“This is the first time I’ve chosen a show for the high school because I had an agenda,” Mr. Martin said. “In this instance, having an agenda as a teacher didn’t give me pause. My job is to give my students life skills. Discrimination is wrong on all levels.”http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/20/theater/20rent.html?hp=&pagewanted=all
Tamer ‘Rent’ Musical
Is Too Wild for Some Schools
A January performance of
“Rent: School Edition” at Fairmont State University in West Virginia, featuring students of nearby Bridgeport High School.
By PATRICK HEALY
Published: February 19, 2009
NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. — Theater directors and students at more than 40 high schools across the country have selected a new show for their big springtime musical this year:
“Rent: School Edition,” a modified version of the hit Broadway musical that, while toned down a bit, remains provocative by traditional drama club standards.
Too provocative, in the view of some high school officials and parents. At least three of the planned high school productions, in California, Texas and West Virginia, have been canceled after administrators or parents raised objections about the show’s morality, its portrayals of homosexuality and theft, and its frank discussions of drug use and H.I.V., according to administrators, teachers and parents involved in those cases.
“Rent,” which ran on Broadway for more than 12 years and in 1996 won the Pulitzer Prize and the Tony Award, is based loosely on Puccini’s opera
“La Bohème.” It centers on a group of artists, straight and gay, living in the East Village. Some are H.I.V. positive; some are drug addicts; some are in recovery.
None of these aspects have been altered for the high school version. The main changes are the deletion of some profane dialogue and lyrics as well as a song, “Contact,” that is sexually explicit. In
“Rent,” that song accompanies the death of
Angel, a gay drag queen with AIDS; in the high school version, his death unfolds in an earlier song.
The 2008-9 school year is the first in which the school edition of
“Rent” — which was approved by the estate of
Jonathan Larson, the “Rent” creator who died in 1996 — has been available to high schools.
The New York producers of
“Rent,” who receive some royalties from the school edition, said they hoped it would become a new, revenue-generating staple of the high school musical landscape, as well as a teaching tool that augments sex education and draws teenagers to acting and theater with a more modern production than, say,
“The Music Man.” In the short term, however,
“Rent: School Edition” appears to be something of a cultural litmus test, with supporters and opponents of the play using its words and themes to battle. In recent years, school productions of
“The Vagina Monologues” and the musical
“Grease” have led to complaints, the latter for its drinking, smoking and kissing.
Ron Martin, the theater teacher and director here at Corona del Mar High School, found out just how controversial
“Rent” can be. It was canceled after he chose the student version for the spring musical, hoping that it would counter what he saw as creeping homophobia on this Orange County campus. A recent video on Facebook, featuring Corona del Mar students using gay slurs, had upset faculty and parents, and some teachers reported that they had heard slurs at school.
“This is the first time I’ve chosen a show for the high school because I had an agenda,” Mr. Martin said. “In this instance, having an agenda as a teacher didn’t give me pause. My job is to give my students life skills. Discrimination is wrong on all levels.”
Ron Martin is the theater teacher at
Corona del Mar High School in California,
where a production of the show was canceled.He said his principal,
Fal Asrani, had objected to the show because of its treatment of “prostitution and homosexuality.” “When I heard that, I stopped her and looked her in the eye and said, ‘First, there is no prostitution in ‘Rent,’ and second, homosexuality is not wrong,’ ” Mr. Martin said. “She made no comment. It was the most demoralizing, disappointing moment in my career as a teacher.”
Ms. Asrani, in a separate interview, flatly denied ever raising homosexuality or prostitution as concerns. She said that she had asked Mr. Martin to provide her with a copy of the script to review so that she would ensure that “the show would be appropriate for people of all ages.” She and Mr. Martin agree that he did not have a copy and that he had said there was not enough time to review the script and ask the licensor,
Music Theater International, if alterations could be made.
Ms. Asrani and Mr. Martin each said that the other was responsible for canceling the show.
Since then, students and alumni have organized campaigns on
Facebook and elsewhere to press for reviving the production. Mr. Martin said he planned to give the principal a script on Monday and to ask her to specify the parts that she finds problematic. He also said he was leaning toward directing
“You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown” as the spring musical “because I don’t think there’s anything she can object to in that.”
For school administrators, the issue is not only one of suitable content for high school students, but also the lack of appeal that the show might have among potential audience members who prefer old-time, classic musicals.
“Our high school shows are so important to our community — we have alumni who come back, we bus in children for them — and I didn’t see
‘Rent’ working here,” said
Susan Collins, the superintendent of the Harrison County schools in West Virginia, who canceled a production at Bridgeport High School there this winter. “But look, I know we can’t stick our heads in the sand, I know drugs are out there, I know children are having babies at 12, I know teens are having sex and always must have safe sex. But I don’t know if we need
‘Rent.’ ”
Ms. Collins said she had not been familiar with
“Rent” until last year, when the Bridgeport drama coach,
Charles Dillon, proposed a
“Rent: School Edition” production for the 2008-9 school year. Mr. Dillon said in an interview that when he told Ms. Collins there were two gay couples in the musical, “she got flustered and worked up and expressed concerns.”
Ms. Collins said she had no personal problem with the homosexuality in
“Rent,” but she was concerned that families in her West Virginia school district would not find that content and other themes appealing. (“We’re a bit back in the woods here,” she said.) She subsequently asked for and watched a DVD of the film version of
“Rent,” she said, and the disc ended up back with Mr. Dillon with a Post-it note that read “NO.” Mr. Dillon ultimately worked with nearby Fairmont State University this winter to produce the school version of
“Rent,” with high school students from Bridgeport and elsewhere making up the cast.
A similar situation unfolded in Rowlett, Tex.: the director of a planned production of
“Rent: School Edition” canceled the show after parents and school board members raised concerns about its morality. But then, with the assistance of a local radio station, a one-night-only concert was held last month at Southern Methodist University, with Rowlett High School students performing most of the songs.
At the same time, other productions are moving ahead in high schools in Mississippi and Missouri. And the school edition is even being marketed to middle schools, although none have apparently pursued productions.
“Like it or not, we’re right smack in the middle of an enormous cultural shift right now, and that shift will give way to acceptance of homosexuality and acceptance of gay characters,” said
Jeffrey Seller, one of the
“Rent” producers, who are also backing a national tour now under way. “But it’s a process, it’s a messy process, and it makes sense to me that we’ll take steps forward and hit a pothole and take a step backward.
“But you know what?” Mr. Seller added. “The kids are going to win. They may not win this month, they may not win this year, but if they want to put on
‘Rent,’ then they are going to have to fight a little bit and stand up to their schools.”
