...as the guy who got the whole Theatre J/Imagining Madoff ball rolling here at Parabasis. I heartily second Isaac in welcoming Ari Roth, Deb Margolin and Morgan Jenness to both this blog and this conversation. Way too often, these things get talked about on a blog and the people involved are never heard from. It's certainly given me and all of us a perspective on this that we didn't get from the original WaPo article or that we would have on our own.
That said, as usual both on the internet and in life, this conversation has spread far afield and touched on a lot of things. Hearing from most of the major players has added background information and clarified points of fact, but there are still some points that are open to discussion in my mind. Often, when these kind of issues come up, there's a flurry of talk and back-and-forth, but then some factual errors or assumptions are corrected and it's treated as though the matter is now settled. I don't think this necessarily is, though it's probably time to move on. Below the jump, I want to highlight the points that I think are still up for discussion and say a couple of other things.
The thing that originally interested me about this is still the most active point: what, as an artist, do I owe to a real person whose life or deeds I use in my work? Do I owe them a positive portrayal? A space for rebuttal? What kind of respect should I give them? In this case, of course, Elie Wiesel is a public figure and an important one, but does that change anything? Does that change the responsibility of the artist?
I have a friend who lost a brother under tragic circumstances around the same time that my own younger brother died. I wrote a play connecting those two losses and used more than a few personal details from my friend's life. I changed a number of things as well, but certainly anyone who knows us both would make the connection. I've never shown that play to my friend and I constantly question whether I should and, frankly, dread the reaction I would get. I wrestle with the question of what I owe my friend whenever I think about working on that play.
The more I heard about the situation for Theatre J and Ari's relationship with Elie Wiesel and how it all was handled, the more I thought about what a theatre owes its community and its patrons and supporters. I know that Wiesel is not a supporter of Theatre J, but the relationship is similar. Should Theatre J not do a play because a supporter would find it offensive or insulting? Does the play's value hinge on whether it offends?
I know that, in Ari's mind and intentions, he didn't submit the revised draft of Deb's play for "approval," but he asks the salient question: what if they had still rejected it? We'll never know. But it's a gut check moment for any theatre. And I do think the legal implications have to be taken into account. I don't think that Wiesel would have had a leg to stand on for a successful lawsuit. But even an unsuccessful lawsuit can tie up a theatre's resources for years on end, fracture relationships and hurt its mission. There's no shame in avoiding that.
Isaac originally mentioned the Rachel Corrie issue in this context and that's one of the places where this conversation has had a bit of...shall we say, mission creep. There are obviously some attendant, larger issues in that discussion (I'll get to that in a second) and the two situations aren't perfect analogues or anything, but the underlying question is still the same: what does a theatre do when a work they think is worthy of being staged risks deeply offending part of their audience? As I indicated above, Theatre J avoided the meat of this question when Deb pulled the play, but its implications are all over this. It's a valid comparison, on a couple of different levels, and a valid question.
Okay, here's something I want to get off my chest: there have been a number of comments lately that I've found deeply offensive and obnoxious. I'm a contributor here and a good friend of Isaac's, but it's not my blog and it's not really my place to scold anyone. But I wanted to say that I agree with Isaac wholeheartedly: this blog is a place for questions, opinions, and discussion. That only works if we trust and respect each other. We don't all have to like each other, or constantly agree, but we have to admit a base level of respect. Or at least try for that. If you can't treat us with respect, please don't comment here. You're unwelcome.
Some of us hold opinions you may not like. Some of you hold opinions I don't like. But we should all be free to express them. Challenge us, yes. Question us, yes. But don't make accusations about intentions, accusations that shut down conversation and discussion. They are unfair and frankly I find them disgusting. You know who and what I'm talking about.
Like Isaac, I will be away from this blog for the next week or so. I think his valediction is pretty spot on: be good to each other and avoid cheap shots.
NPR did a story on the controversy, talking to a lawyer who teaches at Columbia about the rights a living person has when they're fictionalized.
http://n.pr/d3dXZB
Posted by: Esther | May 25, 2010 at 12:54 AM
Just a final note: after I pulled the play from Theater J, the day after, in fact, I was cc'd on a letter sent to Ari Roth from the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity, requesting a 1-year moratorium on even a rewritten script, without Professor Wiesel's character in it at all, followed by an opportunity for the Foundation to consider the rewritten script and express its opinion on whether or not they were comfortable with the play's being presented after that year. -D. Margolin
Posted by: D. Margolin | May 30, 2010 at 10:35 AM