Arts Integrity Initiative in partnership with the New School: The communication announcing the cancelation of a production of the musical The 25thAnnual Putnam County Spelling Bee at Hyattsville Middle School in Maryland could not have been more terse.
Unfortunately we have decided to cancel the Spring Musical dates of May 2nd, 3rd, and 4th.
Additionally, we will hold a parent meeting after spring break, Tuesday April 23rdat 4:30pm in Mrs. Gee’s Room to address next steps and to answer any of your questions, comments, or concerns.
7 comments:
25th annual was the first show I had ever stage managed and probably my favorite. I think it’s a really strong musical with many unlying messages that are shown through a comedic lens. I’ve seen and adored this musical since I first saw a rendition of it my freshman year of highschool, and continued to see other productions of it since. Understandably, the show does have some inappropriate content that is supposed to be more so funny than provocative, in my opinion. When we did it in my school, we did not revise the “My Unfortunate Erection” to “My Unfortunate Distraction” although my high school was a conjoined middle school and a seventh grader was performing that song. As every school has their own views and rules on profanity, my school (along with the cast) saw the musical in a light where the inappropriate songs added to the beauty of the show instead of taking away from it.
Situations like this are happening more and more often recently. I think it may be in part due to lack of oversight or understanding from the school administration. In this case, I feel like there should have been more attention paid to the particular nature of the show. There were so many people involved in that process who should have noticed that this would be an issue. At the very least, it seems like they cancelled this before things got too far underway. I’ve seen several stories where the production is cancelled very close to opening, meaning a lot of hard work goes down the drain. I hope in the future more measures are taken to prevent this kind of incident.
Similar to Mia, 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee was also the first show I ever stage managed, and I loved every single minute of working on it- seriously, the show is nothing short of amazing. I was really surprised to be reading this article and I really came at it with no sympathy for the people who are affected by the gay content in it. The show really doesn't have that much profanity, only containing a couple words here and there, but it does contain merely the presence of homosexuality within around two numbers of the entire shows. I've done this show at my progressive high school and I've also done this show with eight year olds at a children's theatre, and both of them kept the gay scenes in tact. Putting aside that its discriminatory, I really don't see that much of an issue here, they're barely on stage, around zero percent of the story revolves around them being gay, and all they do is portray a fun stereotype of gay dads.
I hate the idea that schools are constantly trying to censor material from students. There’s no reason why this should still be happening. With the way the internet is growing, all information is readily available. I think that if there is sensitive material that schools want to be cautious about, they should present that material in school in a protected and safe environment. That being said, a storyline with two gay fathers in it is ridiculous to sensor. Even if you don’t support gay marriage, it’s a reality of the world that should be represented and taught about. I think it’s horrible that any school would even consider pulling a show because of a gay couple. Beyond that, “Spelling Bee” is a easy enough show to get rights to change a few words for profanity. The only reason the school would cancel the show is if some influential parents said something that threatened the school in some way. I’m so glad they decided to bring it back and continue on with “Spelling Bee”.
I have never actually seen 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee but from everything that I know, and have read about it, I don’t really understand the issue. In fact, it really seems like there is not an issue and that people are just trying to make things up. There’s obviously an issue they had with it but it was a problematic enough issue (like being considered about the gay dads in it) that they couldn’t admit to the real problem, so they made up other non-issues in an attempt to get they want regardless. This is really annoying, and I hate when school districts have this much power over what arts a school can and cannot expose to their populations. The public schools I went to growing up literally gave me absolutely no exposure to the preforming arts, and it was not until I made it to a private school that I really had the chance to join the world. Obviously, this is not the case everywhere, but it is much too common.
I am all for pushback against censorship, which seems to be at the core of this issue. That said, a play that is rated PG-13 is probably too old for most middle schoolers to be performing or viewing without parental permission. 13-year-olds, I believe, are generally in eighth grade: the content is only appropriate for the oldest participants. I think there were a series of poor judgement calls, and whoever made those decisions clearly initiated an uproar. The song “My Unfortunate Distraction,” nominally changed to be more age-appropriate, is likely thinly veiled at best. If middle schoolers do anything particularly well as a population, it is making jokes about genitalia, and their parents certainly want nothing to do with it. It is easy to get sucked into outrage and uproar when a show gets censored, but context is important. It is entirely possible that a parent complained because of the gay dads, making the powers that be review the content of the play, and they discovered that there was enough inappropriate content that the production should be reconsidered.
The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee is not a particular elementary school friendly show I will admit, but by the time kids are 12-14 the content of erections and profanity is not new. On the topic of the erection scene there may be merit to having that be performed in a middle school where puberty is all around and talking about some of the more unfortunate side effect through comedy could be more positive then negative. By not releasing a list this school district is perpetuating the rumors that the dads scene was the issue. Additionally when I was a middle schooler I did not want to be doing “little kid shows”, our director responded to that and we did a production of Man of La Mancha. Although some of the nuances were to complicated for a middle schooler it was really empowering to be trusted with mature content. The middle schoolers in this content have stood up for themselves by coming to a meeting and proposing solutions, and thereby inciting change in their administration.
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