Hi Augusta – thanks for this. Yes, reviewing is often thankless, and it’s hard work. Why do we do it? Adding up the hours can be alarming: for me an average review takes about four or five hours, not counting the hours spent watching the work. That’s a lot of time for each show. And upsetting people goes with the territory: I figure you just have to wear that (although I won’t wear abuse): there’s something graceless in a critic squealing about being criticised. But it’s certainly not all bad: I find it rewarding in all sorts of ways.

Reviewing while being a practising artist is complicated, but I think it’s worthwhile: artists have made distinguished critics for centuries, and bring particular perceptions that others might not have. I don’t see why things should be any different in 2011. But it does mean you have to be as scrupulous and transparent as possible. No matter how much you try to be that, there will always be those who will claim bad faith. Again, you just have to wear that, and make sure you’re square with your own conscience. Again, that can be hard work. I think blogs permit that transparency in ways that, say, newspapers don’t, which is why I resigned from the Oz once I found I was writing in the theatre again: it’s impossible to have that fluidity and flexibility as a print critic, and so too much remains undeclared. I guess it requires a constant process of self-interrogation, which isn’t a bad thing for a critic anyway.

Comps for shows seem to me to be utterly uncontroversial. It’s true: most reviewers, especially those unaffiliated with media organisations, couldn’t afford to go otherwise (I certainly couldn’t). It’s never stopped a reviewer from slashing a production they don’t like.

Oh, I wasn’t suggesting *you* were being graceless! Sometimes a whinge is justified: at least, I hope it is, as a serial whinger… Reviewing is not an easy gig, from all sorts of perspectives, and if you’re doing it for nothing, at the very least some acknowledgement of that effort would be nice. A bit of mutual respect goes a long way!

I really should avoid clumsy attempts at devil’s advocacy late at night when tired and grumpy. I do sincerely apologise for any distress caused, it was not intended.

You know, I’ve actually never thought of you as primarily a reviewer, Gus. I first met you as a lighting operator in the 1990’s, then met you again as a director in the 2000’s. Sometime after that people told me you also wrote reviews. I suspect it’s the lighting operation that’s done it, anybody who takes tech jobs is eternally a maker in my world.

As for direction, ‘Basketcase’ was the best piece in Griffringe (though I am hanging out for ‘Alice’), ‘The Night We Lost Jenny’ was the best piece in ‘Women, Power & Culture – Then’ (most of the rest of it was really quite bad).

The thing is, I essentially agree with your position Gus. It just seems to rest on insufficiently examined assumptions (to satisfy me – they obviously satisfy you and that’s fine – you’re the one doing the reviewing work after all). I just really hate unexamined assumptions – go back to Socrates ‘unexamined life is not worth living’.

There’s a certain amount of irony here, as I’ve actually put in quite a lot of time fighting for more comps to be given out, and fighting to allow them to be used as flexibly as possible. I very much think reviewers should be given comps. I’d go further and say that in general the more comps you give out (whether to cast & crew, members of the theatre, via competitions etc), the more paying punters you’ll get in.

I just can’t seem to come up with a good underlying reason why this should be so, which bugs me because it seems to be a useful thing to know. So I keep poking at it like a loose tooth and sometimes accidentally cause tooth ache in an unintended target.

Take the argument that if reviewers had to pay to see everything they review they wouldn’t be able to afford it – that’s absolutely true I’m sure. But it assumes that reviews do add value to the production, rather than providing an answer to the question of whether or not they do, or how. It also remains a rather singular arrangement in that reviewers in most other industries proudly declaim they paid for the products they review (‘Choice’ magazine et al).

For myself I get my feedback from the audience. As an actor it’s the response of the audience during the show, that strange electric connection that links the stage and stalls and almost becomes a conversation between the actors and audience creating art together (never the curtain call, I personally find that excruciating). As a director it’s standing to one side in the foyer as the audience leave the theatre after a show, watching happy faces. I always think that for some of these people it’s the first play they have ever seen, for some of them it’s the last play they will ever see. And I am so very glad that they enjoyed it, I find it incredibly moving.

I could tell you any number of stories about reviewers: reviewers turning up at the door on the night demanding comps and becoming angry and almost violent when told the house was full (“I am PRESS!” said multiple times loudly with a bit of fist waving really not very endearing), reviewers changing their comp bookings multiple times and then not turning up, reviewers being tremendously fussy about where they sit and then not actually writing a review, and so on. But that’s not really getting us anywhere useful.

Basically, I agree with your thought that reviewers should be given comps – I just wish I knew why I agree. If I can use the basic essay structure somewhat metaphorically, I can see a strong intro and conclusion, can’t see a body.

I dunno, it’s probably not a very interesting discussion. As much as anything I’m arguing with myself, never a good look.

As an aside, people getting angry and abusive because a reviewer can’t make it at late notice… that’s just utterly wrong.

After a particularly down and out few days trying to grapple with whatever realm of reviewing/criticism/arts writing I fit into in Adelaide, I am confronted with the idea that when people say that “critics should think of the livelihood of the people they write about”, how much do they think about the livelihood of the writers themselves? I would love to think I could one day make a living as an arts writer – but not only do I not think we live in a media climate where this could happen, I don’t think we live in an artistic community where this could happen.

I pay for more shows than I am comp’d tickets to, and almost all of the comps I get are when I write for publications other than my blog. I pay for these tickets because I love the theatre, and that’s how I got into writing about it in the first place (and under 30s in Adelaide typically get a pretty sweet deal). I sit in a place where people compliment me on my blog and where it sits on Adelaide, and yet I’m not on their press release lists, let alone their comp lists. I agree with you in that I think that arts writing is an important piece of recording a transient art form. To me, offering someone a comp to review is to say “we value your voice, this work won’t be around forever, we want to know you saw it.”

I think encouraging voices is important – as is having open conversations about quality so we don’t get bogged down in a culture of poorly written responses. I like to think I’m at least somewhat important precisely because I often write from a young/feminist perspective, but I’ve often been told I shouldn’t let these “feelings” get in the way of a review.

I wish that it wasn’t seen the only art which people deserve to get paid for is capital-A-Art: I wish people could see that the hours of work, the gnashing of teeth, the tears when the words won’t come, the fear that people won’t understand what you are saying, where you are coming from, how you don’t measure up to how good you want to be, happen when writing a response to an art just as easy as they come in making of Art. I wish critics weren’t so readily seen as “other”. I wish I could brush off the abuse, the snide remarks, and most of all, the invisibility, and stop questioning my place and how long it is until I quit. I wish people would at least reply to my emails.

This will last a few days. Then a new Good Thing will happen and I’ll feel better about Adelaide and the role that I play and the place that arts writing has here and everywhere. I look forward to the day the roller-coaster comes only from my own judgment of my craft; and not other’s judgment of my career.

Hi Augusta,

I’m with Alison on the “comps” issue. Whether or not I pay for a ticket has absolutely no impact on what I write (or if I write) afterwards.

Nor, for the record, do the canapés, or the quality and availability of post-show wine. No does whether I like the actor/writer/producer “in real life”.

I’m in the, er … privileged position of being paid to write reviews. Unlike the old days (we’re talking a decade ago and more), reviewing is largely a freelance gig these days and not a well paid one. A part time wage for a full time job, I suppose.

I see about 200 shows a year, write up about 130 of them, usually for a deadline the following morning, sometimes (if it’s deemed a “big” show) for the 10.45pm last edition deadline on the night of the show.

And of course, when I’m not actually seeing a work or writing about it, I’m still That Critic Guy (Jane’s “other”) It’s a hat you’re stuck with for the duration. And more. Like Alison says, tough gig, but an endlessly rewarding and challenging one.

Who are reviews for? Anyone with the urge to read one. I write with the understanding that the majority of people reading it will never see the production regardless of what I think about it. As such, I don’t write “for” anyone, though in the back of my mind, I’m always trying to please my editor and deliver opinion in an entertaining(ish) way. That said, I have good days and not-so-good days. Sometimes, the opinion doesn’t gel in the limited time available. Sometimes, you struggle to even form an opinion, but do so anyway. It’s that or a blank space in the paper tomorrow.

What are my reviews worth to the theatre company I’m writing about? I can’t imagine? I only hear anecdotal evidence about the effects reviews (+ve or –ve) have on box office (though years ago, a furious producer of a major musical phoned me just to call me a “c*nt” for “closing down my f*cking show”).

Of course, a review may be important to a theatre maker. They’ll already have plenty of opinions from friends and supporters of course, but somehow, something written – be it on pulped tree or on a blog such as this – often seems more weighty.

It’s worth bearing in mind that what is written and what is understood from that review by someone being written about can be quite different.

Interesting conversation! I’ve always considered myself, as a reviewer, as a kind of representative audient: a privileged member of the audience, to be sure, but by no means above it. And that the audience is as much part of the theatre as any other component. I go, I pay attention as closely as is possible, and I write about the experience. At bottom, that’s the sum of it. This may or may not be useful to the practitioners. It may or may not be useful to other audience members. I suspect that sometimes it is, sometimes it isn’t. Like Jason, I assume a large percentage of those who read the reviews won’t see the show, so I try to make them interesting as autonomous pieces of writing. Maybe that’s the strongest responsibility I feel.

I do think reviews serve a purpose, nevertheless. They act as a record for a temporal artform: theatre isn’t like literature, where a book can be read 100 years after it’s written. Reading about Meyerhold not long ago, for example, the contemporary reviews of his shows permitted me to have some idea of what his work was, and what his shows were in the context in which they were made. For this reason, the more reviews there are, and the more diverse they are, the better. And I think interesting public responses to work make a theatre culture more dynamic: there’s a sense of engagement that goes beyond the makers, and that extends theatre as an art, rather than simply a product that is consumed. Lastly, reviews as much as anything else play a part in educating the expectations of audiences, for better or worse. A lively, informed theatre culture does make a difference; and I speak as someone who has lived in the absence of it.

PS Jane: try to shrug off those comments which suggest you shouldn’t *think* about the shows you see (often, in my experience, this is couched as “bias”, as if a critic shouldn’t have ideas of her own). The more thought and feeling a critic brings with him or her, the better.

Thank you for this discussion. I admit to having held resentment towards reviewers for up to 12 months at a time but I’m gradually learning to respect your art. I read reviews online and in papers daily, and often several times over. Learning about your process helps and it is good to read that writing a review on a work you don’t like takes double the time because for me, as a playwright, that’s one of my biggest gripes. Sometimes it feels as if the reviewer has just scribbled down some piece of crap with out giving due consideration to a work that may have take years to write and years to get to a stage. I also think 250 words for a review is not sufficient and perhaps reviewers themselves need to let the arts editors or who whoever makes such stupid decisions know this is simply not enough space.