to object to racist/offensive language in a play

[TeenyTinyTorya]

I went to see an amateur production of "Arsenic and Old Lace" the other night, and objected to some of the language used. The play is originally from the 1940s, and the script had not been updated.

At one point, a character referred to the Japanese army as "yellow devils", and at another point, an (unseen) character was described as a "chink".

I felt that neither term was necessary to the story, and both could have been changed or eliminated altogether to avoid offence, without affecting the play. I mentioned it to someone I know who was in the play, and they said that after a lot of discussion, a conscious decision had been made to keep the terms in the script. The reason for this was that people would have used these terms at the time the play was set.

AIBU to think that they should have just taken the terms out altogether, as they were not integral to the story?

i'm with you, ttt. it's only an amateur prod of a not particularly brilliant play, it's just put on because it has parts for old ladies and am-dram is crammed with them. it'd have died a death years ago were it not for am-dram. it could hve stopped there and had no wider significance whatsoever. it's hardly burning books...

Thanks, Aitch. I have seen a professional production of this, in a big theatre tour, and I don't remember the words being used then.

Such a play is a glimpse into the past as it was then. It should not be censored.

If we put an end to war will we then show old war films edited to show people throwing flowers instead of bombs?

Aitch, that sounds like common sense, but I'm afraid it amounts to "just burning a few books". Once you let it start it's hard to stop it. It already has started in fact with promoters sighing "oh leave it out. It's not worth all the hassle and complaints"

TeenyTinyTorya, that will be why you didn't hear it in the professional production. They would have taken that bit out to avoid protestors marching outside even if it was wrong to do so.

It's just as wrong to decide to alter what you consider to a not terribly brilliant piece as it is to alter the words of Shakespeare.

i really don't think it would have been the thin end of the wedge.

people alter shakspeare all the time... big chunks go hither and yon.

They do but people are generally aware if they are seeing a modern altered adaptation or a by the book adaptation and can make that choice for themselves, it doesn't take that choice away from everyone else.

ttt wasn't asking fr te text to be altered on the page, just a couple of irrelevant lines to go. nowaadays tbh they probably have more weight than when written so probably throw the characterisation in a way the autgor never intended, so he may have excised them himself.

author.

And removing lines is altering the text, regardless of how much merit you(general you) think they have.

He may have done, but it's his or her place to do that and no one else.

You could get all post-modern about this, I suppose, and claim that works of art (whether high or low culture) are a collaboration between creator and audience rather than a permanent memorial that must be forever unaltered. But there is something uncomfortable about changing words to impose today's social and cultural values on the past. It recalls the unhappy history of censorship, going back to the Puritans, with a special mention for the Victorians, and more recently Hitler, Stalin and other dictators of that ilk.

I think if you are removing words for whatever reason you should make it clear. Perhaps a prominent programme note would do the job.

not on the page, not in a way that means that furute generations won't be able to squabble about whether or not they should go.

thinking about it, i totally believe that the author wouldn't want them in there now, anyway. he wouldn't want the audience going home talking about the merits and demerits of the word chink in a historical play, he'd want them going home tinkling with laughter and yakking about how much they'd enjoyed it. who's vision are we being true to, here?

There is a simple solution.

If someone doesn't like these plays set in times with different customs they should consider watching modern stuff only. That should be safe enough. It applies to traveling abroad too since they sometimes do things differently there.

i favour te post modern, edam, and a prograame note. would have made the programme an interesting read, actually, rather than the usual save our spire stuff.

what a pompous post, onager. and it implies racism on the part of anyone who disagrees with you, how nice.

That's your opinion of what the author would , unfortunately the man himself isn't here to advise us.

And if people are leaving a play discussing only how offensive said words were, and are unable to think of little else I'd say they'd certainly wasted their money and should perhaps stick to their local Blockbusters instead.

Plays and novels aren't just about enjoyment, they're also there to anger us, to make us laugh,cry,and perhaps most importantly to make us think.

And would someone please tell me whose version of morality we are supposed to use as our yardstick when censoring books and plays?

Don't forget in the 1940s we were fighting (or had just stopped fighting) a war against the Japanese. "Yellow devils" is very mild when you consider the horror of the treatment of POWs including women and children.*

And I know the Yanks dropped the atom bomb on them BUT I don't suppose British audiences who had suffered during WWII were particularly bothered about moral relativism.

• I am NOT defending racism, just trying to look at the original context.

Well since you mention it Aitch, I go whole days without thinking of people being one race or another. I think of them as people.

Those people who have to work out which race the milkman is in so they can remember to treat him fairly Are Racist.

lol, you have seen aresnic and old lace, haven't you? it's about a couple of dotty old bats who kill lonely gentlemen... please check your brain in at the door.

this is the equovalent of discusing a ray cooney farce. and while cooney would be concerned about a loss of rhythm, i doubt he'd want people obsessing about lines that steered his characters wrongly in future times.

Oh, just looked it up and realised my assumptions are incorrect. It was written by an American in 1939. Still, the comments would apply to the first British audiences...

Yes I have seen it, and again I say regardless of the merit you believe it warrants censoring it is as wrong as any work of Shakespeare or Dickens.

Censorship is wrong across the board imo, and to me you might as well bloody ban the book/play if you're going to go about ripping sections out of it and altering it as you please. It's no better.