Why Produce a Bad Play?

Experimentation? Maybe someone thought a different approach could make a difference in the execution?

Maybe the Producer or Director saw something in the material that critics did not.

Or, just for the hell of it.

Well I'm glad someone enjoyed it! I loved being in Steppenwolf, but I just wondered why would you produce something that already a track record for not satisfying audiences. But glad you enjoyed it.

I also loved the play at Steppenwolf. The play had also been extensively re-written and restructured since the Atlantic. It's a play written by an ensemble member with a mostly all Steppenwolf ensemble cast. There's lots of reasons to do it. Not every play is for every person and that's fine. 

It should be mentioned you are NOT in the minority. The Tribune gave this production a pretty terrible review and I believe the Times called the original production "tiresome." I'm glad they did the play... which for me was BY FAR the best play they've done this season. 

Count me in the “I loved it at the Atlantic” camp. I thought it was thrilling and beautiful. 

But trying to put aside personal bias: it is, at the very least, a fairly ambitious play. So that could explain both the divided response, and why someone might feel an urge to tackle it. 

The original CARRIE was awful.  (I saw it.)  The smaller versions were much much better - which didn't surprise me because I thought the bones were there when I saw the original production.  People respond to different things and there's usually a fan base for even the most universally panned shows.  The desire to 'do it justice' is strong with such people I think. 

How do you forget you saw a show?  

Many of us on here see theatre more frequently than most. Thereby, making it hard for some to remember if they saw something or not. For me, at times, it’s not that I forgot if I saw a show or not. It’s sometimes my takeaway of a show as in did I like it or not. It get saturated due to me going to/working shows with such frequency. 

But, it can also just be time. For example, my brother was studying in London for a years. He had dinner one night with a close childhood friend of my father’s. Lives is Israel but back then, flew to London and NYC for work with some frequency. He said to my brother that when me and my family came into town that we had to see Blood Brothers. He spoke very highly of it. So, during our visit, we did. At intermission, my parents turned to one another and had the same feeling that they may have seen this one before years ago but wasn’t sure. We got back to the hotel and I did a google search to discover that yes, the most likely did see it before during its short Broadway run.

I saw this both at the Atlantic and at Steppenwolf, and I hated it at the Atlantic and really enjoyed it at Steppenwolf.  I did not know that it was re-written, but I think the text was far more clear at Steppenwolf.  I will say at intermission I did consider leaving as Act one was pretty slow, but it whole piece came together for me in Act 2 and I was really glad I gave this show another chance. 

It has already been noted that some reviewers found the play wanting and/or bad, not just the original poster.

Impeach2017 said: "How do you forget you saw a show?"

I remember seeing this show at the Atlantic, but I don't remember much about it besides Danny Burstein and some of the other actors giving good performances. Something about the staging was out of the ordinary. I know I enjoyed it on the whole.

tbh, if I don't take notes, I forget most of what happens in shows I can't revisit through cast albums or scripts.  

KJisgroovy said: "It's a play written by an ensemble member with a mostly all Steppenwolf ensemble cast. There's lots of reasons to do it. Not every play is for every person and that's fine."

This.

Beyond the Steppenwolf Ensemble of it all, a lot of times a resident theatre will throw a bone to a playwright who they like or want to stay in business with. MCC with LaBute. MTC with Richard Greenberg and David Auburn and Terrence McNally. The Public with Richard Nelson. Vineyard with Paula Vogel. Atlantic with Simon Stephens. NYTW with Caryl Churchill. etc... It's all about building and maintaining relationships, and even if this one isn't a slam dunk, the next one could be. (When it gets bad is when you have Jeffery Richards producing every whisp of a half-baked idea coming out of Mamet's head, or when John Patrick Shanley's last decade of work at MTC has been dreck.)

Updated On: 3/31/23 at 06:06 PM

thank you all for your extremely long and increasingly bizarre "explanations".