EVIL AND THEATER

My buddy Mike Switzer comments on my Clifford Odets post from a few days ago:

um, got news for ya ron...

the bad guys are most likely a part of "humanity" too...unless of course they are reptilian aliens/demons from the 4th dimension...

I know what you mean, mostly, but don't dehumanize evil. We're all capable of it. Some more than others. Each and every one of us chooses saint or sinner or somewhere in between, not once, but weekly, daily, from moment to moment.I think the best art recognizes and reflects that...

here's another thought...

to do really effective political theatre you have to perform somewhere other than a theatre...somewhere that the people are: a bar, a laundromat, a bus, an elevator, the street, a city council meeting, etc...90% of "political" work is just preaching to the choir, which makes us all feel warm inside, but doesn't really "work"...

And here's my response.

I think you mistook my comment, but it's probably my fault for not being specific enough.

I completely agree with you about the nature of evil; in fact, I've written about it here on my blog in my essay "EASTER GRINCH." Perhaps I didn't connect the dots enough: when I judge Kazan's defending his actions before HUAC after forty years of contemplation, when I talk about serving humanity, rather than the bad guys, it is with the understanding that all individuals are capable of both good and evil actions. Evil and good are things men do rather than what they are.

However, it's pretty clear to me that serving humanity is one thing while exploiting humanity is quite another. "Bad guys," as a phrase, isn't intended to dehumanize the corporatists or their legion of apologists. Indeed, my family is solidly Republican and Southern Baptist; in fact, my brother is a lawyer for the energy industry, doing real devil's work: I abhor their views and their support for what I believe to be evil causes, but I love them dearly. Were it not for luck and the odd circumstances coming out of choices I’ve made during my life which seemingly have nothing to do with politics or religion (that is, studying mass media and theater), I would probably be right there with them, a conservative Christian cheering on Bush and his wars. To spell this out a bit, I would lump my family into the “bad guy” category because they contribute, in their own small way, to this awful mess that we’re in—hell, I could even abstract this argument to include myself for benefiting from my status as white male in American society, or for shopping at Wal-Mart, whatever. The point is that “bad guys,” in this instance, is just shorthand. Like you say, they’re part of humanity, too. Even my favorite bad guy, Doctor Doom is a human being (he's fictional, of course, but that's beside the point).

So your statement is well taken, of course, that the notion of good and evil as aspects of human nature is so utterly problematic as to make the idea meaningless—like the Bible says, “all have sinned.” I should probably be more careful about what I say, but blogging is messy. Sorry about the confusion.

As for your point about political theater, I pretty much agree. In fact, to generalize your thought to include all theater, the venerable art form which drew thousands in ancient Athens might as well be ballet or opera as far as ordinary people today are concerned. That is, theater is by and large irrelevant. That’s why I love the efforts of underground theater companies such as dos chicas, Mildred’s Umbrella, and IBP in Houston: they perform in bars, creating new audiences. Sadly, I’ve also seen such groups burn out over the long term, like Austin’s Frontera, or be absorbed into mainstream community theater simply for survival. There needs to be not only a rethinking of theater as a medium, but also the economics behind it.

If I had a ready solution to these problems, I’d be implementing it already.

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