Anyway, some of you will have noticed my moving away from theatre writing and reporting. There’s a reason -and it has everything to do with my inherent curiosity about the world around me. I’m branching out to explore stories that run the gamut from environmental-meets-social media (like One Million Acts of Green) to pop culture (ie -television, film, and music) to the just plain fun (like Ms. Forbes-Roberts and her fantastic fair). So in the coming days and weeks, expect to read more about my thoughts on all this stuff, and less on the performing arts. I still love ’em (deeply -I saw the COC production of Fidelio today, in fact -beautiful) but I love a lot of other things, too. The topics I pursue still have a distinctly arts-and-culture bent, as befits my own interests, but this feels like a natural progression in terms of range and breadth.
“Play” doesn’t just refer to what happens in theatres; the term also encompasses what we do in childhood, the very thing we forget moving into adulthood. It’s also the thing we all want to re-embrace, and what artists -of any discipline do (bravely) embrace. If the “play” really is “the thing,” to quote Hamlet, then Play Anon is about just that -playing, in a lot of different areas, free from the shackles of “should.”
As someone once told me (speaking about themselves) many years ago, “I may not be the smartest person in the world, but I am one of the most curious.” That describes me too. Here’s to a new day, and a new Play Anon.