moved to Tulsa and was shocked at the walking-on-eggshells feeling in the arts community here, among artists and writers alike. The not-so-subtle message persists today: tough  criticism isn’t welcome because we should be “supporting each other.” 

Where is the ferocity, the scrappiness? Are we going to be so careful about not distressing our viewers or readers—and our actual or potential donors or colleagues–that we hem in our own creative and critical power, our belief in the power of live art? 

There are exceptions, of course. A solid quantity of artists and presenters and writers here walk the line between progress and preservation, between challenge and community spirit. As the Irish critic Chris O’Rourke (a onetime Tulsan who wrote about the Watts kerfuffle on Examiner.com) suggests, the excuse that we shouldn’t expect too much, either of artists or of critics, because “they had a small budget” or “they’re young” or “this is Tulsa” is, frankly, insulting, particularly to the hundreds of people working in this cultural landscape who would sure as hell like us to take them seriously.

There’s a widely held belief among dancers: if we don’t get a correction in class, it means the teacher doesn’t think we’re worth investing in. I’m not suggesting it’s not okay to be hurt by a review, or to worry out loud that a tough one will hurt a company’s (perhaps already meager) earnings. Critics are often reviled. They’re often (and why not?) disagreed with. 

But a critic serves an important purpose in any community: to protect and expand the freedom of his or her fellow citizens to judge, to use their minds as well as their feelings. Without that, we might as well not go to the theater at all. An audience that has been shown someone willing to share his or her observations and opinions boldly will eventually grow bold about doing it themselves–which makes a better environment for the arts for all of us.

For more from Alicia, read her review of Tulsa Ballet's latest series.