Critics that have gotten into hot water

[munkustrap178]

Hi all,

 

I would like to pick your brains about theatre critics, other than John Simon, who have gotten into hot water over their remarks.

What are some instances where a theatre critic has caused outrage?  Or, less dramatically, angered a director or an actor?  

I'm not looking for any Reidel/Weinstein or Reidel/Leveaux tales here.  I'm really looking for cases where a critic has written something unnecessarily mean, cruel, racist, sexist, etc.

 

Thank you all very much, and I look forward to reading what you come up with!

[mpd4165]

Hedy Weiss of Chicago Sun-Times has time and time again written things and made no apologies for it. Like when Court Theatre produced Caroline, Or Change and she described Kushner as a "self-loathing Jew". And most recently for a TYA show at Steppenwolf, she went on a massive tirade about a show called This Is Modern Art and compared graffiti artists to urban terrorists.

[munkustrap178]

That's great, thank you!

[neonlightsxo]

When Charles Isherwood decided he would no longer review Adam Rapp?

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/07/theater-talkback-for-one-critic-its-a-rapp/

[munkustrap178]

Thank!

 

Any more?

[LarryD2]

I'm not sure if this is exactly what you are looking for, but three prominent British critics -- Charles Spencer, of the Telegraph; Susannah Clapp, of The Observer; and Georgina Brown, of the Daily Mail -- resigned as judges of the Evening Standard Awards in 2013 after Helen Mirren received the award for THE AUDIENCE. According to the critics, another actress had received more votes, but the Evening Standard's editor and chief theater critic altered the results and gave the award to Mirren.

http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2013/dec/16/helen-mirren-evening-standard-theatre-awards-judges-resign

[munkustrap178]

That's so interesting...thank you.