ong- and well-established contention between artist and manager/editor.
I really don't know what you base this on, especially with regards to photography. I've never read a single comment by a major photographer complaining about the curator of his or her exhibition. Seems to me that most, if not all, museum curators in the photography departments are well respected by the artist they serve.
Same thing with contemporary theater directors that use great plays as material for their "creation"
The comparison doesn't hold. The majority of plays, or operas for that matter, that stage directors mount are either by people that have long been dead or writers and composers that are not present at the place and moment of production. In both cases, it is not thought of as a collaboration, but, as Matt pointed out, an interpretation. Whether or not that interpretation aims to be faithful or not to the original intent is another matter, and part of the very idea behind the concept of interpretation.
On the other hand, more often then not, the curator of an exhibition works side by side, in a spirit of collaboration, with the photographer. I don't believe any photographer would work any other way at mounting an exhibition. On the contrary, the imput of the curator would certainly be welcomed.
In the case of a retrospective, when the photographer is no longer alive, curators aren't interpreters — how could they be? Their role is more that of putting the work in context, which is meant to help the viewer reach a better, or deeper understanding of it.
In any case, I don't mind being "led down a path chosen by the curator". That's his/her job — one that takes intelligence, sensibility, knowledge, vision and humility, a tough combo to get in one person. To be taken down a path I might not have seen, might not have chosen, a path that might make me understand the works of Winogrand, Cartier-Bresson, Dorothea Lange, Gordon Parks, Robert Adams et al better or differently is something I welcome. In the end, In the end, I may agree or disagree with what is suggested, but the ride itself was often worth it, and, as usual, more instructive than its conclusion.
I would add this. There's nothing more annoying, more unpleaseant and unfulfilling than to go to a poorly curated exhibition.