... for someone to make the argument that the O'Neill business makes two shots--and two misses--for Durang and Norman in as many months. Tboy confesses that the echo of the Hedy Weiss controversy occurred to him, too.
Where he disagrees (slightly) with Rat Sass is in this: Norman and Durang, who were presumably enlisted by the Guild to weigh on Weiss' alleged misbehavior, probably had no way of knowing that the Guild had been misinformed on the specifics of the story. They likely knew only what the Guild said, and they probably had reason to believe the Guild had investigated.
The O'Neill drama, on the other hand, is a little more perplexing. Both playwrights worked with Goldberg in Arena's downstairs play-development series, according to her online bio. And Goldberg seemingly had no trouble reaching them in a hurry when she found out about their broadcast e-mail to the "Juilliard Mafia." (Tboy had an e-mail from her, indicating that peace was being made, several hours before the "retraction/clarification" went out.)
So the question's obvious: Why was it apparently impossible for them to get hold of her before they urged the nation's playwrights to boycott the O'Neill?
We can't know, of course--because, as Norman wrote yesterday, "We all agreed not to talk."
Hi Tboy,
My guess is that Durang and Norman knew that the playwright's subsidiary income was off the table but were really annoyed that such a “contrary-to-mission-item” was put on the table in the first place. So the “subsidiary income” was used as straw dog in order to flex their muscles. Muscles not as playwrights, but as teachers of playwrights, the young talents that make the O’Neill relevant. The muscle flexing was a political maneuver insuring they will have ongoing “veto power” over policy at the O’Neill should any other contrary-to-mission-items appear again.
You are of course right that neither Durang nor Norman nor the other 20 playwrights writing letters would know the Guild president had bad info. Why? Well, because the info was not about an Ayatollah who issued a fatwa calling for the killing of a playwright, but was about an incompetent critic in Chicago reviewing workshop productions. Not much to write home about, but the 22 playwrights tried anyway. Some of the adjectives they invented:
“obscene” “scary” “shocking” “destructive ” “appalling” “outrage” “act of vandalism”
The propensity toward finding a scapegoat and the ease in which the lynch mob can be formed bothers me.
--nick
Posted by: nick | Tuesday, 10 October 2006 at 18:37