Brody's Notes... Tempest In Texas: Controversial Play Canceled...Again

By Brody Levesque (Washington DC) Apr 12 | A Fort Worth theater that had agreed to show a student-directed play with a gay Jesus character has withdrawn its offer. Once again the play Corpus Christi, written by Texas native Terrence McNally, drew considerable criticism including death threats on the Facebook page of The Rose Marine Theatre in Fort Worth.

According to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram's correspondent Elizabeth Zavala:

The board of directors of Artes de la Rosa, which runs The Rose Marine Theater on North Main Street, decided Thursday against offering the venue for the production of Corpus Christi, just one day after saying it would. A March performance set for a directing class at Tarleton State University in Stephenville was abruptly canceled after the school received threatening emails.

"The decision was reached by the Board of Directors of Artes de la Rosa to withdraw the offer of the venue, The Rose Marine Theater, which had hoped to host the 4 theatre student directors from Tarleton State University," said a statement posted on the theater's Web site Thursday. "The Rose Marine Theater will not be hosting these 4 students and their casts at any time in the future. We appreciate the public response on both sides of this debated issue."

Adam Adolfo, executive director of Artes de la Rosa, said one "violent" threat had been posted on the Rose Marine Facebook page on Thursday.

"Fiscal repercussions and patronage were anticipated, but in terms of violence, we only received one" threat, he said.

"The combination of producing or hosting a production of this caliber and commentary is always difficult," he said. "The board of directors felt at this time that this was not the appropriate venue or appropriate organization to be hosting this particular play."

Adolfo declined to give any other specifics regarding the board's decision to not stage the play.

The play tells the story of Jesus in a parallel character named Joshua. The character grows up in playwright & author McNally's hometown in the 1950s and 60s.

In the play, which opened in New York City in 1998, Joshua, before the crucifixion, heals the sick, feeds the hungry and provides spiritual guidance. A controversial scene includes Joshua kissing Judas at their senior prom at Pontius Pilate High School. Another shows Joshua performing a marriage between apostles Bartholomew and James.

The Star-Telegram's Zavala writes:

John Jordan Otte, the Tarleton student director who chose the play for a class project, said the decision is a disappointment.

"I hope that this play can be presented where an audience can see it to understand what it's really all about," he said. "I'm still hopeful we'll have another opportunity for another venue. We are looking into that." Otte said he hopes that people in Texas will have the opportunity to see the show, whether it is his or someone else's production.

He has said he chose the play to convey the emotional turmoil sometimes experienced by gay Christians.

In a related editorial entitled, Fear Of A Queer Jesus, Alex Blaze Deputy Editor of The Bilerico Project, a LGBT news & commentary website wrote:

How many times has the American right beaten the story about the fatwa against Salman Rushdie getting death threats writing a "disrespectful" depiction of Mohammed in The Satanic Verses to show how primitive Muslim people are? I know they're beyond hypocrisy, but this is ridiculous...

This thing has a long history, and these folks have a very specific problem with Jesus being depicted as gay. It's not enough for them to have their own Christian beliefs, but everyone who's Christian is allowed only so much leeway. 

So is this how the system is supposed to work? People don't like a play that they haven't even bothered to read or see, but they want to stop everyone else from seeing it? And they get away with it? It's incredibly unfair - if people don't want to see this play they're under no obligation to go see it, but they have no right to keep everyone else from seeing it. All it does is make someone like me, who never would have otherwise heard about it and who isn't a Gay Christian at all, actually want to it. 

But maybe I won't ever since it seems that there will always be a rightwinger willing to take the "debate" to the next level and threaten violence and get it canceled. I'm not going to criticize the theater here for being cowardly and censoring a play because it's politically volatile since I don't know the nature of the threats, but one would hope that living in a supposedly free society would still count for something. Oh well. I guess I just have the film version to wait for.