YOUR FRIENDLY NEIGHBORHOOD CRITIC SLIPS OUT THE BACK, JACK >>>

Last Thursday I was able to do something I almost never get to do anymore: I was invited to a show, so I went, and I didn't review it. Hopefully the cast and crew weren't expecting me to. It was DramaFest at Olympic High School, for which intrepid teenage thespians direct and act in three one-act plays. If it's not too weird to say I'm friends with a high school girl--after all, I was friends with her mom first--oh, God, now it all sounds skeevy--the point is, all invited me, so I went. The family bought my ticket, which was deeply appreciated as I'm super broke right now for reasons that'll be abundantly clear in a couple of weeks. I strolled in right before curtain, read my program, watched the show, and left. Period. It was awesome.

I watched the show exactly the way you would. I didn't analyze the script. I didn't take notes or ask anyone what the house music was. I'm friends with the director, but she and I never spoke and I didn't hang around afterward to say hi to my friend Maya in the cast. I was worried she and the rest of the cast would run up and ask me what I "thought." It's not that I thought anything negative, mind you, I just didn't want to think at all. When I arrived home, I Googled nothing even remotely connected with the show. I didn't think very long about the title of this blog entry, never weighing its initial impression against the text of the entry. In fact I banged the whole thing out in minutes, and I never even told you whether I thought this show was worth seeing. What's the point? It's already gone.

I forgot it only hours after seeing it. You know, like you usually do. I was simply entertained. Gentle Reader, there are times when mere, meaningless entertainment is exactly what the doctor ordered.

If you were to interpret this entry as suggesting it can be kind of a buzzkill to be a critic, well, I see no good reason to dispute that. It is what it is.