Freedom, responsibility and the arts
Holman said that although the high school is a place where artistic expression is broad and people are able to explore more edgy issues, there is an accompanying need for consideration of and conversation about those edges and how they may affect the community.
“We have to have conversations about those edges where we’re pushing out and being really daring, and we have to make sure we’re not being daring in a way that is unsafe for part of our diverse community,” Holman said.
The change was made two days before the show opened, according to Mastandrea.
“I can just say that two days before you open a show is a super stressful time of much going on, so that was difficult. It’s difficult to make changes so soon to a show opening,” Mastandrea said.
Mason said that the timing of the discussion and changes was not ideal.
“My hope would be that these discussions would happen long before the Friday before the play opens,” Mason said. “That’s not good in any way. It’s a stressful time for everybody involved, and it’s way, way, way too late for that discussion to happen. It should happen earlier.”
Last year, when Holman saw the Shakespeare play, she became concerned with the use of drug paraphernalia in the show and asked that the scene be altered in the following showings. This sparked a conversation about how such concerns should be addressed in the future.
“After the discussion last year around the Shakespeare play, I came to an understanding with the drama teachers that they would let me know anything edgy in their plays that they thought I should know about and that might need discussion with the headmaster,” Holman said.
Holman declined to comment on whether or not there was good communication between the drama teachers and the administration in this case.
After Holman expressed concern about the Shakespeare play last year, Friends of Performing Arts (FoPA) held an artistic expression panel consisting of Holman, curriculum coordinators, teachers and students discussing finding a balance between the responsibility of the school and freedom of expression in the arts.
“We don’t have a written policy on that because the way we address those limits in what we choose content-wise to deal with in classes is based on thoughtful practice and trust between administrators, teachers and coordinators,” Holman said during the panel. “If you’re doing it thoughtfully with trust, you don’t always need a written policy.”
According to Mason, the Drama Society can help contribute to discussions about race at the high school.
“The Drama Society, as part of the community, has a role in that. I don’t know that it’s their job that they must discuss every issue that’s being discussed around the school, but when it’s appropriate, that’s fine. That’s certainly a role that’s fine,” Mason said. “Certainly we would expect drama and plays to provoke us and make us think about difficult things, but that doesn’t mean that you can therefore do anything at any time. There’s a difference.”
Mastandrea said theater provides a safe setting to discuss problematic issues.
“I was disappointed that the decision was made. I believe that the role of theater in our lives and in the lives of our students in shows that we do at Brookline High School is a complex one. The job is to entertain, it’s to make you aware of other perspectives, it’s to bring the playwrights to life, it’s to examine the text on stage, et cetera,” Mastandrea said. “But I also think one of the roles of theater is to be able to provide a safe context to explore subjects that would benefit from conversation. So I think that the way we originally staged the moment might have opened up students’ eyes to some of the ways that racism is still in operation today, and still ugly today, and because it was so completely clear to me and to people who watched the show, and were involved in the show with me that the moment in our show absolutely, unequivocally made clear that racist gestures and noises are completely unacceptable.”
Kate Finnerty and Juliana Kaplan can be contacted at [email protected].
Sophie S. • Apr 9, 2014 at 10:08 pm
The thing about the whole high school vs. real world theater is that the school is teaching us what the theater can be like. For middle school, yes, it’s not a good idea, but we have people nearing adulthood (some are adults legally!), you can’t sensor things. Shakespeare wrote these pieces in a time with a really different perception of things. This by no means shows that we believe in his values, but rather how people thought at the time. We need to experience theater for what it is; the good and the bad.
PCamuck • Jan 27, 2014 at 12:50 am
I feel like you sort of destroyed the entire point of that scene. Wouldn’t it have been better to just have made an announcement at the beginning of the play that “certain scenes contain historically accurate material that should be offensive to some. etc…”
donmatthew • Dec 19, 2013 at 2:26 pm
So what will the PC crowd do next? Remove the character of Tituba from “The Crucible”? She was a real-life character, according to the Court records fro Salem, MA. She was a slave who was brought to the “New World” from Barbados, and she practiced some form of so-called “witchcraft” by having the girls of the community dancing in the woods at night.
So what would the BHS Principle do? Ban the character of Tituba? Change her to being Caucasian?
By the way, I’ve acted in the play “The Crucible”, portraying the role of one of the 2 judges. As far as I’m concerned, school administrators should stick to their own jobs, and leave the job of directing the plays to the Directors!