http://seattlest.com/2008/02/12/american_theatr.php All comments for American Theater: Not Dead Yet? A Seattlest Debate en-us 2009 seattle_michael2 Tue, 13 Jan 2009 17:10:00 -0800 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss mvb@seattlest.com mvb@seattlest.com 60 http://seattlest.com/2008/02/12/american_theatr.php#comment-1292478 http://seattlest.com/2008/02/12/american_theatr.php#comment-1292478 Comments Thu, 14 Feb 2008 22:59:59 -0800 <p>relevance might be a starting point. i.e. theater must supply something not available elsewhere in the drenched media world. what might that be? certainly not warmed over news on stage. it must get to the original radical theatrical experience, which was symbolic but not naturalistic as all the other media are. it needs to create a catharis. for example Handke's THE HOUR WE KNEW NOTHING ABOUT EACH OTHER slightly hypnotizes its audience, wordlessly, with a play of images - that have a movement, a climax and a denouement... at which point, the audience having been forced to watch precisely for 90 minutes both ordinary and fabulous goings on, the audience is reborn: we see each other fresh. that is a catharses of a non aristotelean kind, and extraordinarily healthy. </p>