There was a fantastic discussion at the Rocky party about the state of the cast. The vocal consensus was this:
There's an undercurrent of over-professionalism at the show. In small but definite ways, the drive for professionalism stifles some of the fun of the show and makes working at it a chore. Because the show isn't as much fun, it isn't as good, and the audience has noticed. Both directors, theater 3, and Acid's absence were blamed for these problems.
It's so tough to disentangle real harmful effects from nostalgia. So, tell me: do you agree? Have we gained the world and lost our soul (or raised the bar and broken our backs)? The drive for screen accuracy can push us to do better, but if it drives out jokes and connecting with the audience-- if our performance just duplicates the film-- do we want it? The cast members used to work up the audience waiting outside before the show. Does anyone do that now? We have such a great group, and we can fix these problems, but maybe not without big changes.
Feel free to post anonymously or email me separately.
There's an undercurrent of over-professionalism at the show. In small but definite ways, the drive for professionalism stifles some of the fun of the show and makes working at it a chore. Because the show isn't as much fun, it isn't as good, and the audience has noticed. Both directors, theater 3, and Acid's absence were blamed for these problems.
It's so tough to disentangle real harmful effects from nostalgia. So, tell me: do you agree? Have we gained the world and lost our soul (or raised the bar and broken our backs)? The drive for screen accuracy can push us to do better, but if it drives out jokes and connecting with the audience-- if our performance just duplicates the film-- do we want it? The cast members used to work up the audience waiting outside before the show. Does anyone do that now? We have such a great group, and we can fix these problems, but maybe not without big changes.
Feel free to post anonymously or email me separately.
no subject
Date: 2007-05-25 01:14 am (UTC)To some extent, I agree that there's always an us vs. management distinction, but I've been involved in two other Rocky-sized groups that similarly have important collective projects to pursue and decisions to make, and similarly have that distinction but (I think) with less of the division. I think the difference is in how information flows. You and Gary are great at taking feedback, and I certainly appreciate that you're there to make a lot of these decisions. But I don't think that the decision-making process (the information going into it, and the different options considered) needs to be secret. It leaves that the rest of the cast to react to your decisions, rather than feeling like they're their own.