In the 18th century, Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais wrote: “Calumny, Sir. You don’t realise its effectiveness. I’ve seen the best of men pretty near overwhelmed by it. Believe me, there’s no spiteful stupidity, no horror, no absurd story that one can’t get the idle-minded folk of a great city to swallow if one goes the right way about it – and we have some experts here!”
I shall focus on one particular “absurd story”, very cunningly wielded, that has played (or rather, preyed) upon a general ignorance of theatre business.
I refer to the slander case instituted by activist Pia Zammit against the newspaper