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He
Built This City
To
the Editor:
What
is happening to our readers? Have they lost all their intelligence,
or is their use of drugs suddenly catching up to them? I have
to laugh at some of the comments in the readers poll: “Our
mayor looks like he’s in the mafia.” Haha, pleeaaseee . .
. think of something better. News alert—The Sopranos
is a TV show. “New Mayor”—all I say to that is, if you don’t
like it move to another city, but before you do, remember
to throw your beer bottles in the trash as you leave Alive
at Five! Oh, and the comment about the “police, getting off
with nothing”—can the police bashing just stop already! I
think its time for some to take their blinders off, and just
come back down to reality with the rest of us!
Robin
Elario
Albany
The
Critic’s Critic Criticized
To
the Editor:
Having
been unfortunate enough to sit through Madagascar at
the Adirondack Theater Festival last month, I was appalled
by Mr. O’Mara’s savaging [“Not the Play I Saw,” Letters, Aug.
4] of Kathy Ceceri’s spot-on review [“Absence of Malice (and
Everything Else),” Theater, July 28]. The play was a thorough
disappointment. Whatever promise playwright J.T. Rogers’ artful
concept, storyline and dialogue offered never made it off
the page.
Yes, the play won the Pinter Review Prize, and yes, it most
certainly is art. But that alone doesn’t earn it clemency
from real criticism, as Mr. O’Mara seems to advocate. Perhaps
Mr. O’Mara should speak to the opening night audience which
greeted the play’s end with brief, tepid applause (and, dare
I say, a sigh of relief) or the fellow who sat behind me and
snored through the second act.
Furthermore, it is exceedingly offensive to suggest that,
because the two reviews appeared side by side, Ms. Ceceri
was comparing the Shakespearean spoof to the highbrow drama.
Only a poor reader could make such a puerile link.
Too many reviewers seem to think like Mr. O’Mara; praise must
be lavished upon anything that comes under the guise of intellectualism
and the merely entertaining should be abhorred or we risk
“the culture of our region.” But Mr. O’Mara’s standard-less
embrace of anything he deems “art” is as rudderless as the
ATF’s casting, direction and staging of an otherwise intriguing
drama.
Thank heaven that Metroland’s readers have someone
like Kathy Ceceri, who has the courage to point out when the
emperor has no clothes.
Denise
Bassett
Saratoga Springs
Correction
Due
to an editing error, we listed Betty Barnette, Albany’s incumbent
city treasurer, as being supported by the Working Families
Party [“The Candidates on the Record,” Trail Mix, Aug. 4].
This is not true.
Metroland
welcomes typed, double-spaced letters (computer printouts
OK), addressed to the editor. Or you may e-mail them to: metroland@metroland.net.
Metroland reserves the right to edit letters for length; 300
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address and day and evening telephone numbers. We will not
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illegible, irresponsible or factually inaccurate.
Send
to:
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4th Floor, Albany, NY 12210
or e-mail us at metroland@metroland.net.
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