Reviewing Martin Denton Prolific
nytheatre.com founder
pioneered comprehensive coverage BY BONNIE ROSENSTOCK
Martin Denton arguably has the most enviable job in the world. He
goes to see plays about six times a week and writes what he thinks about
them. Denton, the constant creative presence behind the nytheatre.com curtain, turned his
passion for theater into the premier go-to site for anyone who wants to
know anything and everything that’s going on under New York’s bright
footlights.
In addition to cogent reviews and detailed listings, the
website provides particulars to help people who aren’t experienced
theatergoers. When Denton created the site in 1999, he thought about it
from a tourist perspective (which he was at the time) — so there are
clear directions to venues, information on theater amenities and even
info about the area. There is a page to help purchase tickets, and a
page listing discounts for students and seniors, “which people are not
as aware of as they should be,” says Denton. He posts interviews with
theater artists from time to time and conducts podcasts (which he has
been doing for over four years — the first site to have a theater
podcast series in New York). He also answers email inquiries, like “How
do I dress?” “Isn’t that nice,” he said.
Denton, 49, who loves to talk
about theater, started the website (then called Martin’s Guide to NY
Theatre) when he was working as senior director of corporate accounting
services for Marriott International in Washington, D.C. The hotel
conglomerate had sent him to be trained in that new technology called
Internet — and just for practice, he decided to build a website. “As a
hobbyist, I did some basic listings, wrote reviews and immediately got
attention because it was a novelty,” he recalled. “In those days, there
were so few websites of any kind. It was a moment that you could grow
with it.”
Within a year, requests for reviews began to pour in, and the
website’s name was changed to its current appellation. Denton was still
living in the D.C. area and commuting every weekend to attend shows. “I
either had to stop because it was taking up so much time or leave
Marriott, move to New York and make it a full-time endeavor.”
Thankfully, in 1999, he chose the latter. In July of that year, he
created the non-profit New York Theatre Experience, Inc. — and by
December, the organization began publishing an annual anthology of new
plays by unpublished playwrights.
For several years, Denton was the sole
reviewer. Then, Chelsea Now’s own Trav S.D. became the “very, very first
person” to review for the site. Denton credits actor/writer Michael
Criscuolo, “a wonderful reviewer, for putting the bug in my ear that I
can have other reviewers,” he said. Today,
nytheatre.com has approximately 130
unpaid volunteers who critique over 900 shows in a single year. The
biggest part of the site is listings in New York’s five boroughs, New
Jersey, Westchester and Long Island (less in the outer boroughs and
outer burbs because there isn’t much theater happening.)
The listings
are constantly pouring in. On the day of Chelsea Now’s interview at
Denton’s Murray Hill office (convenient for walking to Broadway, the
East Village and parts of Greenwich Village), 465 shows were listed.
When theater in New York was only Broadway, there were 200 to 300 shows
a year. Now that’s a month. “But we review as much as we can,” he said.
Everyone who writes for the website — people he knows personally or
through staff recommendation — works in Off-Off Broadway. “They
understand the importance of getting feedback out to the productions.
They go to see their peers’ work and understand the effort it takes to
put it out with day jobs and little funding,” he said.
For Denton, the
interesting new plays today are rarely on Broadway, perhaps once a
season with luck, which wasn’t the case a generation ago. They are
Downtown in what he terms “indie theater.”
“In the 1950s when Off
Broadway started, like Circle in the Square, even though it was
physically removed and scary to go Downtown, theater people knew about
it. The main reviewers, like Brooks Atkinson, came, but not now. About
90 percent of theater is happening under the radar, which is our main
bailiwick. So we level the playing field and provide the shows that
people don’t know about, with as much space and access as possible.”
A
nytheatre.com review is aimed at two
audiences — those who see the show (for audience building), as well as
for feedback, encouragement and helping the artists in a constructive
way. “We recognize that a lot of reviews we write are much more about
giving the companies validation and evidence of their work because the
runs are so short. By the time the review comes out, there might not
even be any remaining performances. So the review becomes a document
they can bring to a potential donor or producer that says ‘people liked
our work,’ or they can use it for whatever helps those companies grow.”
The site’s marquee event happens every summer — when they review every
show in the New York International Fringe Festival, about 200
productions in two weeks. In nine years, they have not missed a single
show. “They all come through for me and love doing it,” he said. Denton
does no reviewing the week after the round-the-clock Fringe work
schedule, “to do anything to clear my head.” He also has a current
“moratorium” to not see a certain kind of show. “That’s what keeps my
reviewing fresh,” he said.
He can go a week or two without seeing
something he likes, but then a new work by a new artist or an innovative
way of presenting things will grab his attention and make it exciting
again. “I like to see what’s on people’s minds, what reflects what’s
going on in the world today. I’m restless that way,” he said.
Denton
also likes plays about people who aren’t like him, which include
whatever non-domestic theater happens to find its way to these shores.
“The world is smaller, not larger, but we don’t see original other
theater from outside the U.S. except by English and Irish playwrights
and an occasional festival. It wasn’t so before. We have become more
insulated,” he observed.
Staffers who are bilingual are covering more of
the Spanish-speaking theater world — “a very vibrant theater community.”
He has also made a concerted effort to get more women and people of
color on staff, “without trying to put people in holes,” he said —
noting that there are very few women theater critics in a field that is
still dominated by men. So for the Fringe, he put out a call for more
women writers (the current ratio is about 40 to 60, female-male).
When
Mamet’s “Race” changed cast and he was asked to re-review it (he had
seen the original), he assigned it to a black woman. “I thought it
would be an interesting perspective since I hadn’t read any black
woman’s article about it. She looked at it in a whole different way.
It’s more interesting and much more representative of the community.”
Denton didn’t love “Race” because it didn’t take a stand. “People seem
less willing to do that. Most plays now are very wish-washy and cloudy,”
which is why he appreciates downtown theater companies. “Vampire Cowboys
[405 Johnson Ave. in Brooklyn] will surprise you in a good way. Axis
Theatre [1 Sheridan Sq.] does very challenging visceral work, always
very short and to the point. The Boomerang Theatre Company [220 E. 4th
St.] did three shows, which were all wonderful and commented on each
other. The Amoralists Theater Company, which uses the old Pearl Theatre
space [80 St. Mark’s Pl.], has a raw, young aesthetic. Everyone seems to
be under 30, so they don’t think the same way.”
He has also been excited
by the work at HERE Arts Center (145 Ave. of the Americas) this season,
especially a piece by The Talking Band, and a new play by Jean-Claude
van Itallie at La MaMa (74 E. 4th St.) “Unfortunately, all of these
will close by the time your article comes out,” he noted.
On Broadway he
recommends “FELA” and “The Scottsboro Boys” — “both very entertaining,
thought-provoking and extremely well-put-together.” However, he misses
the big, splashy musicals, like “Hello Dolly,” “with stars who had a
certain quality that is rare these days and made a career out of
theater.”
As for some of the larger, well-funded companies (like
Roundabout and Manhattan Theatre Co.), they don’t have an artistic
aesthetic, “except ‘we put famous people in plays’, ” commented Denton.
“That’s just their way of doing business. Sure, there is one good
Roundabout show every year. I don’t want to be mean. But people can’t
see everything, which is why we exist — to guide them.”
The website
“works beautifully” on any reasonably full-featured mobile phone, and he
has the night’s and next night’s listings available for iPhone. He is
working on adding new features, like being able to find shows by price,
and a showcases page because equity members can see them for free. “The
challenge is in two worlds. Every day there are new things happening in
theater and technology. The freshness comes from pursuing both. I get
tired sometimes, but never bored.”
This article, written by Bonnie Rosenstock, was originally published in November 2010 in the newsweekly Chelsea Now.