Good news
Praxis Theatre Co-Artistic Director Simon Rice has resurrected his widely beloved U.S. politics journal The Rice Report.
A Rice Report primer
The Rice Report started back in 2004 – a reaction to Simon’s growing distress with the state of American politics and its questionable foreign policies. His Rice Report newsletter series used the 2004 U.S. presidential election as a springboard to foster rigorous (and informed) discussion of an increasingly compromised democratic process.
His weekly reports became wildly popular among a small group of followers – and included a live play-by-play “performance” of the controversial Kerry-Bush showdown on election night: Tuesday, November 11, 2004.
A new blog
We are thrilled to welcome Mr. Rice to the blogosphere and announce the return of The Rice Report. Among the topics he’s promising will be in the cards:
Who’s running? From Hilary to Huckabee, the A-Z on 2008!
2004 Aftermath – Was the general election stolen?
The Hidden History of 9/11 – A weekly crash course for beginners and/or skeptics.
And if you’re wondering what any of this has to do with theatre, check Simon’s response to one of our 10 questions:
6) How has your interest in American politics influenced your ideas about theatre?
American politics have all the great elements of drama – farce, tragedy, absurdity, heroes, villains, clowns – the stakes are always high and although much focus has been put on the circus-like atmosphere of modern American politics, we all want to know what the next Act will bring. The Bush administration has felt like the usurping power in one of Shakespeare’s histories. With Donald “Rummy” Rumsfeld emerging as chief rhetorician, uttering such poetic lines as, “The absence of evidence, is not evidence of absence,” when no WMDs were found in Iraq. That’s a beautiful line!
I guess what I’m saying is that my passion for American politics deepens my understanding of theatre, and vice-versa.
Click
here to get to
The Rice Report, then hit
“Bookmark
” on your browser. You’ll be glad you did.
The series continues:
55) Why do I have to become a film star before people will come to see me in the theatre?
56) Theatre is better than movies because you can travel through time, space, gender and class using only the actors and the audience’s collective imagination.
57) One is transported to a different space and time with little recognition that one is simply watching a performance, instead they are experiencing and performing along with the artists.
58) The best theatre misses being terrible theatre by a hair.
59) Theatre creates dialogue and community.
Click here for the series introduction and for a complete list of sentences so far.
Donna-Michelle St. Bernard and
Catherine Hernandez(both of
Native Earth Performing Arts)
seen here leaving their offices in Toronto
’s Distillery District.
The pair were seen later in the day shopping at
Toronto
’s upscale
MarieJosette wearable art boutique.
The series continues:
50) Theatre is the art of bleeding in public.
51) What is most interesting about theatre is seeing/experiencing the collective mind in action – no right, no wrong, just the ‘attempt’ at working through a vision honestly.
52) The human spirit is viscerally attracted to and innately seeks out stories; theatre is just one medium to tell a story.
53) I’m tired of seeing B-list TV celebrities on Broadway who can’t act “taking a break” from their lousy careers and making me suffer.
54) To change the landscape of what is revered and what is questioned.
Click here for the series introduction and for a complete list of sentences so far.
The series continues:
45) Dialogue is useful but action is eternal.
46) Theatre is one of the few things in my life that is sacred and ceremonious.
47) It is theatre that stops me from having a 9-to-5 job.
48) Transgression and betrayal of the senses and the accepted reactions of society.
49) Theatre is pornography with your clothes on.
Click here for the series introduction and for a complete list of sentences so far.
The series continues:
40) The theatre is one of last sources of mystery left in the modern world.
41) Theatre dies when it is not played HERE, NOW, TODAY.
42) If a single sentence could contain the essence of theatre, that sentence would surely cause the universe to collapse.
43) Alive: If it weren’t then this blog wouldn’t exist.
44) How many theatre artists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Click here for the series introduction and for a complete list of sentences so far.
Actor
Cole J. Alvis seen here leaving Equity Showcase Theatre.
(Toronto, Canada)
The series continues:
35) Theatre is a museum of the human being’s visceral state; perhaps it could compete with the ROM or AGO if patrons had to observe the piece blindfolded.
36) Theatre is awfully fun to make when you’re working with good people.
37) Theatre is a singularity.
38) Theatre is usually the most magical when its practitioners have small budgets.
39) When someone tries to undermine an actor’s job by labeling it ‘easy’, an appropriate retort would be: “Making it look ‘easy’ is one of the most difficult parts of the job.”
Click here for the series introduction and for a complete list of sentences so far.
The series continues:
30) Theatre brings artists of all genres together to tell a story – or many stories – of the human experience, perhaps seeking to create community.
31) Theatre is most compelling when it engages both the audience and the performers as much in their pinky toes as it does in their brains.
32) When a theatrical performance really and truly grabs hold of me, it becomes very dangerous, and I realize that if the actor jumps off a cliff I’m going to jump with them.
33) Bad theatre is usually the audiences fault.
34) A one-hour piece of theatre can put your materialistic concerns on ice; come feel the warmth inside the theatre community and let some of that freezing cold ice melt.
Click here for the series introduction and for a complete list of sentences so far.
The series continues:
25) Sport is theatre.
26) Theatre is a dish best served with a post-show pint.
27) Theatre lives and breathes everywhere that an audience gathers; no matter if it’s one person, 400, or 2000.
28) This is frustrating.
29) In some respects, those little black-box theatre productions, ubiquitous in the vibrant cities of the artist, can represent some of life’s most disturbing and darkest corners; so the theatre can be a place where you should enter at your own visceral risk.
Click here for the series introduction and for a complete list of sentences so far.
Good news
6) How has your interest in American politics influenced your ideas about theatre?
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