A school play at Jacksonville’s Douglas Anderson School of the Arts has been canceled because of “content concerns”.
The play “Indecent” won Tony awards during its Broadway run in 2017.
Indecent is based on Sholem Asch’s play, God of Vengeance. The play’s plot involves a Jewish brothel keeper whose daughter and a prostitute fall in love.
Evidently retelling a story that’s been around for 100 years was too much for DCPS. “’Indecent’ contains adult sexual dialog that is inappropriate for student cast members and student audiences. It’s that simple,” Tracy Pierce, a Duval County school system spokesman, said Friday, after DCPS shut the production down.
Actually it’s not that simple. The D.A. production team realized there are some in our community who don’t like Jews. There are some in our community who don’t like Lesbians. There are some in our community who don’t like sex workers, and there are some in our community who don’t like any of the aforementioned. Because of this all Students staging the play had to get parents’ approval. Let me say that again, Students staging the play had to get parents’ approval.
There has been some speculation that DCPS caved to the Don’t Say Gay Act recently passed in Florida. DCPS has adamantly denied that. But let’s look at the act. It’s official title is The Florida Parental Rights in Education Act.
The Florida Parental Rights in Education Act; parents have rights with regard to the education of their children.
Okay, the parents of all the students involved in the production of the play exercised their rights and signed permission slips giving their children the right to participate in the production of Indecent.
Students staging the play had their parents’ approval
Students staging the play had their parents’ approval
Students staging the play had their parents’ approval
After DCPS asked the parents if it was okay for their children to put on the play and the parents said, yes, my children have my permission, DCPS said too bad, no play for you.
No to the Jewish, Lesbian, sex worker play. But if it had been a play about a Protestant, heterosexual, football player that would have been okay, I’m sure.
Asch’s original play was also a victim of censorship and hate; its Broadway run began December 1922, producer Harry Weinberger and the cast were arrested on March 6, 1923. They were charged and convicted for “unlawfully advertising, giving, presenting, and participating in an obscene, indecent, immoral, and impure drama or play.” They pleaded not guilty. The verdict was eventually overturned, but only after a lengthy and costly court battle.
God of Vengeance on Broadway should have been a high point of Asch’s career, instead he, his play, and all those involved became targets of bigots and hate. 100 years later and the haters win again.
One cast member is not ready to give up
“They are trying to tell us that this play is dirty, immoral, obscene and of course indecent,” student cast member Madeline Scotti said in an Instagram message posted Thursday night.
The senior instead described the story glowingly.
“’Indecent’ is a story about how detrimental censorship is … ‘Indecent’ is about the purity of love, the strength within a community and the shallowness of those who try to silence identities. ‘Indecent’ is also a queer Jewish love story,” Scotti said. ~The Florida Times Union