Monday, January 17, 2005


This just came to my inbox:

I just read your blog entry re: today's (1/16/05) matinee...... and I was stunned....maybe YOU thought it was your worst performance but I thoroughly enjoyed it!! Bravo! Keep up the great work!

I include this not to merely stroke my ego, but because it always happens--whenever I blow of steam about a performance on this blog, inevitably someone from that performance reads the blog and then mails me. There's a simple lesson here, which I, as a professional, should know by heart: the audience is always right.

Further, my personal observations on how the show went from my end are supposed to stay just that: personal. It's an old rule of thumb in the theater--let the audience have their own experience with your work, and don't mediate it for them by telling them whether it used to be better, what you screwed up, etc. I'm quite good at following this rule for the most part in real life, but for some reason the terrible lure of the blog gets me in trouble.

Which makes sense--I'm often analyzing performances here, and treat it like a workshop/playroom, and the truth is that it's public and there's no assumption of privacy here. Suck it up, Daisey.