Who would have thought the brilliant playwright and pretty good director David Mamet would have anything in common with tasteless schlockmeister Uwe Boll? Boll once expressed a desire to fight movie critics in a boxing ring, and now Mamet has taken it a step further: he wishes all critics were dead. Or at least that's what he told Vanity Fair. The magazine ends each issue with a "Proust Questionnaire," in which a celebrity is asked a series of frivolous-but-deep-sounding questions, usually to coincide with the promotion of the celebrity's new movie. This month it's Mamet (whose Redbelt opens
What is your idea of perfect happiness?
My idea of perfect happiness is a healthy family, peace between nations, and all the critics die.
All the critics, Dave? All of us? Aw, gee. In my high school drama class, we loved doing scenes from Mamet's plays. Granted, this was primarily because it permitted us to swear in abundance, but over time we came to appreciate his work on a deeper level, too. The way he writes dialogue -- the unusual cadences, the stylized realism -- is like music, and the intellectual themes of his plays are eternally thought-provoking.
So my initial reaction to Mamet's desire for my death is sadness. Then I move on to anger. I like what my friend Sean Means at The Salt Lake Tribune said in his blog today: "The most appropriate response is, alas, unprintable in a family publication -- but it's a two-word phrase very familiar to fans of Mamet's work."
But then I think about it some more and I'm a little baffled. Uwe Boll's well-publicized aggression toward critics is understandable, given that critics have universally loathed his films, and given that Uwe Boll is an attention whore. But Mamet's films -- the ones he wrote and directed himself -- have generally gotten good reviews. Look at Rotten Tomatoes: 64% for Spartan, 66% for Heist, 87% for State and Main, 97% for The Winslow Boy, 89% for The Spanish Prisoner. Most filmmakers would be glad to have stats like those.
So I have come to this conclusion: He was talking about theater critics, not movie critics. Yeah, that's it. Theater critics. Those guys are total bastards. I'm with ya, Dave!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
4-23-2008 @ 3:39PM
ML said...
Most creative people have trouble dealing with criticism. But, as Lawrence Olivier once told ... was it Charlton Heston? And it's a paraphrase ... the trick is to learn to ignore the notices ... the bigger trick, to ignore the good notices! Please ignore what the talent says; I think that reviews are generally much more helpful to us than to the talent.
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4-23-2008 @ 11:20PM
Michael said...
This strikes me as the kind of flippant comment that, while ridiculously stupid, he would probably admit isn't quite true if pressed by someone he respected and whose opinion he cared about. Maybe if his idea of perfect happiness had included everyone being immortal and having infinite resources. Otherwise critics are obviously necessary. In a world where there's more things you'd consider seeing or experiencing then you could ever have time for, you need some way to choose. And since not all sights/experiences are created equal, you want a better method than eeny-meeny-miney-moe. One of those ways is the critic, professional or amateur. Now if he had said "professional critic" I can at least imagine a possible argument, even though I probably wouldn't like it. Besides, it'd also be mean.
Anyway, it was probably just hyperbole. Still not too nice.
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4-27-2008 @ 6:36AM
Ethan Stanislawski said...
Maybe it's because most critics are "brain-dead liberals"?
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