Talk:Neil Simon/Archives/2012

Most performed
There should be a citation for the comment that Neil Simon "is the most performed playwright after William Shakespeare". Tkessler 05:50, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC) he's cool!
 * This would be an interesting addition if it could be sourced. Otherwise, how do we know this isn't an "urban theater legend"? ;) David Hoag 00:55, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

David, you're right, of course, and such a quote would be easy to find. I hope someone takes the time. But to a person now in his Sixties, it is a weird request, almost like being asked to provide a citation for the Beatles's popularity! Simon was that popular. He filled the role in the popular imagination that Spielberg fills now, the man with the Midas touch. I added a sentence about it to the article. Profhum (talk) 21:42, 17 November 2007 (UTC)


 * If you say "after Schakespeare" you're implying you mean cumulative number of performances rather than most performances now or most performances at any given moment, but Simon has had less than fifty years to accumulate performances, whereas Christopher Marlowe (to pick a playwright more or less at random) has had over four hundred years. I should think Oklahoma far more often performed at high schools than The Odd Couple, and the number of high schools in the country dwarfs the number of Broadway theatres. All in all, I'd say, a difficult thing to verify (and thus to know). TheScotch (talk) 09:28, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Erroneous link on The Dinner Party
The link for The Dinner Party takes one to a play by Judy Chicago. So a Neil Simon entry needs to be created for TDP and disambiguation cleanup. David Hoag 00:55, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

Criticism
Articles here for many prominent artists have a criticism section, how about this one? I recognize Neil Simon's immense talent, but his humor is so relentlessly relentless and squarely square, and so bittersweetly bitter and sweet, I have to shut it off if his work ever pops up on TV. I'm not the one to write the critique, but surely there must be some fancy words for what Neil Simon is way too much of.

--In the seventies he was always being scolded to produce something that wasn't just funny, but when he tried, he showed his limits. Can't remember the name of that play. Personally, I think the Sunshine Boys really did have depths to it. You also wrote, "Also, the "Jewish-American" bit really jumps out. Is it necessary to assign an ethnicity like this?" Generally I agree. Does Hemingway have to be a British American author or Steinbeck a French/Dutch American? (Whatever he is.) No. When they're not labeled, but all the Jews are, aren't we implying the WASPs don't need labels, they're Just Normal Americans? And yet... about this guy? Simon has often been consciously a writer of the midcentury Jewish American experience. I think I would call Roth a Jewish American author too, for the same reason. Best wishes, Profhum (talk) 08:59, 20 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Not only does Hemingway not have to be a British American author, he couldn't be one since he didn't originate in Britain. Philip Roth has sometimes been a writer of the midcentury WASPish experience (in When She Was Good, for example), and Simon has usually been. By not labeling them WASPish Americans, aren't you implying that in these cases they're writers of the Just Normal American experience? Would any biography of a certain deceased rock guitarist, a chronicler of The Jimi Hendrix Experience, necessarily be an autobiography then? (Wait! Forget that last remark.)


 * Re: "Though primarily a comic writer, some of his plays, particularly the Eugene Trilogy and The Sunshine Boys, reflect on the twentieth century Jewish-American experience."


 * If this questionable sentence (as they are autobiographical, they more particularly "reflect on" Simon's experience) is allowed to stand, it should be moved to the body of the article, and the pretentious the should be removed.


 * Returning to the orginal query: We could have a section concerning how Simon's works have been received by critics, but this might better be done at articles about each individual work. It strikes me as questionable to try to lump them all together, although some critics have no doubt attempted to more or less. "What Simon is way too much of" is way too much POV, of course. TheScotch (talk) 10:02, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Britannica
This article has some sort of citation here, in Encyclopaedia Brittanica (it's the third in a list of 13). Anyone know what's going on?--Shtove 08:48, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Musicals?
The list section and the text both need to distinguish straight plays such as Barefoot in the Park and musicals such as Promises, Promises, and when citing musicals we might specify co-writers (Hal David and Burt Bacharach in Promises, Promises) and whether Simon adapted for the stage someone else's work (Promises, Promises adapted the Billy Wilder film The Apartment, for example). TheScotch (talk) 09:35, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Copyright problem
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