Wendy Thomson, 11 January 2016

Those Who Took Part

Wendy Thomson - Female Arts magazine (called the session)

Laura Kressly - The Plays The Thing UK

Gina Smith - Female Arts

Katie Jackson

Paul Whitlock

Oluwatoyin Odonsi

Vivian Ezugha

We discussed what is a ‘feminist’ review and what is a ‘feminist’ show?

We had to define feminism, those attending agreed this to be (the pursuit of) gender

equality.

Bechdel Testing Theatre in Reviews

Would it be helpful to include a Yes / No in reviews which stated if a performance

passed the Bechdel test? (see @BechdelTheatre) Responses varied - some said it

might be beneficial to the reader (as beneficial as a star rating) but because of the

flaws with the Bechdel test (which was created for films) one-women shows for

example would always fail the test.*

So it was agreed that it would not be helpful for a review to rate ‘How feminist was the

show’? Also a review should not feminist shame.

Critics recording gender split / ethnicity split in productions

Laura Kressly talked about her experiences as a reviewer (Everything Theatre,

Remote Goat) and as a critic for her own performing arts review platform ‘The Plays

The Thing UK’ she had started to record the gender split of the cast in shows and also

the ethnicity split. We discussed if it was possible to implement this at Female

Arts.com and the disadvantages which include the difficulty to record this data about

the creative team, who are equally relevant to a production.

Who are feminists?

Vivian Ezugha asked if feminist reviews should and can involve men as well as

women? (consensus was yes) and we discussed feminist criticism from third world

countries, and not just female perspective, we discussed ‘female’ and the fluidty of

gender and trans.

Subconscious prejudice in critics

Oluwatoyin Odonsi asked if reviewers consciously try to strip out their prejudices when

they review? There can be and there is class, race, lgbtq and regional bias in reviews /

reviewers and there can be very different responses from critics to the same show -

perhaps due to their experiences / backgrounds.

We discussed the importance of diversity in critics and if this is reflected in mainstream

publications e.g. The Guardian (Lyn Gardner, Michael Billington).

Oluwatoyin asked if there is training for theatre critics - Female Arts have reviewer

guidelines / manual and we may hold training workshops in future. Laura Kressly

recommended the book ‘How to Write about Theatre’ by Mark Fisher and The

Guardian's courses.

This D&D session was very helpful to us at Female Arts.com, the leading online

publication for female artists and creatives. We are seeking more reviewers (from

anywhere in the UK) and we're aiming to hold workshops / training on reviewing from a

feminist perspective.

* EDIT: Bechdel Testing Theatre kindly gave some feedback after the report was

published: Sorry to have missed this discussion! 1 woman shows pass if 2 female

characters played/relayed by 1 actor… though personally I prefer 2 women on stage

because a) to see a relationship alive & b) more parts for us! star rating is a good

analogy for #BechdelTesting - an indicator, but you'd want to read the whole review.

I'd love to see more in-depth feminist analysis in theatre reviews but of course that's

opinions, not data… in film #BechdelTest as a start point has put #feminism &

#genderrepresentation higher up reviewers agenda … & made people notice (if not yet

change) underrepresentation in terms of numbers, & related issues (pay!) let's aim for

both intelligent feminist reviews/analysis/debate & a greater number of parts for

#WomenOnStage

Images:

Tags:

Reviewers, Critics, Arts, Performing arts, diversity, critics, Theatre, review, gender,

feminism, Workshops, theatre, Gender, performing arts, workshops, The Plays the

Thing UK, feminist, reviewers, trans, Mark Fisher, The Guardian, arts, Female Arts,

Michael Billington, THEATRE, Lyn Gardner, Bechdel Test, inequality, Feminism,

Bechdel Testing Theatre, Diversity, female, Performing Arts

Comments: 1

Wendy Thomson, 12 January 2016

Twitter conversation about feminist shaming:

holly robindaughter [email protected] fascinated by the idea of “feminist shaming” - can you elaborate?

Female Arts Magazine [email protected]

When a reviewer has criticised a production or individual for not being feminist / feminist enough…particularly if a

production or individual has promoted itself as being feminist.

holly robindaughter [email protected]

that's really interesting. I kind of see that as part of the job of feminist criticism & as someone who makes…theatre that I call

& market as feminist, I would hope to be called out if my show failed in any way & I've often felt massively let down by

shows who market as feminist but have poor race politics or shame women…For certain choices. & have always wanted to

see that reflected in reviews.

Female Arts Magazine [email protected]

It's our @femalearts policy to offer private feedback if a show ‘fails’ that we would call a 1 or 2 star review…

we would comment if a show shamed women. But we want to encourage gender equality (and every type of equality)… I

don't think it's helpful to publish - “your feminism isn't good enough.” we give an overall opinion on a production.

holly robindaughter [email protected]

yeah the femalearts reviews I read are always great & engage with flaws well…I just would never considered rigorous

feminist critique something to be avoided…& that's how the phrase “feminist shaming” read to me. Thanks for the

explanation!

Female Arts Magazine [email protected]

I don't think we avoid feminist critique, but we don't publish if a show is bad, that might be part of the reason why it failed.

holly robindaughter [email protected]

yeah, I'm not being specific to femalearts here - just wondering about the general application of not “feminist shaming”

Female Arts Magazine [email protected]

Another example would be no platforming.