92nd Street Y Blasts Steve Martin Event, Wishes He Played His Old Stuff
A 92nd Street Y event with Steve Martin was interrupted on Monday night when interviewer Deborah Solomon was handed a note, which she read aloud, asking her to focus more on Martin's career. Apparently, the note was in response to angry e-mails from viewers watching on closed-circuit TVs who felt that the presentation focused too much on the art world, which is the setting Martin's latest novel, The Object of Beauty. Besides interrupting the interview, the 92nd Street Y has sent an email apologizing and offering all who were unsatisfied a $50 gift certificate refund. Both Solomon and Martin himself have condemned this move as unnecessary and disrespectful, and frankly, it looks as though they're right.
The entire message that the 92nd Street Y sent is a bit staggering in how much the organization criticizes the event:
"We acknowledge that last night's event with Steve Martin did not meet the standard of excellence that you have come to expect from 92nd St. Y," [Sol Alder, executive director of the Y] wrote in an e-mail to ticket holders. "We planned for a more comprehensive discussion and we, too, were disappointed with the evening. We will be mailing you a $50 certificate for each ticket you purchased to last night's event. The gift certificate can be used toward future 92Y events, pending availability."
Martin compared receiving the note mid-interview to "an actor responding in Act III to an audience's texts to 'shorten the soliloquies.'" Solomon, who Martin had requested to conduct the interview, said she was given no instructions and that she chose to focus on the art world since it "seemed most timely and interesting."
There's been a long history of audiences lashing out against entertainers who didn't give them what they came to see. There was that Neil Young tour in the 80s where audiences who just wanted to hear "Cowgirl in the Sand" got an electro-music experiment instead. Woody Allen thought he had made the best film of his career when he finished Stardust Memories, only to have it torn apart by American audiences who thought he was being hostile towards them. And a number of people probably still feel like Dave Chappelle owes them more TV.
I'll admit that Solomon's assumption about the art world as a key subject of interest is a bit disingenuous, but the way I see it, if you're going to see an event involving anyone creative or dynamic, part of the gamble in buying a ticket is not knowing what to expect. You go see an entertainer like Martin in hopes of finding out more about him, not hoping that he will conform to exactly what you think you already know.
Honestly, those looking for assured hits or popular talking points should go to a Kiss concert or a public speaking engagement with a politician. Sometimes shows from unpredictable performers blow away your expectations and sometimes they are total letdowns, but that's part of the reason you go. Had Martin himself been unhappy with the interview, it may be a different story, but he, too, has blasted the organization, calling their response discourteous and adding, "As for the Y's standard of excellence, it can't be that high because this is the second time I've appeared there." Burn. And win.
·Comedian Conversation Falls Flat at 92nd Street Y [New York Times]
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Comments
Since Steve Martin has just published a new novel about the New York art world, it makes sense that the talk would be about art, especially since it was in New York.
Ms. Solomon thought it was going" swimmingly" until she got the note? Talk about CLUELESS IN NEW YORK!!!!!
Some 25 years ago, I attended a "reading" by Tennessee Williams at the 92nd ST Y. Williams received a lengthy standing "O" at the outset (actually I, like everyone, hoped to hear him read Blanche or Amanda) but he launched into a reading of his poetry, which was the last thing we wanted to hear. The audience was stonily silent; the mood turned ugly. We'd been betrayed. Walkouts ensued. By the end, 3/4 of the audience had left. Williams seemed similarly clueless. It was his last public appearance. Sad.
Ha, I had a similar experience last year when I saw Woody Allen speak at the Y. The interviewer asked that all questions during the Q&A related to the topic, "American Movie Classics." Nearly every question asked avoided that topic, from people asking Woody what he thought of Lebron James to his inspiration for Interiors. The interviewer was pissed, but I thought it was hysterical.
consider the source... They complain when it's 78 and sunny.
My thoughts:
(a) Steve Martin has been very, very unfunny for uh, a long time now. I hear his website is the only place where he's remotely funny any more. This is why I did not scramble to get tickets when he came on tour to my town. If I want to see funny out of Steve Martin, I have to go home and watch my 80's movies.
(b) Where the heck have people been that they are unaware that Steve Martin lost his funny for like, at least a decade or two by now?
(c) Yes, this is rude to complain that Steve Martin is not being funny in public. It is, technically speaking, his choice not to be.
(d) That said, yeah, must be fun to have to deal with tons of complaints about this as well.
(e) Really, if Steve Martin could crack jokes WHILE also discussing art intelligently, wouldn't that make everyone happy, though? I guess he doesn't want to and there's nothing anyone can do about it, but yeah, when you first make your career on doing something and then actively choose not to do it any more, people are at the very least going to wonder why the hell you lost interest in that, and in my case, not patronize what he does any more because when he's not funny, he is sadly rather dull.
More wacky, less egghead.
I was at the 'Y' Monday night, and was similarly disturbed, but for a different reason. I paid $28.00 for a ticket, along with a friend, to hear an interview of John Mellencamp. I was way in the back, row W, and to my right was seated a gentleman (I use the term loosely) who kept checking his cell phone, literally about once every minute or two. The light to the side of me going off continuously and illuminating his face to my right in the dark was as distracting as if his cell phone were ringing. I refrained from saying anything for about 20 minutes, until I couldn't take it any longer and whispered to him that his behavior was very distracting and asked him, as politely as the situation could manage, if he would kindly stop. He did, for about 10 minutes, and then continued. Again, I asked him, this time more abruptly, to stop. He started cursing at me, commented on my parenting (I am close to 50, but look younger), and, although I didn't respond to this incredibly angry man, he started saying, VERY LOUDLY, "Be QUIET! BE QUIET!" trying to make it appear as if I were talking, when I wasn't. In response, a 20-year0ld female usher came over and asked ME to move. I refused, pointed out that he was the one making the disturbance, explained briefly about his cell phone, and again was asked to move with her incredibly bad breath in my face. Again, I refused, and told her to ask HIM to move. She didn't. Why is it the woman always gets blamed?? Eventually, we did move. The man was SO angry that I was truly concerned that on the way out, he'd try to do something physical to me. So, my friend and I moved two rows ahead. We didn't want to be in the row ahead of him for the same reason, that we felt he was SO incendiary that he might try to do something. After the interview, we let him leave first, then went out in the lobby. A couple of women who saw what happened stopped me and my friend and commented on the bad behavior of the angry man. If they 'got' it, why didn't that female usher 'get' it, even after I explained to her? Why do d-bags like this guy even bother going to events if what they'd rather be doing is checking their cell phones and handhelds and don't intend to pay attention anyway? Why do people like him always ruin it for people like me, and my friend - and the other audience members around who had to listen to his anger for several minutes? I intend to ask the 'Y' for a refund. I have been to the Kaufman Theater for many events, but if the 'Y' can't see fit to make their events enjoyable for those people who know proper etiquette in a theatre, then I don't want to go there anymore.