MUST! DESTROY! BOUNDARIES!

Oh I am so tired of the cliché about how vital it is to push the boundaries in theatre. And the best part is that people who call for pushing boundaries seem to have no idea how incredibly conventional they are for declaring a war on boundaries.

Here's the latest example in today's NYTimes from Tom Bradshaw:

When I lived in New York, I was at the theater seven nights a week, and 85 percent of the time I was bored. That should not be the case ever. Theater should always be immediate, in the moment and all-consuming. Playwrights like Miller and O’Neill were pushing the boundaries for their time. We should be pushing them for our time. Why be an artist otherwise?

He says eight-five percent of the time he was bored.

I would suggest that part of the problem was that he was at the theater seven nights a week. Anything you do seven nights a week is going to become boring - if you go to the amusement park and ride the scariest ride seven nights a week you'll get bored. You watch the goriest slasher movies seven nights a week - you'll get bored.
You know what really bores me? People who think that it's so new and bad-ass to push  boundaries in the theatre.