Terry Teachout expands on what I call Tony Kushner’s Law:
The artist must create a whole character and not simply show the side of him that will most convince us of his villainy. What I find striking about much of today's political art, by contrast, is its unwillingness to make such acknowledgments. Instead of seeking to persuade--to change the minds of its viewers--it takes for granted their concurrence. It assumes that everyone in the audience is already smart enough to hate Paul Wolfowitz and Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld and, above all, George W. Bush, and thus does not need to be reminded of their underlying humanity, or of the possibility, however remote, that their intentions might be good. By extension it also takes for granted that no truly creative artist could possibly think otherwise, that good art is by definition liberal (or, to use the term commonly preferred by such artists, "progressive") in its view of the world, and that only progressive thinkers are truly creative. Conservatives are generally thought too repressed or narrow-minded for creative activities.Exactly. Teachout continues:
Isn't just that [these liberal playwrights) feel no responsibility to make arguments that might prove persuasive to those who disagree with them, or at least haven't yet made up their minds. They no longer acknowledge any responsibility to their audiences. They appear to believe instead that so long as an artist thinks all the right things, he need not go to the trouble to be amusing, subtle or even interesting. All he needs do is make his characters say the right things, and he's entitled to the approval of his enlightened brethren. No one else matters.I’m not one to use blanket denunciations of “Hollywood” or the entertainment industry itself. Those people are good at what they do, and I don’t see any political disagreements I may have with them as impediments to enjoyment of their work. But when a work is that snide and condescending, it's hard not to register an objection. Posted by Stephen Silver at June 6, 2005 09:07 PM