The Death of the Critic, Updated

Lots of discussion lately about criticism, and the death thereof. For one thing, there's a Matt Eagan piece in the Hartford Courant that loudly, quite rightly bemoans that "Daily newspapers are trimming full-time critics faster than they can grow back." But why does he omit any real discussion of theater critics? He talks about film critics left and right, but let's be honest: If you were a publisher of a chain of papers and all you cared about was the bottom line, you could get away with one film critic because it's the same product, no matter where you are. You can't do that with theater, which is why the lack of interest in theater criticism is such a problem.

I post a comment at the end of his article, also, because everybody complains but no one ever does anything to address the problem -- such as flexing economic muscle.

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