How Did You Become a Critic: Part 3

I know I said I asked 5 of our country’s top critics, but 2 of them didn’t make the deadline!! (Kelly and Robert, I’m looking at you…)  So we’ll finish the series with one of the most beloved Fringe reviewers, Glenn Sumi.  Aside from being NOW Magazine’s Associate Entertainment Editor, Glenn can also be seen talking entertainment and pop culture every Saturday night on CTV News Channel.

How did you become a reviewer?

I think I’ve always been one.  As a kid, I had way too many opinions about movies, TV shows, plays, books, beauty pageants – you name it. I used to drive my friends and family nuts. After seeing a professional production of Cats, I believe I told my parents it was ridiculous, and tried to explain why.  I remember someone in high school actually telling me I was “too opinionated” and why couldn’t I “just enjoy things like everyone else”?  At university, I was the associate arts editor there when Naomi Klein was editor. After that, I freelanced for several years until I saw an advertisement looking for a theatre writer at NOW Magazine. That was in 1997.  I got the job, began filing reviews and features and shortly afterwards got hired full-time.

Obviously not every show or style will be to your personal taste, so how do you keep yourself objective?

The more you see, the more you realize what’s possible. I have to admit that initially I was skeptical of things like clown and puppetry. But I also knew that my NOW Magazine colleague, Jon Kaplan (who sees everything – way more than I do), was a big fan of the horror clowns Mump and Smoot, and the puppeteer Ronnie Burkett. When I finally saw their work… WOW.  Of course, I haven’t liked everything they’ve done, but they’re all artists working at a very high level.

What I like about the performing arts, especially in Toronto, is that most people go into theatre and dance wanting to make something special. There’s nothing cynical about it. They’re not trying to make a quick buck – or if they are, they quickly discover this isn’t the place to do it and they move on. So that’s inspiring as an audience member and critic.
 
Do you think having been in the business gives one a better perspective and basis for reviewing?

I’m not sure. I talk to theatre artists all the time who don’t want to take apart their art and analyze it, and I can understand that. But that’s part of a theatre critic/reviewer’s job. We have to see how and why something is or isn’t working. (Note: it’s easier to discuss something that isn’t working. How do you write about something where EVERYthing is in such perfect harmony… without sounding breathless?)

We also have to stand in for the paying audience member, who probably won’t know how a show gets mounted and frankly doesn’t care. They just want to be entertained, amused, instructed. And then there’s the ethical issue of some theatre reviewers who occasionally dabble in the theatre, working with producers, directors and actors they regularly write about. But let’s not go there…

Though there are many female reviewers in on-line media, traditional media seems to be almost exclusively male.  Any thoughts on why that might be?

I think it’s the same in any type of reviewing. Most movie reviewers tend to be male. You should see the press room during the Toronto International Film Festival – it’s like a fucking Judd Apatow movie! But there have been some terrific female theatre reviewers, like Kate Taylor, and some not-so-terrific ones as well. Why are there more men? Again, I’m not sure, but I have to say doing it full time can be tough on family life. I’m not suggesting all women want to raise families, but the hours can be tough if you do: out at 7 to get to your 8 o’clock, back by 11 if you’re lucky. And if you leave from the office, you probably won’t make it home before the show begins anyway.  It’s unfair, but in the traditional heterosexual model, most men probably find that easier to do.

Any favourite Canadian plays?

I know I’m going to forget something or someone, but top of mind: The Drawer Boy (opening night of that show was one of my all-time favourite experiences…  everyone at Passe Muraille knew they were witnessing something special); Harlem Duet; Billy Bishop Goes To War; In On It; The Danish Play; Radio :30; Inexpressible Island; Glenn; 2 Pianos, 4 Hands; I Claudia. It’s hard to call something like Robert Lepage’s Lipsynch a play, it’s so massive; similarly The Overcoat – is it a play? a dance work? And what about a multi-part work like The Gladstone Variations? Or Tamara? Are works like Theatre Smith-Gilmour’s Chekhov’s Shorts or Longs Canadian?

I’d love to see a good production of Les Belles Soeurs, and I’m looking forward to seeing Tomson Highway’s The Rez Sisters next year at Factory. Among recent shows, I loved Eternal Hydra: a rich and complex work that you could study endlessly. I think Carole Frechette (Helen’s Necklace, Elisa’s Skin) is a genius. Andrew Moodie, Claudia Dey, John Mighton, Jason Sherman, Adam Pettle, Diane Flacks, d’bi.young – they’ve all created some brilliant things. I know I’m going to kick myself when I realize who I’ve left off.
 
Any plays, Canadian or otherwise, you’d love to see revived?

Canadian: I’ve heard so much about Robert Lepage’s The Seven Streams Of The River Ota. I missed earlier Burkett works like Tinka’s New Dress and Awful Manors. If I could go back in time I’d love to see The Drowsy Chaperone again at the George Ignatieff. Or see Fringe veteran T.J. Dawe’s first show, which was at the Annex Theatre. I’d love to see Theatre Columbus’s the Betrayal again, or Daniel Brooks’s Insomnia. Were they as good as I remember? You can revisit a movie at an older age, and bring all you now know to it. But you can’t do the same with a theatre production.

Non-Canadian: Too many to name. But I’ve always wanted to see a staging of Stephen Sondheim’s Follies, which is one of those musicals that exists so vividly in my imagination that I’m not sure how I’d react to seeing it live.