Theatre Scene and Trends

Not only the theatre is constantly re-inventing itself – theatre criticism too is subject to change. In print media it is given less and less space, while at the same time new platforms in the internet are accelerating theatre criticism to an undreamt of degree.

The shift of parts of theatre criticism to the internet is inexorable. Alone the gradual cutting back of theatre criticism, particularly in regional print media, has left gaps. This is especially felt by theatres beyond the metropolises, which appear less and less in the arts section of newspapers. It has also had the consequence that fewer and fewer young journalists can try their hand at theatre criticism. The only alternative: the internet. To what extent we can speak here of professional journalism, however, is a question.

It cannot be denied that in weekly print media such as the Zeit and the Spiegel theatre criticism hardly any longer appears, while at the same time theatre editors of regional dailies are obliged to cover only the distribution area of their papers. Only monthly professional magazines such as Theater heute and supra-regional newspapers such as the Süddeutsche Zeitung, FAZ and Frankfurter Rundschau have the whole range of German language theatre in view. Parallel to this partial retreat of theatre criticism, however, more and more internet portals are being established that are committed exclusively or in large measure to a critical format. The first online medium was nachtkritik, founded in Berlin. In the meantime, the monthly magazine Theater heute has also opened a fast internet portal, kultiversum, and in Munich Kultur-Vollzug has set up a digital arts section.

On the Net, no waiting

In principle, these internet portals operate like daily and weekly newspapers with an editorial staff that commissions texts and edits submitted ones. The decisive difference is that, since internet portals need not stick to editing times and individual texts need not appear in a totally composed ensemble, the sites can afford a rapid acceleration of theatre criticism. On the Net there is no waiting for the copy deadlines and printing; hence the online critic could, in principle, already write his text during the premier, put it directly online from the theatre, and so be faster even than his colleague from radio.

Whether that would be sensible and desirable, however, is a different story. A golden rule of the guild is that a theatre critic should sleep on his impressions and begin writing only the next day, depending on the deadline. Those that write for daily newspapers have as a rule, depending on when they get up, up to five hours time for writing. Criticism written for nachtkritik, however, has in fact to be composed during the night and delivered in the morning at seven o’clock sharp. This can be done, but since it is not given to every writing theatre-lover to go into sudden critical labour, the quality of the criticism on online media varies greatly. Not infrequently theatre evenings are touched upon only descriptively and treated in generalisations. Argumentative discussions of the production are the exception.

Editorial standards

Why the editors of nachtkritik send their staff into this bleary-eyed speed-writing contest is not altogether intelligible. After all, the online text appears at all events a day before the criticism in the print media. Net writers would still belong to the Formula One drivers of theatre criticism if the editors put the reviews online at midday and allowed their authors more time for argumentative reflection, precise formulation and concentration. This is in essence about editorial standards and the question whether online portals have sufficient time and manpower to correct and edit submitted texts. It is about standards of language and about how a review tells the story of a premier and how the underlying play is discussed in relation to the production.

A very alarming development is that of the stationary critic. A theatre critic does not receive the object of his desire delivered by mail to his doorstep, as does, for instance, the literary critic. He has to travel. That costs money and it is one reason that regional print media have cut back on their theatre criticism. Online platforms now want to report about theatre in the most wide-ranging possible way, but they likewise cannot afford the travel costs and so have local authors do the reviewing. Again, this can be done. But the quality of a review stands and falls with the horizon and scope of comparison available to the critic.