Mail Online: A theater in Salt Lake City, Utah, has won praise for its response to a letter from a mother who complained about a kissing scene between two male characters.
The unnamed woman, who visited the Pioneer Theatre Company with her teenage son, called a performance of the 1978 play Deathtrap ‘offensive and vulgar’ and its kiss scene an ‘explicit, homosexual display’.
2 comments:
While this woman’s intentions were to possibly try to damage the reputation of this theater company, she did the exact opposite. I can say with certainty that some people agree with how see feels towards homosexuality. However, her outrage and ignorance has been brought into social media, where conversation thrives. People, who were originally indifferent to the issue, are now forming opinions about it. The theater company did their job, whether intentionally or unintentionally, in starting this by choosing to do the show. The director then raises the important question, “You object to the kissing but not to the fact that they are murderers?”
Some try to argue that the theater should have put a disclaimer warning audience members of what to expect when seeing the show, but similar to almost all forms of entertainment, in order to successfully to tell a story, there has to be an element of surprise to it. If the theater company had to summarize the entire plotline before the audience saw the show, then they would not have bothered to even put on the show. The intention is for the show to be seen live.
In entertainment, you are not going to please everyone. The real issue is handling something you do not like with maturity but respectfully disagreeing with it. Some people like horror movies, some like romance novels better. Some people are gay, some people are not. No one is the same. To try to stop a show or a theater company for an opinion some people have is unnecessary.
Art lives through how we act, how we think, and how we feel. Obviously someone must have liked the show for it to exist.
I applaud Mr. Lino for his beautifully handled response, and don’t think that I could have made a better one myself. Making people with these opinions realize the triviality of what they’re upset about. Mr. Lino’s comment also vaguely brushes on censorship of sexuality in general, which is an all-too-common theme in the arts. When an art exhibition has to be 18+ due to nudity and a 13 year old can go see a movie that shows graphic violence, there is a problem somewhere. The censorship of sexuality has taken over American art culture, and it’s not protective anymore, it’s limiting. Regardless of the ever-present censorship, there will always be people like Mr. Lino who are willing to bring a logically defended rebuttal to instances such as these, and for that, there is hope that one day we won’t have to trouble ourselves with ridiculous arguments such as these.
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