David points us to an article discussing the prevailing orthodoxy:
At various times, and in various conversations, I wonder out loud whether any of them could imagine a play that challenged, say, the values of multiculturalism. Mostly I am met with baffled silences. Sir Peter Hall sums it up for me when he says: “I’m sure there are people who would like to write that sort of play, but they would fear it wouldn’t be acceptable.â€Â
well, look how well Redford’s little leftist cant is doing with audiences.
:::snort:::
In case anyone’s not reading the comments there, David’s hidden his good stuff below the fold:
I’ll gracefully decline rubbing in how Freudian-Marxist this insight is, and just point out that the linked-to article’s and comments’ recurrent reactionary description of musicals and romantic kitsch as “conservative” — which, yes, they are, definitionally, in appealing solely to the “mainstream bourgeois” etc. that, as David notes, is crazily invested in denying its identity as such — is a rhetorical-strategic means of erasing political conservatism, which for this tactical reason alone shouldn’t call itself that (not to mention the fact that it mostly isn’t conservative), from the world of speakable, presentable things. Political “art” is garbage anyway, but you guys shouldn’t allow that pre-emptive erasure of…whatever the hell it is you want to make.
There’s good news, though, if you care about art enough to give up on Art. If you don’t want to be the establishment, you don’t have to care about it. Outside the world of (however circuitously) government-funded, -sanctioned, and -pleasing aesthetic production, there are islands of, if not exactly right-wing, practically libertarian/anarcho-capitalist, if rhetorically anarcho-communist, self-contained and -financing islands of actual artistic radicalism — some of which are, really, conservative. In the old-fashioned way. Saving things from careless loss.
I make my living in a couple of them, and we’re not famous, but we’re fine. And fundamentally, it’s public, political, and art-world indifference that keep us free. So…no plugs.
I wouldn’t mind a plug.
Psychologizer,
I’ve just updated the main post to include the extract you mention, and my comments on it. Thanks.
The “right wing” movies (i.e. – familiy movies) make more money.
Frig the lefties if they can’t take a joke.
A small circle does not a quorum make. There is nothing better than a movie star(rock star)with a brain the size of a pea, and an ego the size of Texas.
Go,Bozo’s…
“Go,Bozo’s…”
Show of hands here. Was it the sake that made me forget to put “whatever” on the end of that phrase?
Hmmmm?
Has there been a Broadway musical even remotely conservative since “Oklahoma!”?
Well, I suppose one could make the case for “Phantom of the Opera” insofar as those who recoiled in horror at the Phantom’s disfigurement weren’t immediately carted off to a Lookism Reeducation Seminar and a tidy, eight-figure sum awarded to the aggrieved fellow in federal court.
Oklahoma? conservative? I guess it does have attempted rape and a stabbing. so there’s that.
Oh yes, Maggie. From the first bars of “Oh What a Beautiful Morning” you know this is not the usual Broadway fare of wry cynicism. These people are not bucolic cardboard cutouts that appear in the ballads of Woody Guthrie or Pete Seeger, people who only exist as icons for “progressive” political initiatives. These people love their homes, their land, their way of life. The relationships are all red-blooded, with even the peddler’s dicey relationship windsing up in a normative manner. Only Judd, the aggressive, bitter ranchhand is left on the outside looking in and, when he tries to use force to get what he wants…he get it in the neck.
Yes, Oklahoma is a very conservative musical.
*sniff* Jeffersonian, that deserves it’s own post. Though, Laurie strikes me as maybe a bit too, er, opinionated for your average Jesuslander. ;D
I guess I had forgotten that art was supposed to challenge the status quo. I’m guessing that the problem is that the status quo is way to the right of most artists and way to the left of the rest of us. Better get the UN or maybe the Hague in here to define status quo for us.
Ah, tell it to your status quo aunty.
“Cats”? “Annie”? “Oh, Calcutta”?
Oh, wait…
I think that the supreme irony here is that “the arts†proper is not a significant force exerted upon politics – the television media, yes – precisely because the themes are so often various permutations of struggling against a rightwing strawman, and marketed to a leftist audience anyway. Most people know “theatre people†to be silly attention-seekers, perhaps with redeeming qualities (from time to time there is a hot theatre chick), but mostly you pat them on the head and ignore them when they attempt to speak of anything of import.
If there was an active, artistic force from a right perspective, they might actually have to engage in the political debate that is actually being conducted outside of “the arts†and in that way perhaps exert some real influence.
Sticky B wrote:
“I guess I had forgotten that art was supposed to challenge the status quo.”
Exactly. Maybe instead of looking at the product for signs of right- or left-wingedness, we should instead look at the intent, at the motivational foundation. What, exactly, is the goal of art? Is the idea that it should as its primary function challenge the status quo a relatively recent development? And, for that matter, are we talking about the status quo as it exists outside of the world of art and artists or that world itself?
It’s my belief that the need for art to challenge the status quo most likely comes from a need to produce something unique, not necessarily iconoclastic.
So for a “right-leaning,” classically liberal foundation for artistic expression, let me suggest that the goal or intent of art should be to produce that which is Beautiful, and not that which is merely clever.
Alec, I think you’re forgetting that for many “theater people” “the right” is a threat because they will cut public funding and many more artistes will end up on the streets. so of course they’re going to demonize them.
I am excited about reading this article. I am going to nuke a noodle bowl and read it which will be cool cause no one saw me have lunch the first time.
Well, except for New Girl.
Oh. I think a lot of this is cause theatre isn’t really a business. Well, kinda, but it’s a business like breeding poodles is a business. Except if you want to buy a poodle you’ll probably not have to worry about finding parking.
I yearn not for a conservative bit of theatre, if that’s what you’re asking. I just want them to bring Buffy back.
Yeah, but she still wanted to look good for Curly at the hootenanny.
Theatre and classical music are a bit different from my background of “popular” music, because of the separation of the writer and performer and much more public funding, but one thing that occured to me much too belatedly was the mindset of many musicians that self-expression was what it was all about. It wasn’t until I had given up the chase and working a day job again that I realized monetary success came mostly through entertaining the crowd rather than yourself, which is ultimately what self-expression is. I wonder if this is the cause of the leftward cant of the arts, frustration that people don’t appreciate you for who you are.
Once again I’ll say it: liberalism is the culture, conservatism and especially Christianity are the counterculture. You want to be a radical? You want to fight the man? You want to buck the establishment and shock your parents, you want to be on the bleeding edge of culture? Take off the Che T-Shirt, take out the piercings, forget the tattoo, and leave the faux anarchy club. Pick up a Bible, listen to Rush Limbaugh.
*sigh* B Moe, I’m going to be chewing that one over for a while…. thanks.
I think that used to be true Christopher, but from when I have to talk to people I usually wouldn’t I have mostly learned that what they will do – the radical ones – is opt out. They do the “both parties suck there’s no difference thing” and they say all music sucks and there’s nothing on tv and they haven’t been to a movie all summer. Then they start the laughing about stuff they saw on The Daily Show thing.
Because it’s funny.
Sorry Maggie, and for what it is worth, I still play to suit myself. I just don’t get all bummed out if we get outdrawn by the dog and pony show down the street.
And they think this makes them edgy and nonconformist?
strike a pose there’s nothing to it
heh, no problem. I’m just stressing about my latest project… bordering on professional here and trying to decide what to aim for next, if anything.
I think that used to be true Christopher, but from when I have to talk to people I usually wouldn’t I have mostly learned that what they will do – the radical ones – is opt out.
That’s the thing: they are taking the non radical, conformist way of pretending to be noncomformist. They’re being like everyone else in an attempt to look edgy and cool. Tattoos and piercings are mainstreamed, being blase’ about politics and entertainment is standard. Being a real noncomformist, being a real radical and part of the counterculture is being a Christian conservative in today’s America. That’s why so few people really do it.
In my chronology of things the whole tattoo thing mostly started on Cher’s ass.
I think it was a butterfly. I’m not googling that.