Who’s to Blame When the Theater Critic Disappears?
With the Washington Post’s arts and culture sections gutted what are D.C. theaters doing to foster the local critical ecosystem.
By D.R. Lewis
March 11, 2026
This review originally appeared in Washington City Paper.
When longtime Washington Post theater critic Peter Marksannounced in December 2023 that he accepted a buyout and would be leaving the paper after more than 20 years, artists and audiences took to social media to thank him for his service to D.C.’s theater scene. Several months later, when the paper announced that it had selected Naveen Kumar, a New York-based critic, to fill the vacancy as a “frequent visitor to D.C.,” many of those same people met the decision with outrage (despite Marks having been similarly based in New York for the latter half of his tenure). How, they asked, could the critic for our hometown paper cover the region’s 89 professional theaters if he lived more than 200 miles away? Were there no local writers capable of filling the only remaining full-time theater critic position in the Washington metro area, itself one of the country’s last such staff positions?
For many, that wound remained unhealed when Kumar was one of the hundreds laid off by the Post on Feb. 4. The move decimated the paper’s arts and culture desks. The next day, Theatre Washington, the local industry’s advocacy organization, condemned the layoffs and joined a national chorus singing a requiem for arts coverage. More than a month has passed since the Post published a theater review, signaling that its apparatus for assigning and publishing criticism has been obliterated.
In the aftermath of the layoffs, I, a local theater critic for City Paper and DC Theater Arts, asked my readers and colleagues the same question I did when Marks left the Post in 2023: What are D.C. theaters and their administrators doing to foster the local critical ecosystem? The suggestions I put forth the first time—link to our work, use critics’ names, and help us and our outlets build trust among audiences seeking reliable voices—have still gone largely unheeded two years later.
On Feb. 18, Theatre Washington released a follow-up statement signed by executives and artistic directors from nearly three dozen theaters that finally recognized the crisis of arts coverage in Washington more broadly:
“While the many other local outlets do vital work, no single outlet can fully replace the reach, influence, and regional perspective that The Washington Post has historically provided,” the statement reads. “The DC region’s theatre industry remains vibrant, resilient, and deeply committed to ensuring robust coverage of the work happening across our stages. Going forward, we intend to prioritize outlets, platforms, and independent journalists who demonstrate a meaningful commitment to arts and culture coverage. We will seek out and support new and existing models, including digital outlets, newsletters, podcasts, Substacks, and collaborative initiatives that invest in serious, sustained arts journalism.” (As of today, that means continuing to invite critics and journalists to openings and advertising in such outlets.)
While this apparent endorsement and prioritization of local and independent media is encouraging, the statement was absent of clear commitments—how are these theaters deeply committed to ensuring robust coverage?—or acknowledgment of the challenges that have led to the diminishment of arts coverage. Instead, Theatre Washington’s statement focused entirely on the financial implications that a shrinking arts press will have on the theaters themselves, noting “reviews, profiles, and features” as drivers of “ticket sales, visibility, philanthropy, and public engagement for theatres of all sizes,” but offering nothing on how to support the media outlets still doing such work.
By many measures, the American theater—nonprofit and commercial—is in its own financial crisis. Broadway is a veritable money pitfor investors. Regional theaters are buckling under production costs while struggling to keep tickets affordable. Incubators of new work are canceling programming and facing budget shortfalls. Things are so dire even lawmakers, in 2024, tried to step in by introducing legislation that would direct hundreds of millions of dollars to nonprofit theaters to offset operating expenses (it died on arrival). Expecting theaters to also fix the media funding model is ridiculous, but we nevertheless find ourselves at a similar crossroads. If arts writers and theatermakers are to find a way forward, it has to be found together.
To be clear, I do not speak on behalf of any individual or organization beyond myself. Though we sometimes share editors, arts writers (and especially critics) work largely independently. Some piece together a living through a combination of reviews and reported pieces, while many others have full-time jobs unrelated to theater and review in their free time—grateful if they can earn a freelance fee. Most aren’t compensated at all (City Paper pays all its critics). None of us are getting rich off our work, a reality we share with most of our colleagues in newsrooms and theaters alike.
While the relationship between critic and artist has historically been tricky, as it stands now, the relationship between arts writer and arts administrator is mostly transactional. Theaters provide material for stories, and publications produce coverage that stirs publicity. As far as reviews specifically, comps go out and, assuming coverage is positive, ticket revenue comes back in. This circle is not rooted in quid pro quo, but symbiosis.
Far too often, though, theaters break the circle just short of the opportunity to help an outlet earn revenue, cutting off vital support needed to pay its writers and editors. Though we are all well past the point of digital ignorance, it bears repeating that digital media earns revenue through traffic, clicks, ads, and subscriptions. When reviews are sliced and spliced, then plastered into mass-marketing emails, websites, and social media graphics without linking back to the original story, the outlet is robbed of its opportunity to earn its nut and connect with the audience. Even top-to-bottom raves, which are rare (as they should be), carry no guarantee of linking, as evidenced by a recent marketing email from Shakespeare Theatre Company that quoted five such reviews of Bill Irwin’s extraordinary On Beckett from MD Theatre Guide, DC Theater Arts, The Hill Rag, BroadwayWorld, and Metro Weekly (its five-star rating also served as the email’s subject line) without mentioning any of the critics’ names or linking to a single outlet.
In the case of a bad review, the hesitation to link is understandable, but these behaviors ultimately compound and accumulate over years. One missed click won’t damage a publication, but tens of thousands will. And considering most of the 89 regional theaters produce several shows a year, some in houses with capacities of more than 700 patrons per performance, the model scales exponentially. The Post saga proves that to assume or expect a news outlet to publish arts coverage simply because it’s culturally valuable is naive. Readers and theaters are voting with their clicks.
But this behavior injures audiences too. A single review takes hours to write, edit, and publish, but when theaters distill it to a couple adjectives strung together by ellipses and attribute it (if at all) only to a faceless publication, the writer disappears and the connection between human beings is broken. When Marks left the Post, many felt like they lost a friend and adviser. They’re still feeling that loss, and the self-inflicted blurring of criticism and advertisement only deepens the fracture imposed by social media platforms inundating us with products.
Theatergoing is expensive. But audiences still go, as they have for 2,000 years, because the increasingly rare connection between living, breathing humans feeds the soul. If critics failed to mention the names of the artists who create the work they’re reviewing, they would be derelict in their duty. So then why is it still acceptable for pull quotes to run without full attribution? The practice may be tradition, but it again begs the question: How is this fostering a strong critical ecosystem locally?
The most disappointing omission from Theatre Washington’s statement, however, was the failure to recognize the critic’s role in artistic development. Over the past year, I have had the privilege of reviewing two world premieres, one U.S. premiere, two regional premieres, and two “revisals” of classic musicals, many of which seem aimed for Broadway. Some of them I adored. Others, I didn’t. But I approached every one of those reviews with the implicit understanding that these were works at the beginning of their lives, and that my words could have some impact on the future of those plays here in the DMV or far beyond. That is a responsibility I take seriously. Many writers know that the biggest reward of being a regional critic is the opportunity to witness and encourage budding talent. We relish in pointing friends and readers toward shows they otherwise would never think to see. We agonize when a premise doesn’t yet live up to its promise. We bounce our legs with anticipation of a rising curtain. And we rejoice when a work penetrates our souls.
As independent publishers take the torch from legacy media and arts writers find themselves free of the archaic institutional restrictions that once kept us at arm’s length from theater-makers, we must hold tighter to our journalistic integrity while also recognizing the realities of a new paradigm. Unlike the role of influencers, the kind of engagement critics cultivate is between themselves and the art with the reader as a partner, not a customer. The distribution of comp tickets is the prerogative of the theaters, but administrators should never expect favorable coverage in exchange for tickets, or consider punishing a critic who dislikes a work but nevertheless engages with it accurately and honestly. To do so would only accelerate the demise of criticism and arts coverage more broadly. Instead, we must focus on reversing the trend by embracing opportunities that respect journalistic ethics while allowing us to connect with our common audience.
It must begin with giving writers credit and sharing their links. It should extend to talkbacks and educational opportunities. It could eventually lead to fellowships, workshops, and dialogues between artists and critics. We are resilient, creative people. There is a way forward.
We have most likely not seen the last setback for arts coverage. When the next one comes, and I again ask theater-makers what they’re doing to foster a strong local critical ecosystem, how will they answer?