Defending a Theater for the Absurd

Vanessa Redgrave is once again the victim of political blacklisting. According to news reports, the talented but politically controversial actress has been dropped from a national theatrical tour of the British comedy “Lettice and Lovage” because of statements she made in support of Saddam Hussein and against the presence of “U.S., British and all imperialist troops” in the Gulf.

In 1982, the Boston Symphony Orchestra canceled a performance of Stravinsky’s “Oedipus Rex,” in which Redgrave was to perform the role of narrator. The cancellation came after several musicians refused to perform with her, and after many subscribers and board members threatened to cancel their season tickets and contributions. Redgrave sued the symphony and eventually lost, but many civil libertarians were upset with the orchestra’s decision to mix art and politics.

It is ironic that Redgrave should be the focal point of a debate over blacklisting and over the propriety of mixing art and politics, since she has urged artists to do just that. In 1978 and again in 1986, Redgrave tried to get the British Actors Union to blacklist Israeli artists and to boycott Israeli audiences. She approved as “entirely correct” the blacklisting of Zionist speakers at English universities.

Redgrave’s political views are extremist and border on bigotry. She has described the American film industry as “Zionist dominated”--an obvious euphemism for controlled by “the Jews.” She has called Zionism a “universal threat,” comparable to “Nazism.” And she has said that there is no “room for a state of Israel.”

Redgrave has also expressed hatred for America and for our form of government, preferring a radical Marxist vision of violent revolution. She is a leader of the Trotskyite Worker’s Revolutionary Party, which has received significant financial support from Libya’s Moammar Kadafi and the Palestine Liberation Organization. In exchange, her party has agreed to provide intelligence information to Libya on the activities of Jews in the British government, industry and communications.

But her performances on-stage generally receive rave reviews, and she does fill the theaters in which she performs. The decision to cancel her tour cannot be justified as a purely economic one. It is primarily a political decision based on disapproval of her politics. Those who canceled her tour will argue that there were economic considerations as well. But that is always the argument in such cases.

Redgrave’s political views should be debated, rebutted and defeated in the market place of ideas. But she and her audiences should not be punished artistically for the absurdity of her political ideas.

Nor is it a persuasive argument to point to Redgrave’s own hypocrisy in calling for blacklisting, censorship and the punishment of other artists for their political views. The true test of liberty is our willingness to grant it to those who would deny it to us. H.L. Mencken once observed that fighting for freedom requires the defense of some of the worst people. That is the spirit in which I defend Redgrave’s right to perform.