LET’S TALK NASTY

Last week we asked our readers to tell us what aspect of the increasingly nasty world of arts and entertainment bugged them the most. They responded. In some cases, quite nastily.

You want to talk nasty?

Consider what is dramatized in ghastly detail by Martin Sherman in his play “Bent.”

First, there is the herding of human beings into death camps. There is also: betrayal, brutality, genocide, murder, racism, sadism and suicide.

And what is the word for sexual intercourse with a dead or dying girl?

And yet, Times critic Dan Sullivan found the play’s touchiest scene to be two adults talking about making love. What is bent here? Is it the play or Sullivan and his audience?

What your critic and his ilk choose to find nasty in “Bent” is self-serving; it reassures them and their world that they are “straight.”

What then, are their feelings about the remainder of this harrowing work? Reading between the lines of Calendar reveals the true depth of today’s nastiness.

GEORGE KRAMER

Los Angeles