By ANTHONY McKAY
I’m a theater-goer from the 20th century, when standing ovations were a rare occurrence. Then, a smattering of claps greeted an overlong or frankly boring effort, and a spontaneous burst of applause graced a production that managed to entertain and even deliver a morsel of truth to chew on, but no one received a standing ovation unless an audience was brought spontaneously to its feet. Now, standing ovations happen at every production that I attend, anywhere, Broadway included. Standing O’s have become meaningless.
What’s going on?
This is not a new phenomenon, it’s almost two decades old and has become increasingly rampant. An actor friend of mine contends that a standing ovation should happen only when you can’t help yourself. Like helium in a balloon, you find that you must express your astonishment, gratitude and how deeply you have been moved by standing, vociferously clapping and, if the spirit so moves you, by cheering. In his view, it’s involuntary.
Everyone, at least everyone in my generation, remembers the shows which brought them to their feet. Here are some of mine: Marat/Sade at its first preview in New York in the ‘60s – yes, I’m that old– a production of Six Characters in Search of an Author at Carnegie Mellon’s School of Drama, and a production of Ibsen’s The Wild Duck in London. Mike Nichols’ production of Streamers deserved a standing O, but the impact of the play was so devastating that it didn’t seem appropriate to stand up and cheer. Pittsburgh theater has had its triumphs too. My votes in this department are City Theatre’s Birthday Candles, Andrew Paul’s production of The Christians, Pittsburgh Public’s production of Wit, and Quantum Theatre’s recent Moon for the Misbegotten, to name a few. Everyone’s list of life-changing, standing-ovation theater is different but, if you’re being honest, short. Now, unceasingly, the audience stands dutifully and claps. It’s pro-forma, often executed in a weary manner, an obligation, a chore.
Is that what’s at the bottom of this empty gesture? Do audience members feel it’s their job to make sure that the actors don’t feel bad? Or is it, in the case of Shakespeare for example, that they want to let everyone know that they are part of the cognoscenti and get the bard’s difficult rarified message? Whatever the case, as an actor I can assure them, it’s not their job.
Talking to actors here in Pittsburgh, they know the difference between a silence brought on by intense involvement and a silence, often accompanied by coughing, where the audience is unengaged and bored. Yet, no matter what, at least some in the audience stand. Despite this, and because standing ovations have become du rigueur, a production that does not receive this empty gesture probably counts itself as one of the worst productions ever.
But in my experience, the opposite is sometimes true. On occasion, when a production is solid, the actors have performed with aplomb and the play has proved to be sturdy, the paying public sometimes keep their seats with a sense that they’ve been well served, leaving the theater without gilding the lily. With our current situation, audience members feel coerced by their fellow standees to get to their feet.
After all this grousing, let me quickly add that I applaud theater audiences. I give them an unreserved standing ovation. They are champs. They support their theater through all its ups and downs. Without the paying public, there would be no theater. Playing to a mostly empty house is dispiriting to actors, directors and producers alike. Having the audience responding, laughing and crying, is the final and most important segment of the theater equation, the reason the actors are onstage at all. Not only do audiences show the actors where the laughs are, they teach them what the play is about and, in fact, what might be missing. It’s a two-way street. The theater needs the audience and vice-versa.
The Greeks, the creators of the theater experience — Western-oriented theater — thought attendance to be a civic duty. Employers would garnish their workers’ salaries encouraging them to take time off, go see a play. When seated on their stone benches, the Greek audiences behaved raucously; they threw olive pits at the performers if they didn’t like the show, but they were honest. I’m not recommending that audiences bring rotten vegetables to chuck at performers, but I am encouraging the paying public to clap or stand as they see fit. Polite applause is totally acceptable. After all, everyone did their best. But honesty is part of the dialogue between the performer and the people in their seats. It’s a relationship that stretches back millennia. Let’s return curtain calls to a celebratory but honest exchange. It’s time to take a stand.
Anthony McKay is an Associate Professor of Acting at Carnegie Mellon University.
Categories: Arts and Ideas, Our Posts
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