If you’re looking for critical consensus, you won’t find much of it in the new book The Critics Say…: 57 Theater Reviewers in New York and Beyond Discuss Their Craft and Its Future (McFarland & Company, $35). That’s because the critics interviewed for the book by Matt Windman, himself a critic, have a wide variety of opinions about what it is they do, how they do it, why they do it and whether it will continue to be done.

Rather than devote a chapter to each critic, Windman organizes the book topically, so that even while the interviews were discrete, the critics’ thoughts begin to engage with one another on subjects from “Why We Exist” to “Regrets and Advice” through devised interplay. That’s useful, because transcribed speech often isn’t compelling to read, so by extracting themes, Windman is constantly changing up who is “speaking” at any given moment, creating rather more of a narrative than would otherwise be the case. Windman certainly threw out a wide net and reeled in many of the biggest fish, including both Ben Brantley and Charles Isherwood from The New York Times.

If you go looking for gossip and backbiting in the book, you won’t find a great deal of it. Yes, Isherwood chides “those crazy queens on All That Chat,” and Brantley, who doesn’t use social media opines that it is “largely about” self-promotion. But the book is much more concerned with a sober-sided consideration of the place of the critic in the arts and journalism culture of today, and it provides a strong primer in the thoughts of those who practice criticism – or at the least what they’re willing to share on the record. Oh, there is a brief chapter devoted entirely to Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark, but even there, the critics use the show as a pretext for discussing the power of critics, or lack thereof, in today’s society.

The book contains countless revealing insights into the minds of the people who shape public opinion of theatre, available almost by opening the book randomly to any page at all. A few choice thoughts:

“The critic is part of the theatre community, but he is the annoying guy at the part who’s telling everybody, ‘You look like shit.’” – Rob Weinert-Kendt, editor of American Theatre

“I tell students it’s a marvelous hobby, but I do not encourage them to pursue it as a career.” – Alexis Soloski, The New York Times, on advice to aspiring critics

“When I was on the Obies committee, I was told (though I think this was tongue-in-cheek) that the standard for conflict of interest is whether you slept with the person. Mine is that I can’t have been invited to their birthday party.” – Helen Shaw, Time Out New York

“One of the hardest critical jobs is the correct appropriation of praise and blame. Did this actor do this? Was it a directing choice? Did this flow from the play? Was the director absolutely doing that? A critic does not see the production process. To some degree the critic is trying to imbue the process.” – Chris Jones, Chicago Tribune

“If there weren’t critics, people would have to depend on advertising. And advertising, by definition, almost always lies…” – John Simon, Westchester Guardian

Having begun my career as a publicist, albeit one who worked mostly in Connecticut, which short stays in Philadelphia and New York, I’ve had the occasion to know a great many critics, and the majority of the individuals in the book I know at least from reading, many from professional interactions and a few I consider friends. I’ve had the chance to discuss, debate and sometimes profoundly disagree with some of the critics in the book. Consequently, I can say that they come across just as they have across telephone line, social media and even a dinner table. Because of the timing of the book in 2016, I do find myself missing the presence of some of the critics with whom I worked most directly, and spoke with most often, from whom I learned so much, all of whom have now passed away: Mel Gussow of The New York Times, Howard Kissel of the New York Daily News and Michael Kuchwara of the Associated Press.

While their absence is inevitable, there are a few major voices missing from the book, for reasons unknowable. While print may be shrinking or even dying, and online reviews are now widely accessible, making more criticism available to more readers than ever before, Mark Kennedy’s voice at the Associated Press has significant amplification and reach, through the many outlets that carry AP copy; he’s not in the book. On the west coast, which is generally underrepresented in the critical mix of the book, Charles McNulty at the Los Angeles Times is a major and influential writer about theatre not only in Los Angeles, but frequently in San Diego and New York as well. And Michael Feingold, the long-time – and once again – critic at the Village Voice has a historical perspective that is unfortunately not heard.

There’s one other voice I wish were included, that of Frank Rich, the former theatre critic of The New York Times, who is named multiple times in the book. Frank, unlike Gussow, Kissel and Kuchwara, is still with us, having gone on to write for the editorial pages of the Times and now as a political columnist for New York magazine (as well as being an executive producer of the TV series Veep). While his days as a designated critic may be gone, theatre has remained a part of Frank’s writing in the two decades since he left his post. His insight would have only added value to Windman’s book.

The book is not wholly New York-centric, with critics from the Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, Washington Post, Toronto Star and Austin Chronicle included, but it certainly skews to the America’s northeast. So while it’s problematic to draw any definitive conclusions about the critical community from the 57 critics represented, it’s worth noting that there are only nine female critics among the 57, and only two critics within – to the best of my knowledge – who are persons of color, highlighting the lack of gender and racial diversity in the critical ranks overall. The interviews don’t skirt this fact (though one critic mistakenly declares that Hilton Als is the only black theatre critic anywhere), but as an area of inquiry, discussion of how the lack diversity among critics affects audiences and artists is limited. It seems a missed opportunity.

Have I spent too much time talking about what I miss, rather than what’s in The Critics Say? I am perhaps guilty of doing so, but only because I have had the privilege of such conversations throughout my career and the book prompts me to want to ask yet more questions, both with the people in the book and those who aren’t. But that’s where Windman’s effort pays off, in assembling provocative conversations with people inaccessible to most readers and creating a strong platform for yet more discussion. In his preface, Windman cites two previous books that spoke with critics, from 1993 and 2004, but just as I miss hearing the opinions of those no longer with us and those who didn’t participate, perhaps this form of inquiry deserves to be undertaken once every decade or so, for the historical record, as criticism, theatre and the media continue to evolve.

Whatever the fate of theatre criticism is in the next ten years or the next hundred, The Critics Say is a worthy time capsule of where things are right now, and surely required reading in arts journalism and arts management classes. And for those you read theatre reviews and find yourself saying, “Who the hell wrote this?,” Windman’s book offers some answers about who did, and why.

Ever so quietly this week, the national arts scene became a bit more fragmented, a bit more stratified and a lot more invisible. The Associated Press has just spiked a chunk of its opera, dance and off-Broadway coverage. And in this case, no news is bad news.

In an email, AP chief theater writer Mark Kennedy described the decision to me:

“We sent out a survey before the Tonys to the members of our cooperative, asking about their use of our reviews,” he wrote. “While music, books, movies and TV came back positive, the results proved what we have long suspected: Members overwhelmingly are not using our opera, dance or off-Broadway reviews.”

“It’s more than that,” Kennedy continued. “In some cases, they actually resent [that coverage], thinking we can use our resources better. So while we of course will dip into the world of off-Broadway, whether for an occasional review or a story, we have to listen to the people who pay our bills.”

This may seem like an inside-baseball story, of interest only to theatrical publicists and producers. But the ramifications are a little greater.

Coverage in The New York Times has prestige and tradition, and speaks to the arts community; The Wall Street Journal reaches art organizations’ board members and corporate sponsors; USA Today has mass appeal. But the AP almost certainly has the widest reach of all: Its copy is available to hundreds of print and online outlets internationally, including the big three above.

Indeed, as news has increasingly shifted online, AP arts coverage is probably more accessible to more people than it has ever been. It appears directly on countless news websites — including NPR’s — without any human effort, as part of a continuous news feed, where it’s not subject to the day-to-day editorial priorities and space limitations that govern a print paper or radio show. Even when editors “don’t use” this coverage, it appears on their sites; in some cases, an AP item may prompt an outlet to do its own story on the same subject.

In my days as a publicist, pre-Internet, reportage by The Associated Press often resulted in a single story cropping up in the most unexpected places. It would get relayed back to me by other publicists in other cities — or, charmingly, by the parents of co-workers.

Further back, when I was a teen hungry to learn, AP coverage fed my arts interest with news of culture beyond that originated by my local paper.

What’s important to note is that this week’s news is not the callous edict of a commercially driven corporate behemoth, but rather a practical decision by a member-driven service organization that operates as a not-for-profit. Yet it represents how, in an ever more challenging environment for the news industry, the arts are drawing the short stick.

Some might think that coverage of these areas is essentially local news for Manhattanites. But the arts ecology is more complicated than that. Sure, many people may not be able to attend a New York opera in person, but both radio and TV broadcasts bring those performances to audiences across the country — and the AP’s stories may be the most accessible source of advance coverage for fans in a variety of markets.

Dance companies may well tour to those same locations, and since few can sustain themselves playing only in Manhattan, the AP’s coverage has a direct impact on the viability of those bookings as well.

As for off-Broadway? That’s the easiest to argue for. It’s home to a significant number of new works that may never reach Broadway, but which increase the body of theatrical literature — and which often go on to play numerous regional and amateur stages.

This is particularly important when it comes to plays (as opposed to musicals): Of the 45 works recognized by the Pulitzer for drama or the Tony for best play since 1984, only five originated on Broadway. Yet that is the arena on which the AP will now narrow its focus. Coverage of “regional” arts organizations — long hailed as a similarly deep well of creativity — has already been marginalized.

This is just the latest news in a dispiriting trend. Onetime show-business bible Variety has all but eliminated regional theater reviews, along with a significant amount of its off-Broadway coverage; there’s occasional opera coverage in its pages these days, and no dance coverage.

The Village Voice, home to off-Broadway’s Obie Awards, laid off drama critic Michael Feingold just weeks ago, after more than four decades of service, even as it broadened its coverage of food.

There are countless other examples: Arts coverage at outlets large and small has been narrowing in favor of the largest and most popular companies and offerings, just as arts funding sources have been shrinking, and often tilting in favor of the bigger players. That stratification will only be reinforced by the AP’s coverage reductions.

There’s an invisible cost here. When attempts to reduce or eliminate funding to the arts crop up — which they do with a depressing regularity — they gain traction in part because not enough people encounter the arts, or even regular coverage of the arts, on a daily basis. When a resource as mighty as The Associated Press can’t even offer material for consideration because of a professed lack of interest by other media gatekeepers, I worry it’ll only lend support to those who want to delegitimize the arts with a charge of elitism.

Because celebrity holds ever-increasing sway in all entertainment coverage, and because the performing arts are (to too many editors) the poor stepchild of entertainment, I have a sneaking suspicion that if Hugh Jackman ever ventures off-Broadway, when Renee Fleming sings something at the Met, wherever David Hallberg dances, The Associated Press will probably manage to tell us about it.

We’ll also still hear from the AP when an artistic leader is the victim of internecine violence in his own company, or when a tech mishap injures a performer. Bad news always trumps good.

But we will know infinitely less about all the fine work being done by those who aren’t already well known, or at companies where tragedies mercifully don’t happen, or among worthy troupes that could most benefit from national attention not found elsewhere.

And should The Associated Press’s decision prove to be a model for yet more media outlets, then entire swaths of the arts may be, as long feared, on the brink of popular irrelevancy. Because soon no one may know they’re there.

Here’s the post in its original form on NPR.org