Artistic Differences? Yes. Racism? No.

As someone who has written before in these pages about how the Mark Taper Forum treats its actors, I cannot let the Nov. 11 story by Don Shirley (“Mamet’s Play at Tiffany After Taper Dispute”) pass without comment.

I have often argued with my good friend and fellow artist (and Taper artistic director) Gordon Davidson both in person and in print--about providing a more productive and respectful role for actors at his theaters, but to find him accused of racism by a disappointed actor is to hear a charge so ridiculous as almost to need no comment. Yet, however ridiculous, the charge is too serious to let pass.

The record of the Taper can speak for itself to those industrious enough to research it, but let me say from personal experience that in all my dealings, especially most recently in my attempts--with his support--to establish the Antaeus Company as a resident classical ensemble at the Taper, Davidson has bent over backward to insist that his stages must be open to the city’s diverse acting pool--not that those of us who founded the Antaeus Company ever intended otherwise.

And he bent over backward, in the diversity of his programming and in his commitment to non-traditional casting, to include minority artists on his main and side stages--so much so that very little room in his schedule is left for the so-called traditional projects, like the great classics. You can imagine how frustrating that has been for those of us who believe that the survival of the great and wise classics is essential to the survival of our culture and to its ability to be diverse and all-embracing.

But racism from Gordon Davidson? Nonsense. If anything, I have found Davidson and his staff too politically correct on the subject. Pro-active, almost to a fault, if one can ever be faulted for opening this city’s stages to traditionally disadvantaged minority theater artists.

So where does the charge come from? It comes from disappointment--from a disagreement over casting that resulted in the canceling of David Mamet’s “Oleanna” at the Taper. It comes from a refusal to accept the aesthetic and economic fact that producing and casting a show in a major urban theater is a messy business.

It comes, I suspect, from an altogether worthy desire to maintain a kind of idealism about the art and the craft, an idealism that is easily wounded when it collides with social and financial realities. It comes from the love-hate relationship artists have always had with producers who make the necessary compromises to provide them venues, audiences and financial support.

I do not know Lionel Smith, the actor who accused Davidson of “acting in a racist manner.” I do not think I have ever seen his work. But he comes highly qualified, I know, and has the backing of the play’s director and writer, who have chosen to shift their play to the Tiffany Theatre early next year. It is hard to be caught in the middle of an artistic dispute. It is hard when someone or some institution does not rush to validate your work wholeheartedly. It is hard when someone suggests that there might be some other actor out there--even some other African American actor--who might be better or more right for some role than you are.

All of us actors suffer from that. I hate it too. And I usually think such people are wrong about me and my talent--it’s the way I keep my self-respect.

I’m not a minority actor--though my paternal grandparents were Portuguese immigrants who bought their passage to the New World with years of indentured servitude in Hawaiian cane fields--so I can’t accuse such people of racism. But maybe it’s not racism in Smith’s case either. Maybe it’s just the fact that every once in a while, always too often, people in a position to call the shots think you’re not good enough or not famous enough to land a plum role. Or maybe they just want the liberty to look around.

And maybe a charge of racism seems like a good way of dealing with that rejection. But maybe it isn’t. Maybe it’s too easy and too dangerous. And too cruel to a good and honorable man.