While a Broadway show is in previews it's supposed to be hands-off from reviewers but the New York Times has a section that allows readers to write their own reviews. The brilliant Scott Rudin, who is unhappy about this, has decided to run quotes from the reader reviews in ads for his new show, The Year of Magical Thinking. He puts the quote out there with the tag line New York Times Online. Fucking brilliant, Mr. Rudin!!! The Times feels this is unethical and have asked him to stop running the ads. Rudin responds by telling them they can't have it both ways. And I agree, it's not right to for The NY Times to allow a show to be reviewed on their own website and then get upset when that review is quoted elsewhere. An amusing exchange of letters, which the NY Post printed today, is a thought-provoking debate about ethics, advertising, theater, and the word "review."
Check it out by clicking here.
I'm reprinting the article below. Hopefully, I won't get sued.
April 20, 2007 -- WAR has broken out between Broadway producer Scott Rudin and the New York Times. At issue is the advertising campaign for Rudin's show "The Year of Magical Thinking," starring Vanessa Redgrave.
While the play was still in previews, the Times, on its Web site, encouraged readers to "write a review." Rudin didn't think that was fair. So on March 30, the day the show opened, he turned the tables on the paper, quoting, in ads in the Times and the Post, a reader who said: "An evening of magical theater. Get yourself a ticket to the Booth Theatre." Rudin attributed the quote to "The New York Times Online." That's when the battle began.
Yvette Encarnacion, a lawyer for the Times, demanded Rudin pull the ads. Rudin fired off a response to her that, in turn, led to an exchange of letters between Rudin and Craig R. Whitney, an assistant managing editor in charge of "ethics and standards" at the paper.
(Boy, that place is top-heavy with administrators; no wonder its stock price is down.)
I obtained copies of their correspondence from a third party, who thought I might have some fun with it.
And so today I present excerpts from "Love Letters," starring Scott Rudin and Craig R. Whitney. Enjoy!
From Rudin's April 3 letter to Encarnacion:
I am at a loss to understand why you are questioning the sourcing of these quotes, since they are, in fact, directly taken from the New York Times Web site, and credited thus.
The Times obviously feels these reviews have substantive credibility - otherwise, clearly they wouldn't appear on the New York Times' Web site . . . despite the fact they come from a random selection of faceless amateurs whose only qualification to review a play is that they bought a ticket and have access to a computer.
By the way, you called . . . to ask us to stop quoting your Web site . . . in the New York Post. Are you not aware that this same quote actually ran last Friday in the Times? Is there any other possible conclusion at which to arrive other than the inevitable one: that even the people who work at the Times don't actually read it?
On April 4, Whitney replied:
We think that when you attribute a quote to "The New York Times Online" . . . readers are entitled to trust that the appraisal came from someone actually employed by the New York Times - not from a letter from a reader. The New York Times Online did not describe your play as "An evening of magical theater." A reader, not vouched for in any way by the New York Times, said that.
By the same principle - a principle we would call "honesty" - we have no objection to your ad quoting the New York Times saying "Vanessa Redgrave is arguably the greatest living actress of the English-speaking theater." A Times critic said that. Surely you see the distinction. Lots of things that are published in the Times . . . do not reflect the judgment of anyone at the paper. That is, not everything in the New York Times is of the New York Times.
And we have called the attention of our advertising department to the lapse that led to the publication of the reader quote without proper attribution in the ABC ads last Friday.
That, as you say, "lots of things are published in the Times that do not reflect the judgment of anyone at the paper" is radiantly clear to all of us who read it. . . .You refer to these online reviews as "letters from a reader." They are not letters from any reader. They are reviews. You - the paper - label them reviews. There is something deeply corrupt about the Times' professed offense at our using these reviews to sell a production of a play. If you continue to run them, you can expect to continue to see them in our advertising. In fact, if you look at today's ABC listings in the New York Times, you will see the quote running once again, despite whatever instructions you gave to the advertising department.
On April 12, Whitney wrote:
I repeat, it is not only wrong but dishonest for you, in advertisements like the one that slipped through in the ABCs again yesterday, to quote from readers' reviews as "The New York Times Online." . . . We intend to continue to resist your attempts to mislabel them as ours in the New York Times. I will try to respond as quickly as possible to the pre-opening issue you raise. . . .
Later that afternoon, Rudin sent, by hand, the following:
When the Times stops running Readers' Reviews on its Web site, I'll stop using them in advertising. You can look forward to seeing them anywhere and everywhere until then. If the paper desires to engage with me in a First Amendment dispute, be my guest.
Yesterday, Rudin wrote to Whitney one last time:
You wrote me promising a response regarding the use about which we have been corresponding. To date, I have heard nothing from you. While it's nice to receive lectures about ethics from the paper that brought us Judy Miller, Jayson Blair and the Duke lacrosse team, it's not really what I was looking for. I'm still waiting for that response.
I am, too, Mr. Whitney. And when you get around to writing it, will you cc me, please? Let's keep the debate going!
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