What does the death of Tragedy and Comedy foretell? Monday, September 28, 2009 Some time ago, I went to see a play by a very fine Asian American dramatist. It was a play that talked about contemporary Asian American issues and struggled with many of the conflicts with which many multi-cultural immigrant families contend. I was very moved by this play and left the show feeling rejuvenated and excited. Then, I went out for drinks with some friends who were not Asian and their take on the show was quite different. Under the glare of their well-measured critique, I had to admit that the play was technically flawed and that there were a bunch of loose ends that weren't addressed. But, concurrently, I truly understood that my colleagues were missing nuances about the immigrant experience that were fundamentally important to play. At this moment, I came to an important realization. I had experienced this play the way enfranchised, affluent, well-educated theater audiences are experiencing much of the work that is being produced right now. I can't begin to tell you the number of times I've walked out of a theater saying, "Why did this prominent theater with a forward thinking mission statement decide to do this particular play about enfranchised, affluent, well-educated people? It's technically flawed and there were a bunch of loose ends that weren't addressed!" But, now I know. These theaters are speaking to their audience. When a person sees a play about himself, certain things fall away. He consumes it with his soul and all those technical critiques can be saved for the people who can't quite go along for the journey. American Idol, Lonely Girl, Bridezilla, Survivor, Big Brother, Extreme Home Makeover -- it can't be denied that we've acquired a certain appetite for experiencing stories in which we play the central character and this translates to the work we see on stage. But this trend begs an important question: Where does this kind of work fit in the spectrum between Tragedy and Comedy? A tragedy, following Aristotle's formula is a play about people who are above the audience's social status. A tragedy does not end happily. According to Plutarch, a comedy is a play about people who are below the audience's social status. A comedy ends happily. But, if the audience is seeing a play about itself, with characters that are neither above or below its social standing what is it seeing? This question becomes important in the context of distance in the theater, and I don't mean the difference between Orchestra seats and Mezzanine seats, but rather political and social distance. Write a classical tragedy about a King and you have a lot of real estate for political discourse. Write a classical comedy in which, as is typical of the form, a low class person and a high class person switch places and you have automatic social critique. But, write a play about yourself and what do you end up with? The answer is: melodrama, and I don't mean exaggerated over the top theater. I mean a highly digestible form of theater, developed in the 18th-Century in which the emotions of the audience are manipulated with music (melodies). A typical melodrama follows a highly formulaic structure. There is a hero who is unquestionably good. His actions are highlighted with heroic sounding music. There's a villain, who's really, really bad and his actions are highlighted with ominous sounding music. Ultimately, the hero prevails over the villains (HOORAY!) saves the heroine (NICE!) and things, by and large, end well. (Phew!) This structure should feel familiar to you. It's been perfected by Hollywood. When's the last time you saw a play that had a genuinely tragic ending? When is the last time any of us have seen a true satire that wasn't written by Moliere? I know there are exceptions, but Tragedy and Comedy are BOTH dying. What's the cost? Well, if we continue to cast ourselves in melodramas, it foretells a society that is really bad at talking about it's leaders and itself. Who among us is good a critiquing himself? A recent psychological study shows that people are not even accurate in determining whether they are extroverted or introverted. If we are constantly demanding and being presented with stories about ourselves in which there is a good guy (us) and a bad guy (them) and the story resolves tidily in ninety minutes, how long until we relent to a president who doesn't want the networks to show coffins coming home from Iraq? How long until, as Paul Krugman suggests, we have a grid-locked Congress in which Richard Nixon would be considered a leftist and our representatives no longer have a forum to speak about what's best for the nation? How long until Nancy Grace, Rachel Maddow, Stephen Colbert, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Keith Olberman and John Stewart are the only characters in the universally important drama about politics? end of scene