WHY READ PLAYS?
"The question is so absurd that we need not only answer it but find out why it's being asked as well. Most simply put: plays, the good ones, at any rate, the only ones that matter, are literature, and while they are accessible to most people through performance, they are complete experiences without it...
AND
God help us all!
God help us all!
...Still, I am convinced that the following is true: no performance can make a great play any better than it is, and most performances are inadequate either in that the minds at work are just not up to the task, no matter how sincerely they try, or the stagers are aggressively interested in "interpretation" or "concept" with the result that our experience of the play, as an audience, is limited, is only partial.
Further--and not oddly--performance can make a minor (or terrible) play seem a lot better than it is. Performance can also, of course, make a bad play seem even worse than it is. God help us all!"
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| Edward Albee |
