Did you know Justin Hayford is drawn to experimental, intellectual theatre? Or that Kerry Reid was a solo performer? Or that Lawrence Bommer once saw Tennessee Williams sneaking out of one of his plays?

Neither did David Zak, until he started writing about them. Never a man to stomach boredom, Zak—who formally announced he was stepping down from Bailiwick Repertory Theatre just last month—is writing stories for the blog Examiner.com, and he decided to tackle Chicago’s theatre critics.

“I’ve always wondered, where do these people come from,” said Zak. “I just wanted to generate this conversation about who the people are who are deciding.”

So he e-mailed questions to a few critics around town, and has published answers to six so far: Venus Zarris, Mary Shen Barnidge, Hayford, Reid, Al Bresloff, Bommer and Tom Williams.

“Everybody got back to me except for the guys from TimeOut Chicago, which I thought was hilarious,” Zak says.

Some of what he got surprised him, but some didn’t at all. Some critics gave shorter answers, others delved a bit deeper. And Zak’s still not done. He’s got feelers out to all of Chicago’s theatre critics, old and new.

One of the things Zak says he wants to find out from critics is their view of the off-Loop scene. Bailiwick’s first show in 1982 was a smash hit, thanks largely to The Tribune’s Richard Christiansen, who came out to see it. Now, he says, “the chances of that happening for brand new theatre companies is pretty tough.”