NEW YORK, NY – In 1964, Marshall McLuhan wrote the book “Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man.” In that work he coined the phrase, “the medium is the message.”
It essentially claimed the medium in which a story was told was more important than the content of the story itself. It was a revolutionary thought. One that deeply affects us today.
That book is now playing on Broadway. It’s being offered in two parts. One is titled “Network,” the other “Ink.”
Of course, the two plays are not based on McLuhan’s writings, but it is hard to believe the book wasn’t an influence.
Both stage productions are brilliant as they chillingly support McLuhan’s claim that public opinion can be shaped by the manner in which information is presented.
Individually, each play is a satisfying drama with excellent acting and brilliant staging that keeps you involved in a story that is critical to understanding the world in which we live.
Both “Network” and “Ink” examine how a vital form of communication can be hijacked by those who know how to exploit large numbers of people.
Once upon a time, like in 1976, when the film “Network,” written by Paddy Chayefsky, came out people watched television nightly and believed in the integrity of the news anchor.
“Network” uses the premise that Howard Beal, a popular newscaster, goes crazy after being fired for bad ratings. He threatens to kill himself on air, and his network recognizes he’s unintentionally plugged into the sensationalism the public wants.
As he taps into a market of the disenfranchised, his motto becomes, “I’m mad as hell and won’t take this anymore.”
It’s no longer important what the news anchor is saying. The public plugs into his passion and takes up the chant and his ratings soar.
“Network” shows how the cult of the news anchor as an opinion shaping personality can be established.
The production is energy personified as television monitors are everywhere - capturing the trivial and offering close-ups to the personal moments.
Amidst this controlled chaos, Bryan Cranston is always the center of attention as he offers a brilliant performance of the disturbed, confused and enlightened Howard Beal. Cranston is terrific as the weary man who has lost his identity, his purpose and a reason to live. It’s a masterful, gut-wrenching performance.
If there is a problem with the work, it’s that in 1976 the material seemed a cautionary tale as it predicted what might be the future. Sadly, in today’s world it seems almost tame to see a passionate madman pontificating on television. Indeed, “Network” now seems more a story about how we got to where we are rather than a scary description of what could happen. It’s fascinating, yet rather toothless.
However, “Ink” is a different situation. We see a group of journalists rebel against the status quo and take the power from the establishment. They take the radical approach that the news belongs to the people and they are committed to change the delivery system.
As one character explains, “The readers produce their own content. They become the storytellers.“
“Network” is fiction. “Ink” is real. In 1969, an Australian entrepreneur, Rupert Murdoch, purchased a dismally performing London newspaper, The Sun, and turned it into the most popular and influential paper in the country. In its quest for massive readership, the paper pandered to low taste and turned the broadsheet into a populist tabloid. Along the way, it destroyed journalistic integrity by glorifying “fake news.”
What makes “Ink” so disturbing is that for most of the first act it is almost impossible not to root for this group of people. They were talented, but ignored by the editors from the elite papers - either because they weren’t educated at the right schools, had inferior social connections or just because they were the “wrong” sex. In other words, the system was fixed against them and many in the audience can relate to their resentment.
Such feelings of empathy makes you feel culpable when the excesses of their behavior are revealed in the second act. The Frankenstein monster has been released from its cage, and we watched while it being created. Not only did we watch, we were passive participants.
There is no single performance in “Ink” equal to Cranston in “Network”. But the work of Bertie Carvel as Murdoch and Jonny Lee Miller as the driven editor Larry Lamb are amazing. Together they form one horrible and disreputable person whom it is impossible to hate. That might be a definition of evil.
And should you be thinking that the stories are different because “Network” is about television and “Ink” about print, think again.
When at the end of “Ink” Murdoch says he is thinking of buying a television network in the United States, you could sense the entire audience shudder. We know the end of that story as well.
The medium has become the message and two tough insightful plays help us to realize just how that happened over the past 50 years.
“Network” continues at the Belasco Theatre in New York City through June 8. “Ink“ has been extended until June 28 by the Manhattan Theatre Club at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre.
Bob Goepfert is theater reviewer for the Troy Record.
The views expressed by commentators are solely those of the authors. They do not necessarily reflect the views of this station or its management.
