Author: Kate Foy

We left this poll open for a couple of weeks, and the results are in.
Seems as though most artists and creatives do read reviews and criticism of their current shows.  Only 10% claimed to wait till after the show was finished.  Not one respondent was bold enough to ignore the reviews.  Shame really, as many are not worth reading, especially those that (for starters) get the facts wrong and are penned by those whose halting syntax and lack of theatre nous (rather than the subject of their criticism) are what take centre stage.

We created an ‘Other’ category for people to add their comments.  These are two of the comments from the 20%:

• ‘Yes, but not until well into the run’;
• ‘When acting, not till show closes. When coaching, yes – a necessity.’

So, there you have it.  I suppose this opens another can of worms which we’d be happy to see wriggle away here or elsewhere i.e., what constitutes a quality theatre review?  Maybe that’s the next poll!