FRIENDS
posted by James Reel
Although some Tucson theater people would surely like to see me drawn and quartered, I am on friendly terms with several local actors, writers and directors. I try not to get into true friendships with them, unless I knew them before I got into the theater-criticism racket, because that could lead to all sorts of conflict of interest issues, real or perceived: Could a positive review of a friend be trusted? Could I bring myself to write negatively about a friend if that were warranted? Kathy Allen, at the Arizona Daily Star, has gone so far as to marry an actor, and she has to recuse herself from covering anything he’s involved in.
After the Tucson Weekly launched its own Facebook page for marketing purposes, it seemed logical that I, as the paper’s arts editor, should set up my own profile. At a site like this, other people can ask to become your “friend.” Some of these requests come from actual friends and family members; others come from people you may not know well (or at all) but share some of the interests you have revealed; others are just people trying to network, and make you aware of what services they might be able to sell you. (I occasionally get friend requests from cartoonists, who mistakenly believe I have any influence over what comic strips appear in the Weekly.)
What should I do when I get “friended” by some local theater person I don’t really know? At first I was reluctant to confirm or seek out such people on Facebook, because I held a very traditional interpretation of the term “friend.” How would it look if I were Facebook friends with all these people I have to write about? But eventually I realized that these people aren’t necessarily being displayed as true friends in the old sense. Facebook, MySpace and Twitter are social networking sites, and having “friends” there isn’t necessarily much different from mingling with people at a Chamber of Commerce mixer. So I decided to open myself to friendship, although I'm not going out of my way to initiate the contacts.
Am I wrong?
