The Ex

To the Editors of The Crimson:

I congratulate Abigail McGanney for her eloquent and pithy article of last Saturday. With wit and elegance she champions the "experimental" cause in Harvard Theater, condemning the conservative elite and its oppressive, narrow-minded approach to the creative process. Her careful research helped her understand most of the intricate issues she brings together in her article. Her quotation of me, both accurate and in context, very successfully makes me look the fool.

McGanney makes two points. She argues that the conservative elite has a "strategy" to keep the Ex in the hands of directors who "enjoy its 'favor'." Second, she laments that the Ex no longer produces "off-the-wall things that don't get put up in the houses." Let us first consider the plays that earn Ex slots.

McGanney first notes that the Experimental Theater should do "experimental" plays; she would settle a complex argument by calling on the power of a name. By her logic, she will be quite content if we change the name to the Elite Theater. But I don't think changing the name would help. The name argument is clever, if specious, window dressing.

McGanney then notes that only the Ex receives money from the University. For this reason, she argues, the Ex should support theater that would not find funding anywhere else. One of several criteria for choosing Ex shows should be consideration of University support. But would McGanney feel her tuition better spent were she able to see six dreadful productions of "experimental" plays?

More important, why does "experimental" theater deserve the University's exclusive support? Each director, actor, designer and producer has his own style of theater. If several name themselves "experimental," do they deserve exclusive claim to one of the finest technical theaters on campus?

What, though, does McGanney mean by "experimental"? I imagine the authors of March of the Falsettos would be surprised to hear themselves labeled conservative. How about the shows she does not list? Is Jim's, for instance, "experimental" because it was written by a student?

On to the HRDC's "strategy". Elite, favor, elect: these words run through McGanney's article. Yet how does she know who is in my "favor"? Has she, over our lunch meetings, looked deep into my soul and seen to its finest detail the bias I wield over my intellect? Does she know which directors have worked during my tenure, and my relationship with them? She uses fighting words, and she had best have strong proof to back them up.

I frankly do not understand McGanney's logic when she charges that we forbid reviews to keep our deceptive policies under cover. We stopped reviews to encourage creativity, to prevent such reviews as The Crimson's personally affrontive review of Brad Dalton's "experimental" Hamlet.

McGanney notes that actors and directors oppose our decision. That is quite true, but others don't. Her point wants numbers.

McGanney does quite well to quote my comment about Anne Frank. Let me explain. I had played the same middle-aged British pun-mixing snob in six shows running. Playing a German Jew whose family dies at Nazi hands presented a challenge. Its being "conservative", for me, made it "experimental".

Again, I appreciate McGanney's article, her thoughtfulness and her careful research. I disagree with her conclusions, and believe her absurd accusations of elitist plotting only weaken her argument. Her extremist views rest less on a consideration of the facts than on her own preference for "experimental" drama and an overzealous fascination with the power of a name. Andrew C. Watson '88   President, HRDC