Critics and Criticism

Copyright © 2000 Robert C. Huber

 

"Nay, Sir, do not complain. It is advantageous to an author that his book should be attacked as well as praised. Fame is a shuttlecock. If it be struck only at one end of the room, it will soon fall to the ground. To keep it up, it must be struck at both ends."

Dr. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784), critic

It is a very human thing to want to discuss and comment upon the ideas presented by others. In a way the literary world is divided between those who write, and those who write about that writing. The deeper and more complex the written source, the greater and more enduring is the commentary about it. The Bible and the works of Shakespeare have each stimulated generations of interpretation and scholarship. Indeed, one measure of the worth of any art is the quantity and quality of critical comment that it engenders. Today we tend to use the terms critic and reviewer synonymously, but it is important to make a distinction between them. A critic writes criticism, and a reviewer writes reviews. This begs the question: "What's the difference?" This lecture will answer that question.

The word criticism has a negative connotation to most people. When someone says "She's so critical" we understand that it is not a compliment. But in the literary sense 'criticism' means to analyze and explain as much as to evaluate and judge. In that sense, this very lecture is a form of arts criticism. We shall look at criticism in this positive sense as we investigate the world of critics and criticism as they apply to the dramatic arts.

 

Critics

Criticism has a very long history. It is in fact ancient, dating from the era of the first dramas. Criticism takes a long view of its subject and goes into great depth and analytical detail. It is the "long form" of the art. It is aimed at readers who are professionally involved or have a serious interest in the subject. A critic is an expert in either stage, film or television and has a formal education in one of those subjects, in writing, or in both. Rather than writing about a single performance, critics might look at an entire season. A critic may write about the oeuvre (all the works) of a single playwright or director, or the theatre or film industry of an entire nation. Another area of focus might be to identify a new style or genre of plays that is emerging, or the effect that violent scenes have on society. These are the concerns of critics. Their work might appear in a hardcover book, or as a piece in serious magazines such as The New Yorker, The Nation, or Harpers or specialty journals such as American Theatre or Theatre Journal. Critical writing in its most accessible form may be found as a long article or "think piece" in the Sunday supplement of major newspapers such the Calendar section of the Sunday Los Angeles Times. In this case such an article may be written by the same person who normally writes reviews. In fact, many people write both criticism and reviews.

 

Reviewers

Reviews are a fairly recent form of criticism, developing along with newspapers in the last one hundred years or so. Those who write reviews are addressing a different purpose and audience. Reviews are a kind of news story written by an entertainment reporter. A reporter goes to the scene of an event, interviews the principals and witnesses, then quickly writes a story which describes what has occurred in order to meet a deadline. The value of such a story is largely in its timeliness-that's why they call it 'news.' By next week it will not be of much interest. The more precise analogy for a reviewer would be a consumer reporter. This reporter looks at a product with the purpose of informing his readers about it, as well as evaluating whether it's worth spending their money on it. A reviewer, then, is expected to not only describe a performance, but to render a judgment upon it as well. Reviewers, since they are specialists, are expected to be more knowledgeable about their subject than other reporters. Finally, their reports are expected to be brief and easily understood by those who would be most likely to read them. Reviews are published regularly in daily newspapers like the Los Angeles Times, weekly entertainment tabloids like the L.A. Weekly, and national magazines like Time and Newsweek. Reviewers tend to specialize in stage, film or television. In the Los Angeles Times, for instance, the lead reviewers are Charles McNulty for theatre, Kenneth Turan for film, and Howard Rosenberg for television. But reviewers work in other media as well. Film reviewer Roger Ebert (www.ebert-roeper-movies.com) has a nationally syndicated weekly program called "At The Movies," and many local television and radio stations have their own entertainment reporters who do reviews. Reviews are also widely available on the world wide web at sites maintained by newspapers, magazines, and radio and television stations.

Having made these careful distinctions, the fact remains that most reviewers call themselves, or are normally referred to, as critics. Just be aware that no matter what they are called, the two types of writing are very different.

 

Training

To become a professional critic one must first and foremost become expert in the particular medium to be focused upon. This usually means a university education in one of the dramatic arts. Some university theatre arts programs offer graduate degrees with a major in theory and criticism. Some say it is also important for the critic to be a practitioner of the art before becoming a commentator upon it. This might be especially helpful in being taken seriously by the people being written about--a critic who has acted might have more credibility among the actors he critiques. Equally important is the ability to communicate clearly. Even if a critic wants to use television to communicate, he will have to write his own material. In fact, many critics have come to drama from the fields of literature and journalism. A critic should also have a passion for his subject. Finally, a critic should be very aware of the world outside his art. The dramatic arts are a reflection of society, and one of the jobs of a critic is to make connections between the art and the world it reflects.

 

Audience

I have implied that the critic has two distinct audiences. The first audience are the consumers of the art--the viewers of plays, films and television. This audience wants to learn more about the art either out of their own passion and curiosity, or they merely want some help in deciding whether to spend their time and hard-earned money on it. The second audience are the creators of these media: writers, actors, directors, and designers. In addressing this audience the critic attempts to correct, improve, and encourage the art as a whole.

 

Digression: A Short History of Criticism

Drama and the criticism it spawned have had a symbiotic relationship--each one effecting the other. As drama outgrew its criticism it would generate new criticism, and then outgrow it again. This happened in five distinct phases.

1. Classic critics of Greece and Rome, of which Aristotle is the most important, focused on the form of drama--how it was constructed.
   
2. Critics in the Renaissance became very interested in the purpose of drama, especially its need to both teach and give pleasure.
   
3. Critics of the seventeenth century in France looked back to the classic period to establish rules of playwriting--a movement later called Neoclassicism. They also focused on the concept of poetic justice which laid the groundwork for melodrama with its core of reward and retribution which was to follow.
   
4. Critics of the Romantic period in the late eighteenth century made room for middle genres between tragedy and comedy, and while they argued against the old "rules" approach, merely substituted new rules for the old. They were also concerned that drama not be "morally hurtful."
   
5. Realists and then the Naturalists of the nineteenth century were most concerned with subject and the banishment of rules. Victor Hugo argued that the purpose of art was not to correct nature, but to take it as it is--even the ugly and grotesque were fit subjects. The Naturalist Emile Zola called for a scientific approach to drama in which heredity, environment, and psychology became the basis of the modern concept of character.

At that point in the late 1800s, criticism ceased to work in the old way. That is, the critic no longer had any real influence on the style of plays being written. Criticism continued, but no one paid that much attention to it. Today, newspaper criticism (reviews) has influence only on individual plays, not on the form of plays in general. The kind of theoretical writing that critics used to do now falls into the category of aesthetics. They still want to educate the audience, but the problem is that they're mostly read by other critics, not the audience. Much of it is so arcane that it requires some background in dramatic criticism just to understand it.

 

Critical Approaches Today

Objective

Today's criticism tends to fall into one of three styles. The first is based on the classical "rules" approach in which the critic classifies a play according to genre, then deals with it within the ideal framework of that genre. The problem with this approach is that many modern plays do not fit well into accepted genre categories.

Subjective

The second approach evolved out of what was called the "new criticism" of the late 1940s. In this style the critic accepts the work on its own terms and attempts to illuminate it from within "the world of the play." There is much attention given to the craftsmanship aspect--how well the play is put together. This approach also implies that plays are written for particular audiences, so the critic is measuring the relative rather than the absolute worth of such a play.

Related Field

Finally, there is the related field approach. These critics take the theories of such fields as psychology, sociology, anthropology, politics, or religion and use the plays to demonstrate them. One problem is that this may tell you less about the play and more about the field it relates to.

Of these three approaches or styles of criticism, the one most commonly seen today is the second. The subjective approach seems to work best with today's rather eclectic dramatic styles. On the other hand, do not be surprised if you find some elements of the other two styles in any given piece.

 

Reviews Today

As stated previously, reviews are primarily addressed to the consumer and secondarily to the artist. We may say that reviews have descriptive, interpretive and evaluative components aimed at the consumer, but they also contain a corrective component which is aimed primarily at the artist. In the descriptive part of a play, film or television review, the writer describes the work so that the reader will gain a general understanding of its nature. This usually involves some discussion of the subject, style, plot, characters, themes, and technical elements (cinematography, sound, editing, effects, scenery and costumes) of the piece. Comparisons to similar or related works are also commonly employed for this purpose. However, reviewers must be careful not to reveal so much information that crucial elements of surprise are undercut. Next the reviewer may explain or interpret those elements or other fine points of the piece that the audience may miss or be unaware of. At some point we expect the reviewer to make an evaluative assessment or judgment of the relative value of the work, both in its parts and in its entirety. It is in this phase of a review that we will most likely see the corrective function. A reviewer may not only point out weaknesses and flaws, but make suggestions for improvement as well. Artists reading reviews may or may not accept such suggestions as valid or useful. There is even conflict among reviewers about this. I often heard Roger Ebert say to Gene Siskel: "Are you reviewing the movie he directed, or the one you wish you'd directed."


It is important that reviewers have strong ethical standards. An ethical reviewer should have a deep affection for the art form he surveys, and be committed to its improvement and development. An ethical reviewer should acknowledge and set aside any biases that he might have against anyone or anything involved in a production he reviews. Finally, an ethical reviewer should be more concerned with accuracy and fairness than in being clever, witty, and entertaining in his reviews.

 

Purpose

When one watches any dramatic work with the intention of reviewing it, especially when employing the Subjective method, try to discern what purpose its creators intended it to serve. This matter of intent is extremely important. Imagine for a moment that you are going to buy a new car and are reading a review of a new model in Road & Track. If the author said that the new smallest Hyundai is terrible because it does not have leather seats and will not go over 120 miles per hour, it would be clear that he had not understood the purpose of such a car.

Throughout history those who create drama have had two general artistic purposes: to educate and entertain. This has been described as the "sugar-coated pill" approach: the play itself is enjoyable, but contains within it a lesson--the medicine. Critics and commentators in the past have argued as to which of these purposes should be supreme. Virtually all dramatic art can be viewed as having varying proportions of each of these two purposes. But dramatic art has a societal as well as an artistic purpose. As a social and cultural institution, theatre has served such purposes as providing:

• an opportunity for people from different classes to mix
• an outlet for the emotions
• a forum for the introduction and discussion of new ideas
• the reinforcement of established political and moral beliefs.

Some playwrights and screenwriters might be quite conscious of their choice of purposes, but most artists approach this aspect of the creative act more intuitively than intentionally. If we look closely we can identify a number of specific purposes that encompass all of the dramatic arts.

 

PURPOSES OF DRAMATIC ART

1.Amuse
2.Divert

3.Inform
4.Instruct

5.Persuade
6.Motivate

7.Celebrate/Honor
8.Inspire

 

The chart above is arranged in descending order of seriousness or intensity. Those purposes at the top of the list are somewhat lighter, and those toward the bottom are heavier. It is extremely important to understand that no play, film or TV program has only one purpose, but rather a combination of two or more purposes.

A play or movie can have as its primary purpose to simply provide amusement: to hold our attention and pass the time in an agreeable and pleasant manner. Amusements require little investment of intellect or emotion and fall squarely into what most people would call pure entertainment. A movie such as Dumb and Dumber, or a TV series such as Dharma & Greg have as their primary purpose to amuse. A diversion requires a bit more intensity in order to draw our attention away from the cares and pressures of our daily lives, and is often referred to as "escapism." Many popular film and most episodic television comedies fall into these first two categories of purpose. It is more difficult to find plays that fit exclusively in these categories since modern theatre by definition tends towards the intellectual, even in the lightest of comedies. One exception would be the murder-mysteries that pervade community and dinner-theatres.

Many dramatic entertainments deliver enough significant information, of which the audience may not have been previously aware, as to rise to the level of an intent to inform. This information may be presented so incidentally as to not call attention to itself, consequently the audience may or may not retain it. Some of the more serious law dramas on television such as The Practice and Law and Order focus on timely social issues which no doubt offer some level of new information to their audiences. When the purpose is to instruct, the information is overtly presented and repeated so as to cause the audience to come away with a new perspective on the subject. Do not confuse dramatic material with documentary-- shows like Nova on PBS are certainly instructive but rarely dramatize their material. A better example of dramatic art that is intended to instruct might be a film like Schindler's List where human details of the holocaust are portrayed in a way that the audience will not soon forget.

At the next level of intensity are dramatic stories whose purpose is to persuade; to not only inform the audience of facts about a subject, but to change their minds about it. Such stories are told in a way that uses both emotion and intellect to make a case for the author's point of view. Plays in this category might include Tobacco Road and The Grapes of Wrath which argue for a more compassionate attitude toward the less fortunate. A film such as Dead Man Walking (1995) clearly attempts to change people's position on capital punishment. The most strident of all the educational purposes is a story whose primary purpose is to motivate. These stories go beyond the mere changing of minds to a call for action--they seek to have you leave your seat and man the barricades. Or at the very least, write your congressman, walk the picket line, or get out the vote. There are not many dramatic tales that rise to this level of urgency. One such play was a famous drama from the 1930s called Waiting For Lefty, which urged its audience to leave the theatre and join the labor union movement.

Dramas that persuade and motivate walk a fine ethical line. When an author composes a work that misstates or exaggerates facts, presents only one side of the issue, and unfairly skews the material toward his own point of view, the result is propaganda. Propaganda can make use of the dramatic form to manipulate the audience into forming unjustified conclusions. The Nazi era in Germany during World War II gave rise to many films which manipulated public attitudes toward minorities, and glorified the aggressive policies of Adolf Hitler. Leni Riefenstahl's Triumph of the Will (1935) is a classic of the form. Of course any war tends to bring forth such films on both sides. Many U.S. films during the same period tended toward propaganda in their portrayals of Japanese as sub-human, and Vietnam era films such as The Green Berets (1968) with John Wayne uncritically glorified our own war effort.

Films and plays have also been written to celebrate important events and honor famous people. Glory (1989), and the recent Steven Speilberg film, Saving Private Ryan, have the clear purpose of celebrating the extraordinary heroism and sacrifices of ordinary citizens in the great battles of the past. Biographical films such as Gandhi, Malcolm X, and Selena typically fall into the category of honoring the lives and accomplishments of extraordinary people. While these films certainly have inspirational qualities, some dramatic material is primarily purposed to inspire. Among them such plays as Thornton Wilder's Our Town (1939) and the film It's A Wonderful Life (1946) are typical examples. However, when discussing art designed to inspire we must not overlook religious works. Plays like Saint Joan and Beckett, such films as The Rapture (1991), The Last Temptation of Christ (1988), Jesus of Montreal (1989), The Omega Code (1999), the biblical epics such as The Robe (1953) and Ben-Hur (1926, 1959), and even television shows like Touched By An Angel and Nothing Sacred (canceled 1998) represent this often overlooked group.

It might occur to some that profit is also a purpose. While making money from one's writing may be an important motivation, it is not an artistic purpose as such. In any case, once a reviewer has determined the dominant purposes of a work, it is much easier to review. This allows the reviewer to discuss and evaluate how well the playwright, screenwriter, and the production have succeeded in achieving their purposes.

 

Critical Lexicon

When you read reviews you will undoubtedly come across some words that are unfamiliar to you. Like any field, criticism has a certain language that is unique to it. Sometimes these words are somewhat familiar, but are used in unfamiliar ways. Since criticism has such a long history, many of these words come from ancient times and places, such as Greece and Rome. The French exerted a strong influence on criticism in the Neoclassic era, so many French words also appear. The French also were the first to look at film as an art form and to write seriously about it, consequently modern French terms appear regularly in film criticism. Finally, there are trendy terms and buzzwords that come into fashion, are done to death, then quickly disappear. There is not enough space here to list all such terms and define them, but a few of the most common are listed below as examples. In any case, many such words are defined as they appear elsewhere in this text. It's a good idea to have a dictionary close at hand when reading reviews, since you can anticipate words and phrases such as these are likely to make an appearance.

French

dénouement: the end of a play, after the climax
film noir: literally means dark film, refers to that genre of films that was common in the forties and fifties, usually black and white, often about hardboiled detectives and the underworld, used lots of shadows and strong key light--especially the shadows of venetian blinds on the wall.
femme fatale: female character who is both strikingly beautiful and dangerous.
mise-en-scène: the stage picture, how the director has selected and composed what you see on stage.
Grand Guignol: from the original slasher puppet shows of Paris, refers to any bloody and horrific action.

Yiddish

schtick: silly comic bits inserted into a scene, like Stan Laurel playing with his hair or Steve Martin bumping into things
schlock: anything cheap, trashy, or inferior
schmaltz: literally chicken fat, exaggerated sentimentality, as in soap operas

Latin

deus ex machina: literally 'god from the machine', from the Greek practice of having a god come in at the end of a play to put things right, used today to describe anything which comes out of nowhere to resolve a conflict in drama; considered an inferior feature of plot construction.

German

angst: dread, anxiety, anguish
sturm und drang: literally 'storm and stress,' used to describe dramatic material that is filled with inner turmoil and tension.

Current Buzz Words

arc: 'transition' or 'change' as in "he had trouble finding the arc of his character."
backstory: events leading up to the beginning of the story, what used to be called background information
informs: synonym for 'influences,' as in "the graphic style of comic books informs his directing"

Since some of criticism does involve finding fault, there are a number of negative terms that appear frequently.

banal : lacking in freshness or originality
bathos : insincere or overly exaggerated sentiment
cliché : dialogue (or action) that is overused and predictable, or filled with common sayings such as 'sadder but wiser' or 'dead as a doornail', "The dialogue was so clichéd that the audience was finishing sentences for the actors."
trite : lacking effectiveness because of repetition or overuse
formulaic : constructing a plot by copying a common pattern or model, lacking in originality

No discussion of common critical terminology would be complete without mention of a phrase coined by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, an English poet and literary critic who lived from 1772-1834. He described "the willing suspension of disbelief" as the necessary requirement for anyone to enjoy dramatic art. In other words, we must forget that we are watching actors to the extent that we can enter into the world of the play and become emotionally involved in its content.

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Reading Assignment

You should be reading Chapter 4 in your textbook to get more information about the role of the audience and its imagination. Before reading the chapter go to the online quiz at:

Chapter 4 - Quiz #3

I suggest you print out the quiz and mark the answers on the hard copy as you read the chapter. When you are ready to submit your answers, go back online, fill in the "Name" box with your last name, comma, first name--like this: Smith, Jamie. Then fill in the "Email" box with the address you want your your score sent to. Put your 7-digit Cerritos College Student ID number in the third box. Then click the buttons for your answers. Make sure you have filled in your complete email address, not mine. Click on the Submit button at the bottom of the quiz. You will immediately see a confirmation that your quiz has been sent. Right after the due date I will forward your score and a copy of your corrected quiz to you.

Lecture Exercise

For each of the eight Purposes of Dramatic Art listed in this lecture find your own example of a recent film or play that illustrates it--a different film or play for each purpose. Do not use any of my examples and avoid TV if you can--and remember, documentaries are not dramatic art per se, but are a kind of "news" so don't use them. For each example give a brief reason why it best fits the definition of the purpose. Remember that the purpose must fit the overall film or play, not just a scene or two.

The purpose of these exercises is to show me you "attended" this specific lecture by employing the relevant points from the lecture in your answer to the question. Review the lecture and be sure you are answering in terms of what's there, not just your opinion.

Note that when submitting the answer start the subject line with:

TH101DE -- YourFirst&LastName -- L-6

 

Next lecture: Stages & Auditoriums