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Free speech groups denounce Florida officials for canceling a high school play : NPR


Playwright Paula Vogel speaks on stage during the 2017 Tony Awards.

According to Wargo/Getty Images for Tony Awards Productions


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According to Wargo/Getty Images for Tony Awards Productions


Playwright Paula Vogel speaks on stage during the 2017 Tony Awards.

According to Wargo/Getty Images for Tony Awards Productions

PEN America and two other free speech groups are drawing national attention to Florida county school officials’ decision to cancel a play. it’s him about censorship.

Last week, Duval County Public Schools officials canceled production of Paula Vogel’s impolite at the Douglas Anderson School of the Arts. Officials said the play about the love between two women was “inappropriate”. report of the WJC.

PEN America, together with The National Coalition Against Censorship and Dramatists Legal Defense Fund released a declare condemned the decision and “urged school officials to reverse their decision and work with the students to stage the play as planned.”

impolite is about the controversy surrounding the 1923 Broadway production vengeance god, a Yiddish play by Sholem Asch. In the story, the daughter of a Jewish brothel owner falls in love with one of her father’s prostitutes. Asch’s screenplay included a love scene between two women. The play was a huge success in Europe and the theater scene in downtown New York. But once it was translated into English and performed on Broadway, the entire cast was arrested and charged with pornography.

Free speech organizations wrote that impolite explores “LGBTQ+ rights, immigration, censorship, and anti-Semitism in the early 20th Century — topics that are strikingly relevant to the issues facing society today.” They point out that recent Douglas Anderson products include TO RENT and Chicagoexpressed with “much, if not more, ‘sexual dialogue’ as conveyed in impolite.”

“If the dialogue about adult sexuality is vaguely defined” is reason enough to ban plays from appearing in schools,” the statement continued, “these and many classics Others will be banned from showing in student cinemas – Romeo and Juliet to describe sexually active adolescents, Oedipus Rex for incestuous themes and other works of serious literary and artistic value to students and community members.”

Paula Vogel herself has also given the cause of her play being cancelled. The Pulitzer Prize Winner has released a declare and, according to an interview with PEN America, asked to meet with the school board. She also recorded a podcast with student actors.

“What surprised me was the courage of this high school student to speak up and the courage of the students in that cast,” she said. arriveold American Pen. “The faculty and the administration have been basically silenced. I fear for their work. … art censorship is always the first step to totalitarianism, and ultimately to annihilation. strains.”

She went on to say that other high schools have done it impolite no incident: “It’s up to the director and the students. If they don’t want to kiss on stage, then let them hug. I don’t control directing the stage. I don’t control the script of And if a high school wants to produce one of my plays and change the F to ‘cheating’, I don’t care.”

NPR has reached out to the Douglas Anderson School of the Arts and Duval County Public Schools for comment, but has not received a response.

According to WJCT’s Brendan Rivers, Douglas Anderson Principal Tina Wilson informed members that impolite will be replaced by the play Chekhov Seagull.

In an email to students, she wrote, “Although students are required to have parental consent to appear in the initial selection, a closer look at ‘Indecent’ adult content ‘ led us to conclude that ‘Seagull’ is more suitable for a school production.”

Rivers reported that a statement from school district officials, “said the decision was unrelated to Florida’s new law restricting discussion of race and gender topics. It is our responsibility to ensure that students participate in educational activities that are appropriate for their age.” ‘”

Vogel’s play is,about the purity of love, the strength in a community and the shallowness of people trying to hide their identities,” said Madeline Scotti, a member of the Douglas Anderson cast. impolite in an Instagram parcel. She urges everyone to read impolite and god of vengeance“and there are conversations that we’re forbidden to have.”

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