Picto Diary - 12 October 2018 - Romeo and Juliet (OSF)
Lunch with Perfesser (sic). Behind, Perfesser's (sic) yellow Z beemer coupe. 12 October 2018. Omar's Seafood and Steaks, Ashland, OR
Lunch with Perfesser (sic). Behind, Perfesser's (sic) yellow, Z, beemer coupe. 12 October 2018. Omar's Fresh Seafood and Steaks, Ashland, OR..
Perfesser (sic) is active contributor on Bishop's political email forum. Introduced to Mwah (sic) by Aunt Joyce.
Perfesser (sic): US Army retired, former zoo keeper, college professor, Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) volunteer, EMT volunteer, Fulbright scholar, and frequent world traveler.
Lots to talk about...mostly me listening and learning.
Key learning: Moor culture apex was 1250 AD. Moorish decline thereafter, including during the golden years of the Alhambra, from 1400 AD to 1492 AD.
Perfesser (sic), an OSF volunteer, and Mwah (sic), a regular OSF theater goer, also mused on current OSF goings on.
Its been known for a year, now, that Bill Rauch, OSF's creative director, will be moving on to a theatrical position in New York City after the end of next OSF season (2019). His departure is generally seen as a good move for him after a generally successful, ten year tenure at OSF.
My own sense of Rauch, after attending plays here for the last 15 years, is that he's done a very fine job. The performance quality of OSF offerings has been excellent, even as Rauch has aggressively advanced social justice and politically correct themes into OSF performances.
But, on the veille of Rauch's departure, OSF has hit a bump in the road.
OSF receipts were down by $2MM this year. The decline in receipts has been attributed to OSF having had to shut down numerous 2018 season outdoor theater performances on account of persistent smoke from nearby forest fires.
Also, unexpected was the recent announcement of the departure of OSF's business head, Cynthia Rider. Her departure was announced as a voluntary resignation.
And, twenty-six OSF staff (including some long time mainstays) were let go, recently, in what is seen to be a cost cutting measure.
Beyond the smoke, are there other threats to OSF's revenue line?
Perfesser (sic) and Mwah (sic) discussed the possibility of adverse impact of the license creative director Rauch has taken towards stretching the boundaries of creative expression in plays to advance certain social agendas. Rauch is gay. He and his spouse have two adopted children, one of whom, a putative male teen, has announced as a transsexual. Not that there's anything wrong with that (hat tip: Jerry Seinfeld)!!!
For example, the leads in this year's production of "Oklahoma," were not a man and a woman, as the musical stipulates, but two females in a lesbian relationship. Other Rauch adaptations have had females playing male roles, blacks playing "white" roles, yada. Males played female roles during Shakespeare's day. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose?
Geezers make up the bulk of the OSF customer base. They have the time, as retired people, and the money... up to $200 a seat... to keep OSF functioning. Most of the geezer playgoers are drawn from the I-5 market, from San Diego to Vancouver, so one might assume they are more of a liberal political persuasion, and more susceptible to appreciating Rauch's social messaging... but, perhaps, many are not. Could there be some resistance to the growing outre, political correctness of Rauch's recent offerings?
Though her role was as business head of OSF, Cynthia Rider was a vocal and active supporter of politically correct OSF envelope pushing, and local, Ashland left-wing political causes. Who knows why she departed... rumor has it she was fired... and, to be sure, her departure was totally unexpected and hasty. But, the point is, are the audience and the OSF trustees queasy about OSF's pronounced push to the social justice left? More than half of OSF's 2019 play offering, Rauch's last year, will advance politically correct social messaging.
Setting aside concerns about an overabundance of politics in performances, pure demographic changes could threaten OSF attendance. Older theater lovers are dying off and not being replaced, in no small part due to the 07 recession and its adverse financial impact on the aging, theater going cohort.
We know that millennials are by and large not interested in any of the stuff their parents liked... maybe this includes theater going.
So, down in revenues whether due to smoke, or resistance to "outre" play offerings, change in millennial preferences, or the effect of the 07 recession on aging theater goers, OSF seems to be at a crossroads. Filling the two top positions with capable people has an especial importance for the OSF trustees.
Stay tuned.
— at Omar's Fresh Seafood & Steaks.
Above: Central Oregon and Central Pacific locomotive northbound on the old Siskiyou Southern Pacific railway spur, from Redding, CA to Medford, OR. 12 October 2018. Ashland, OR.
In 20 years of visiting Ashland I've never seen a train on this track. Proceeding on impulse power, it pulled five railroad cars laden with what looked like lumber products. I was out walking and too far away for a close up look. This image is a 4x telephoto.
The the locomotive image seen here is 15 miles north of the famed Siskiyou railway tunnel #13, where the last train robbery in US history was perpetrated on 11 October 1927... uncannily, almost to the date, 91 years ago.
My friend Bob Peterson, WW II vet from Ashland's Oaktree Restaurant morning ROMEO meetings (now deceased), spent his entire career as a Southern Pacific railroad worker on the Siskiyou line. — inAshland, Oregon.
Pre play. OSF. Beasy's On the Creek restaurant. 12 October 2018.
Beasy's. A TIMDT favorite for 20 years.
Hat trick tonight. Food, service, and setting all 10 of 10.
Are we back in Spain?
— eating dinner with my love at Beasy's On The Creek.
Side note on straws. TIMDT usually orders iced tea at lunch and dinner. I drink iced tea at lunch. At no time have any of the Ashland restaurants we have frequented on this trip withheld straws when serving iced tea. Has otherwise progressive Ashland not received the message yet?
Above: Romeo and Juliet. Oregon Shakespeare Festival. 12 October 2018. File image.
OSF play, Romeo and Juliet, was good enough... up to standard.
The production paid fealty to usual OSF politically correct exigencies: female playing male character (Mercutio), dwarf as an extra, deaf actor, and a disabled actor in a wheel chair. Before starting the play, the actors gave thanks for how the local Indian tribes were good stewards over the land before the white man showed up. OSF should invite Elizabeth Warren to perform this introductory ceremony, lending authenticity to the proceeding.
Notwithstanding the fine play performance, one has to question the relevancy of Shakespeare these days.
Suicide as a response to unrequited love? Doesn't make sense.
In today's world, Juliet would have accused Romeo of sexual assault. Romeo would be vilified, his life ruined, and Juliet become fabulously wealthy via a crowd funding campaign.
I mean, the notion of a male and female so devoted to one another that they prefer unity in death to separation in life? The absurdity of the thought boggles the mind.
Shakespeare is passe. We need to move on to something more culturally relevant.
— at Oregon Shakespeare Festival.
Addendum:
Idiot.
Jack Aroon,
Mahwah, NJ
Mr. Magoo is promulgating his preemptive defense.
Phoenix,
Phoenix, AZ