I'm late to the game on this one. Darren Barefoot has a great post up about it, with really mature, thoughtful and insightful writing. I'm not going to get anywhere close to that today, but I will link him and quote his quick summary. It's pretty good. It's short.
"Blogger writes what seems like a positive review of a Fringe show produced by a local company. Artistic director of said company posts a rather catty comment on her review. Mack weighs in, and a long conversation ensues."
You're going to have to make your own decisions on this one. Read the links or don't.
In the end, this is a non-starter for most people. Darren calls it a tempest in a teacup, and he’s right. But it's easy for me to sit back and judge on the Internet pretending I know anything about the personalities involved and that my opinion mattered... so yeah, let's do that.
My take? As an emerging artist in Calgary, I was ashamed and embarrassed with the way Haslam (the artistic director of Teatro la Quindicina) engaged with his audience (Sharon, the blogger). Turning away our other half, the observed telling the observer to go fuck off, and doing it so publically was just poor judgment. Haslam makes a specific jab about the portion of any ticket sale that ends up in the artist's pocket. He calls a ticket sale "her crappy 19 bucks". He tells her to take her entertainment dollar elsewhere, on a review of his show. In front of other people's crappy 19 bucks, mine included.
Isn’t that normally the job of the reviewer, warning us to stay away, take our dollars elsewhere? Well, thanks Jeff for pointing that out to us. You just saved me cash.
Had this been a long festering wound then at some point over the years he should have pulled her aside at a show and spoke to her face to face. If he believes that she is immaturely publicly attacking his craft, then he should have showed some class, manned up, and done it in person. Show her how a real professional gets it done, as he’s so quick to call her an amature.
Or at least an e-mail. A fucking letter would have been awesome.
But he's chosen to paint himself as a troll. In an interview with Brittney LeBlanc about this issue, Haslam references the fact that he should be allowed his opinion and he was taking advantage of the discussion that blogs can provide. He has a right to comment on Shannon's blog.
Well, sure, not arguing that at all. But just because we can do a thing doesn’t mean we should. Hey, I could go outside and piss on the first police officer I see. That would be on a different scale of stupid idea. By magnitude. But urinating on a cop and being a asshat to a blogger who says your next show should be fun are both kind of stupid ideas. Mines better though.
Where the hell is the disconnect here?
Embarrassment aside for an artist treating our paying public this way, what I really don't understand here is what pissed him off. I'm reading her reviews and trying to figure out how they have been hurtful. I'm worried that Jeff might be a little out of touch from reality here. Blogger vs. professional critic and their place in society debate aside, whatever... I'm really having trouble figuring out what set him off.
Was this a stunt? Reading over the further comments that Jeff has made around the web I don't think that could be the case. I'm starting to doubt he thought that far ahead. He's seriously burned some fans. If it was to drum up some noise surrounding their company, they did. Free publicity for sure. But it's more like he's running his own smear campaign against his own company.
And here I go adding to it. Giving him more free ink to help damage his and his companies reputation.
This whole thing seriously makes my head hurt. Sure, she thought the 08/09 season was a bit rocky. A particular physical choice he made she wasn’t a big fan of. But she bought season freaking subscriptions, two of them.
Oh, no wait, I think I found some hurtful things in her posts going back.
"...I adore Davina Stewart and Jeff Haslam..."
" Mack and I also enjoyed Jeff Haslam (when don’t we?) "
" All and all, it was a great "
"left me smiling as I left the theatre"
"The end of the play has been resonating with me even now, hours later"
"super-charged ride through a farcical murder mystery"
@maupassant7201 said it best: "I, for one, will assiduously avoid offense to Haslam by simply not attending any plays with his name on them."
I agree, I wouldn't want to piss him off by seeing his shows and talking about them.
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