When the Berlin Wall fell, it was a commonplace observation that there were more Marxists in New York City than in the USSR. If the new Oxford University Press book Theater & Human Flourishing is any indication, they have since relocated to various university drama departments. There they exploit the bourgeoisie and the proletariat equally, earning a steady income and fattening their pensions by instructing young people in the means by which to produce the worst theater possible.
Over and over, the book’s chapters praise revolutionary and “proletarian” theater, focusing on drama that aims to overthrow the established order. It soon becomes apparent, however, that the academy believes that the way to do this is to bore audiences into submission. Indeed, these accounts scrupulously avoid discussions of critically lauded plays, and they almost never mention such basic but vital concepts of good theater as the development of character and providing the audience with an engaging and amusing story. More typical is an enthusiastic account by Colby College professor Gwyneth Shanks, accurately titled “Refusing to Flourish,” about a Los Angeles–based theater company dedicated to avant-garde and revolutionary theater and its production of the play Here’s How (Refuted).
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