Abstract:

For decades, Theatre Journal has served as an important venue for documenting what made past theatrical productions or performances compelling and significant. As the journal commemorates its achievements over its first seventy-five volumes, this essay reflects on the vital contributions of the performance review section by considering its enduring impact on the field. In addition to tracing the evolution of the section from its earliest days as a single-authored article highlighting productions from the Broadway season to its current iteration, the essay argues that performance reviews have afforded authors crucial opportunities to hone their critical voices and vocabularies. It further contends that, even as performance reviews have been instrumental in introducing the journal’s readers to artists and events that they might not have otherwise known about, the influence of the section has also manifested in more practical ways. For example, it has been key in cultivating a pipeline of editors, thereby shaping how we think, read, and write about drama, theatre, and performance critically. Central to the essay is a consideration of the meaningful ways that the performance review section has advanced and enhanced the journal’s rich legacy of accomplishments.

摘要：

几十年来，《戏剧杂志》一直是记录过去戏剧作品或表演引人入胜且意义重大的因素的重要场所。在该杂志纪念其前七十五卷所取得的成就之际，本文通过考虑其对该领域的持久影响来反思绩效审查部分的重要贡献。除了追溯该部分从最初作为一篇强调百老汇演出季作品的单人文章到目前的迭代的演变之外，本文还认为，表演评论为作者提供了磨练批评声音和词汇的重要机会。它进一步认为，尽管表演评论有助于向期刊读者介绍他们可能不知道的艺术家和活动，但该部分的影响力也以更实际的方式体现出来。例如，它在培养编辑人才方面发挥了关键作用，从而塑造了我们批判性地思考、阅读和写作戏剧、戏剧和表演的方式。本文的核心是考虑绩效审查部分推进和增强了期刊丰富的成就遗产的有意义的方式。