School Plays Are Harder Without Political Drama
School Plays Are Harder Without Political Drama
Even though Stevie Ray Dallimore, an actor as well as a teacher, had been in charge of the theatre programme at a private boys’ school in Chattanooga for the previous ten years, he had never experienced a school year quite like this one.
According to him, a neighbouring girls’ school turned down a staging of the play “She Kills Monsters” that would have involved his kids because of the play’s homosexual themes. A production of “Shakespeare in Love” at the girls’ school that was going to involve his lads was cancelled due to concerns around cross-dressing. According to him, the play “Three Sisters,” which is a classic by Chekhov, was not allowed to be performed at his school because it dealt with adultery and there were worries that some boys may portray women in the performance, as they did in the past.
School plays, which have long been an important component of arts education and a formative experience for creative adolescents, have become the latest battleground at a time when America‘s political and cultural divisions have led to a spike in book bans, conflicts over how race and sexuality are taught in schools, and efforts by some politicians to restrict drag performances and transgender health care for children and teenagers. School plays have been an important element of arts education and a formative experience for creative adolescents for a long time.
Student performances have been the subject of scrutiny over their appropriateness for younger audiences for many years. More recently, students and parents with a left-leaning political ideology have opposed several musicals due to the way they represent women and people of colour in the cast. The most recent round of criticism is being led by conservative-leaning parents and school administrators for the most part.
The conclusion to the drama that Dallimore has been playing out in Chattanooga for the past year? He was informed that his post at the McCallie School, in addition to its equivalent at the adjacent Girls Preparatory School, would be removed. They were given the opportunity to submit their applications for a single new post that would manage the theatre programmes at both schools; however, neither of the educators was successful in their applications.
According to Dallimore, “This is obviously a problem that affects the entire country, and we are just a small part of it.” “It’s definitely a part of a bigger movement—a strongly concerted effort of politics and religion going hand in hand, banning books and trying to erase history and villainizing otherness,” said one commentator. “It’s definitely a part of a bigger movement.”
Jamie Baker, who works as a spokeswoman for McCallie, admitted that two school theatre positions had been eliminated so that the programmes could be combined. However, she stated that “implying or asserting in any way that the contract of McCallie’s theatre director was not renewed because of content concerns would be inaccurate.” She said that the institution has a “Judeo-Christian heritage and commitment to Christian principles,” and she added, “That we would and will continue to make decisions aligned with these commitments should be no surprise to anyone.” She said that the school has a “Judeo-Christian heritage and commitment to Christian principles.”
Teachers of drama all around the United States report that they are coming under increasing scrutiny for the shows they choose to present, and some school districts have banned the production of shows that were considered appropriate only a few short years ago. According to the findings of a poll that was conducted on teachers and published by the Educational Theatre Association a month ago, 67 percent of respondents stated that worries over censorship are impacting their selections for the forthcoming school year.
Over the course of the past few weeks, instructors and parents have spoken with one another via email and phone to name numerous examples. Concerns about depictions of race in “South Pacific” and “Thoroughly Modern Millie” and gender in “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying,” “Bye Bye Birdie,” and “Grease” have been raised by those on the left, while those on the right have raised objections to homosexuality in shows like “The Prom,” “Almost, Maine,” and other popular productions. And at certain schools,
there have been a variety of unanticipated complaints, such as those against the depiction of bullying in “Mean Girls” and the lack of white characters in “Fences,” as well as those over the use of the words “damn” (in “Oklahoma”), “bastards” (in “Newsies”), and “God” (in “The Little Mermaid”) in those productions.
Teachers claim that due to the increasingly polarised political atmosphere as well as the powerful amplifying effect of social media, challenges to school performances carry far more weight than they used to.
Jennifer Katona, the executive director of the Educational Theatre Association, which is an organisation of theatre educators, stated that “We’re seeing a lot of teachers self-censoring” recently. “Even if it’s just a bunch of girls dressed as ‘Newsies’ boys, which would not have been a big deal a few years ago, that’s now a big deal,” said the reporter. “That’s now a big deal.”
Now more than ever, educators are frantically searching for titles that are somehow relevant to the youth of today while still being unlikely to get them into trouble.
According to Chris Hamilton, who is the theatre director at a high school in Kennewick, Washington, “There’s a lot of not wanting any controversy of any kind,” he added. “She Kills Monsters,” a comedy about a teenager who finds solace in Dungeons & Dragons that is the seventh most popular school play in the country and which features gay characters, was banned by school administrators for the first time this past year, according to Hamilton, who has been teaching for ten years. “She Kills Monsters” is a comedy about a teenager who finds solace in Dungeons & Dragons. “The level of scrutiny has grown,” Hamilton stated.
Teachers of theatre all throughout the United States, in both blue and red states, report that it is becoming increasingly difficult to locate plays and musicals that would avoid the type of criticism that, they worry, may lose them their jobs or result in a reduction in financing. This is the case even when it comes to works that have been highly received by audiences. “People are losing their jobs for booking the wrong musical,” said Ralph Sevush, the executive director of commercial affairs of the Dramatists Guild of America (DGA).
“The culture wars are being fought out in high schools by a society that is increasingly polarised,” he continued.
Stephen Gregg is a successful playwright who has been writing for high school students for the past three decades. This year, his publishing house sent him an email requesting “major edits” to his science fiction comedy “Crush.” The email requested that an anecdote about a gay couple be replaced with one about a straight couple, with the explanation that “as we are a public school in Florida, we can’t have gay characters.”
Gregg did not agree to fulfil the request because, in his words, “you probably have gay kids in your theatre programme, and it sends a terrible message to them.”
This year, several school musicals made headlines when they were cancelled due to concerns over the substance of the shows. A performance of “Indecent” that was scheduled to take place in Duval County, Florida, was cancelled due to the play’s lesbian love tale. Because of its morbid subject matter, “The Addams Family,” which is widely considered to be the best school musical in the United States, was banned in Pennsylvania’s North Lebanon School District.
According to Jonathan Friedman, director of free speech and education programmes at PEN America, “there was a very clear streak of theatre cancellations this whole school year,” and “it is happening in parallel to, and related to, the efforts to ban books.” “There are times when it has an effect on plays that are now in production, and there are other instances when it has an effect on the approval of plays in the future. The entire climatic system is influenced.
Several productions have prevailed despite opposition. Cedar Grove High School in New Jersey initially decided not to play the musical “The Prom,” which features a lesbian as the lead role, but then changed its mind in response to criticism from the local community and presented the musical. After Carroll High School in Fort Wayne, Indiana, cancelled a performance of “Marian, or The True Tale of Robin Hood,” which is promoted as “a gender-bending, patriarchy-smashing, hilarious new take on the classic tale,” students produced it anyway in a nearby outdoor theatre. The play is marketed as “a hilarious new take on the classic tale.”
