ATCA members (who make up the largest part of the electorate) were mailed their ballots a couple of weeks ago. Please take this responsibility seriously. If your ballot didn’t arrive or you’ve misplaced it, email for a replacement. 

“Right to an opinion – or wrong?” is Michael Phillips’ Aug. 12 Chicago Tribune column about the lawsuit by classical music critic Donald Rosenberg against the Cleveland Orchestra and his own paper, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, which took RosenbergMichael Phillips off the Orchestra beat in response to complaints about negative reviews. A former ATCA member who was theater critic for a half-dozen papers before he became Tribune film critic, Phillips was this year’s Perspectives in Criticism speaker at ATCA’s O’Neill conference. Here’s the link.

Dick Kerekes and Leisla Sansom, “American Theatre Critics Compare Notes in Connecticut,” July 29, at EU Jacksonville.

(More links to come. But see also the ATCA Blog.)

At the ATCA/O’Neill conference “All Campus” panel on “The Theater Barbara Bannon (left) presents the Primus Prize plaque to playwright Jamie Pachino.Looks at Critics,” July 17, featuring an actor, director, designer, non-critic journalist, two producers and two playwrights (* see below for list), moderated by O’Neill managing director Preston Whiteway, ATCA started the proceedings by presenting an award and a check.

First, Barbara Bannon, chair of the Primus Prize committee, presented a plaque to the 2009 winner, Jamie Pachino, who had long since received the $10,000 check Jeffrey Eric Jenkins (left) presents a check and books to Dan Sullivan under the O’Neill tent.made possible by the generosity of the Francesca Primus Foundation. The 2010 Primus winner, Michele Lowe, will received her plaque at a future conference.

Then Jeffrey Eric Jenkins, president of Foundation ATCA, presented an $1,800 scholarship check to Dan Sullivan, head of the National Critics Institute — who immediately passed it on to Whiteway. Jenkins also distributed to this year’s NCI fellows copies of The ATCA Bench.Under the Copper Beech: Conversations with American Theater Critics, which he edited, published by the Foundation in 2004. It’s a reminder that we all work in the great critical tradition nurtured by Elliot Norton, Henry Hewes, Ernest Schier and others.

Everyone wanted to caress the O’Neill’s 2010 Tony Award.In the background sat the ATCA bench, presented in 2004 to mark the 30th anniversay of ATCA’s founding at the O’Neill in 1974.

(* “The Theater Looks at Critics” panel: actor Peter Jay Fernandez; director Wendy Goldberg [also Artistic Director, National Playwrights Conference); designer Rachel Hauck; journalist Patrick Healey; producers Tom Viertel [also chair, O’Neill board] and Steven Hendel [Fela]; and playwrights Jamie Pachino and Adam Rapp.)

The debate about the criteria for ATCA membersip that flared (by design) at ATCA/O’Neill is now going forward on Wendy Rosenfield’s Drama Queen blog. It’s her July 21 entry — take a look and click on Comments. Leonard Jacobs also comments on his Clyde Fitch Report, although so far mainly (negatively) about our hotel. Let us know where else ATCA/O’Neill comment appears. If you were there, send us any links to your published comments or write comments to add to our ATCA Blog.

The conference ended July 18 with the satisfaction of much  The Conference Hat: To embarrass the conference chair (this year, Chris Rawson), on the final day he’s made to wear a hat laden with memorabilia from previous conferences, presented by the previous conference chair (Jay Handelman, right, who chaired Sarasota). The chief recompense is that Rawson will get to add something from the O’Neill and embarrass whomever chairs next year’s Ashland conference.accomplished. (The next day it poured in New London, but that’s another story.) As soon as we rejoin life in our home cities, we hope to get those accomplishments posted here — officers elected, actions taken, awards given, decisions made, insights achieved. Meanwhile, look back on the conference blog here — now 13 posts and still counting. And if you wish you’d been there or want to know what you missed, go to the conference page and find the full schedule.

NOTE that our membership year is June 1-May 31, so you are being billed for 2010-11 and “last year” is 2009-10. Address any questions to treasurer/administrator Barry Gaines.

Michael Phillips is film critic for the Chicago Tribune, most recently sharing TV’s “On the Movies” with A.O. Scott as joint successors to Siskel & Ebert. Before that he had a record cross-country tour as theater critic, moving briskly from the Dallas Times-Herald to the San Diego Union-Tribune to the St. Paul Pioneer Press to the Los Angeles Times to the Tribune. His perspective on what critics do will be worth hearing. (Click here for the history of the Perspectives in Criticism series and its distinguished speakers.)

ALSO ATTENDING: guests at the conference will include playwright Jamie Pachino, winner of ATCA’s $10,000 Primus Prize (2009) for an emerging female theater artist.

AND NOTE THIS: “the future of criticism is always bleak and the present always a riot of ill-informed opinion and boisterous disputation … . The future of criticism is the same as it ever was. Miserable, and full of possibility.” Read A.O. Scott’s full essay, “A Critic’s Place, Thumb and All” (NYT March 31, 2010).

NOTE ALSO: The seagull logo (above) eventually outpolled the non-seagull version (here); both appear on the conference banners and also the conference necktie, for the critic who dares flaunt his Daumier.

Michael Kuchwara, AP drama critic since 1984 and thus the most widely disseminated in the U.S., died May 22, age 63. He was an even-handed, well-informed, enthusiastic critic who did the profession proud. Only a sporadic member of ATCA, he was always available to discuss issues of importance. Click here for his AP obituary.

NOTE (June 30): The AP is listing an opening for a theater critic and pop culture reporter for its New York Headquarters. “This person reports on  Broadway and the theater industry, as well as serving as AP’s drama critic. She or he covers pop culture, breaking news and spot stories  within the entertainment industry.”

By recommendation of the American Theatre Critics Association, the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center in Waterford Conn., Tony Award given to Alliance Theater, 2007now in its 46th year, will be awarded the 2010 Tony Award for a regional theater at the ceremony on June 13. The announcement was made May 3 by the American Theatre Wing, proprietor of the Tony Awards, and its partner, the Broadway League.

ATCA made its recommendation after a lengthy process of debate and balloting. The regional theater Tony, which is limited to a theater outside New York City, is the only award based on a recommendation from a national, non-Broadway group. Presumably it is announced the day before the full slate of Tony nominations to give the winning theater a moment in the sun before the handicapping begins on the other Tony races.

For a complete list of winners of the regional theater Tony back to 1976, go to that page on this website.

For this year’s Pulitzer Prize in Drama, the 17-member Pulitzer board rejected the three finalists selected by its own five-member Drama jury, instead awarding the Pulitzer to “Next to Normal.”This is an old story. The Pulitzer for Drama began in 1917 (although no play that year was deemed fit). After various controversies, the New York Drama Critics Circle Awards were started in 1935 specifically to counter the Pulitzer’s reluctance to recognize “morally questionable” drama — like Eugene O’Neill’s. Eventually the Drama Pulitzer modified its morals clause, but that wary spirit persists in a reluctance to recognize the new and a decided preference for shows staged in New York, especially if still running and preferably on Broadway, so the (heavily New York-centric) board members who don’t usually go to the theater can play last-minute, mid-town catch-up. The board’s distrust of its own jury’s recommendations was signaled recently when the jury was instructed not to rank its choices but simply to present a pool of three names from which the senior group could pick a favorite — or, as in this case, not pick one at all.

This year’s frustrated drama jury was made up of Charles McNulty (chair), critic of the LA Times; John Clum, Duke University drama professor; Nilo Cruz, playwright; David Rooney, just fired chief theater critic of Variety (scroll down this page for more on that); and Hedy Weiss, long-time Chicago Sun-Times theater and dance critic. Their recommendations were Rajiv Joseph’s “Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo,” Kristoffer Diaz’s “The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity” and Sarah Ruhl’s “In the Next Room or the Vibrator Play.”

Read McNulty’s expression of dismay, a more Olympian response from Ben Brantley of the other Times, and Leonard Jacobs’ “Pulitzer Implosion.” And go to our ATCA BLOG page, where members of our New Plays Committee react to the Pulitzer decision, with some reference to their own work in selecting the Steinberg/ATCA and Osborn Award winners.

The critics (in this case, the 20-some members of the New York Drama Critics Circle) will get back the Tony Awards vote next year, according to a March 25 announcement by the Broadway League and American Theatre Wing, the Tonys’ joint proprietors. Last July, they threw out the baby with the bathwater by disenfranchising the 100-strong First Night List, replete with editors and others in addition to critics. Now they’ve apologized for what was “perceived as a slight against … working theatre critics … we deeply regret if offense was inadvertently given.”

ATCA entered the discussion on Aug. 7 with a letter of protest from the executive committee which suggested doing exactly what the Tonys have now done — return the vote to the NYDCC (“and such other critics as seems best”). A report by Randy Gener on “Critics’ Right to Vote?” in the Dec. issue of American Theatre quoted liberally from that letter, which was echoed in the lead letter in AT’s Feb. issue.

Only a few members of the NYDCC are ATCA members — after all, ATCA was started in 1974 specifically to give voice to critics outside New York — but it has always been important for ATCA to express solidarity with theater critics everywhere. Charlotte Martin of the Broadway League contacted ATCA to acknowledge its helpful contribution to the debate.

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March 27, Louisville, KY — Bill Cain’s “Equivocation” is the winner Playwright Bill Cainof the $25,000 2010 Harold and Mimi Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award. The largest such prize in the country, the Steinberg/ATCA recognizes the best American scripts which premiered professionally in the award year (2009) outside New York City.

The Steinberg/ATCA and two additional citations were presented March 27 at Actors Theatre of Louisville during the Humana Festival of New American Plays. Cain received a commemorative plaque and a cash prize of $25,000. The two citations, including plaques and $7,500 each, went to “Time Stands Still,” by Donald Margulies, and “Legacy of Light,” by Karen Zacarías.

“The long-standing partnership between the Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust and the American Theatre Critics Association has recognized some of today’s greatest writers, and helped identify the great playwrights of tomorrow,” said trustee Jim Steinberg. “We’re delighted to help support the unique telling of tales on the American stage.”

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The American Theatre Critics Association (ATCA) announces that Jason Wells has won its 2010 M. Elizabeth Osborn New Play Award for an emerging playwright. The award will be presented March 27 at the Humana Festival of New American Plays at Actors Theatre of Louisville, Ky.

The Osborn Award recognizes Well’s play, Perfect Mendacity, which premiered in May 2009 at the Asolo Repertory Theatre in Sarasota, Florida, directed by Michael Donald Edwards. Originally commissioned by the Manhattan Theater Club, Perfect Mendacity was developed as part of Steppenwolf Theatre’s fourth annual First Look Workshop Series, where it was directed by David Cromer.

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Playwright Theresa RebeckThe ATCA website is for news about theater critics and criticism, not about the theater in general. But playwright Theresa Rebeck’s stem-winding March 15 Laura Pells keynote address is more than theater news in general, and it certainly bears directly on theater criticism. So follow the link to read it, and for an extra pleasure, read John Weidman’s introduction, as well.