Opinion: Who axed the school play?

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Was it the principal? Or was it the drama teacher? Was it about the gay characters? For all the mystery surrounding the cancellation of a play at Corona del Mar High School, in an affluent and generally conservative area of Newport Beach, you’d think the play was ‘Sleuth.’

But it was ‘Rent,’ a Tony-winning play, based on La Boheme, about impoverished young New Yorkers living in the shadow of AIDS. According to the Daily Pilot, the principal had asked to review the script for objectionable material, which is common enough practice, but some say she asked in such a way that made it impossible to continue. The conjecture is that she objected to the portrayal of gay characters, although the play already had been edited to remove scenes of physical contact. Some say the principal stopped the play, others that the drama teacher canceled it in response to the concerns raised.

The question is whether the principal wanted the characters stripped, so to speak, of sexual identity, which would be sort of like trying to produce ‘Angels in America’ so that it takes place with all-straight characters in a rural farm area. But then, Rent isn’t exactly ‘South Pacific’ on a number of fronts, depicting drug users and an S&M entertainer.

It’s a tough question, where to draw these lines. Is it discriminatory to gay and lesbian students for drama productions to present only a world in which everyone is straight? Should community standards--and the knowledge that parents often take young children to high school plays--make a difference?

Handout image of the Broadway production of Rent