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Copyright holder demands that the blacks know their place
The Rogers and Hammerstein Foundation withdrew the license to perform some of the music in Big RIver from a high school production because it used reverse racial casting (or, more accurately, colorblind casting that resulted in reverse-race casting*) for the roles of Huck Finn and Jim. Way to keep that black actor in chains, R&H! Maybe instead of a slave, he can play a drug dealer or pimp in the next production.
Obviously the foundation doesn't see it that way; it argues that the role of race in Twain's story requires that proper respect be given to the race of the characters in casting. I can't help but think they are missing the point. Nobody watching the play will become confused about the history of race and slavery in our country. Once the audience adjusts to the skin color of the actors it will be able to watch the play, and understand the weight of the racial issues it portrays, in a way that I think Twain would have appreciated.
(Via Sivacracy)
* It is easy to assume that this was a Joseph Papp-style stunt casting in which the point of the production was to reverse racial roles. In this case, it doesn't appear to be true. The white actor playing Jim is apparently a big kid with a deep baritone; the African-American actor playing Huck comes up to his shoulders. According to the director, switching their roles for the purpose of maintaining racial consistency would have been a silly sight gag because the young Huck would have towered over the older, stronger Jim.
Posted by Charles Star on 05/22/2005 | Permalink
Comments
Twain may have appreciated the liberal take on race, but he very well may might have refused Rogers and Hammerstein permission to use his story in the first place. He was kind of an asshole about copyright, which is to say, he was a copyright maximalist. ("Sivacracy" Vaidhyanthan has an excellent chapter on Twain in his book Copyrights and Copywrongs)
Posted by: Carrie McLaren | May 22, 2005 2:45:49 PM
I haven't read Vaidhyanthan's book, so I can't on that specifically, and I generally agree with the SF! party line (for lack of a better term, I know there's no party line really) on abuse of copyright laws by corporations and artists' estates. But I do know that the context during the 19th Century was radically different; part of the origin of current-day copyright law is the fact that Uncle Tom's Cabin was subjected to dozens, maybe even hundreds, of knockoff melodramas by traveling theater companies, and Harriet Beecher Stowe never saw a dime. Now, in a way, this was obviously a good thing, as it spread the abolitionist message across the country to illiterate and semiliterate audiences, using what was probably the most popular form of storytelling at the time. But on the other hand, there is something horrific about having your book taken from you without and control or compensation (not that I think Stowe was a great artist, or that the current system is really that much better, but some protection is comforting).
As far as the Rodgers & Hammerstein Foundation goes, I can't imagine that anything can be done to make Big River a lousier show than it already is; it saps all of the irony, humor, intelligence, and cynicism out of Twain's work and turns it into sentimental saccharine nonsense...
The problem with estates and theatrical productions is an interesting one, though, however you slice it. The Beckett Estate is famously tight-fisted (for example, you have to have the tree with one leaf in every production of Waiting for Godot, no matter what), but there are still loads of bad Beckett productions. Other the other hand, the Estate of Sarah Kane (an English playwright who committed suicide in 1999, at age 28) is run by her brother Simon, who (from everything I've heard) is genuinely concerned about the plays themselves and his sister's intentions regarding them. I've heard conflicting information about the Borges estate and Calvino's widow from different theater companies as well. My fear, though, is that totally undoing posthumous copyrights (which I am pretty sure SF! isn't endorsing, but just say) would lead not to a huge proliferation of new, exciting adaptations, but rather crappy Hollywood product that would try to use some version of brand manipulation to discredit or crowd out other, smaller adaptations somehow. That, or big corporations would use the new laws as a weapon against the Writer's Guild, who they hate with a passion. I know, these are worst-case scenarios, but I think they belong in any discussion about copyright reform...
Should copywright laws be governed by something like the unwritten rule re. making jokes about tragedies? Estates have to let go of copyrights once most people stop mourning, but not before? There's some Mel Brooks line I can't remember about making fun of the Lincoln Assassination, I think...
Great new issue, by the way.
Posted by: Jason Grote | May 22, 2005 9:54:27 PM
Personally I think a simple rule could be: once a copyright holder has made somewhere between $1 million and $10,000,000 off of a particular work, that work should go into the public domain.
So Disney now owes us for Mickey Mouse -- many times over.
Posted by: Alec Vance | May 23, 2005 9:53:35 AM
Oh, I get it. Now that race doesn't make any difference, let's cast "Roots" with Whites.
Posted by: Jim | May 23, 2005 12:18:06 PM
it's a high school play; they don't have a huge selection of actors to choose from. so if there's one black kid who auditions for the show, it isn't fair to automatically cast him for the black role. the director has to judge who is best suited to which role, regardless of race. besides, the story is well-known enough that it's obvious what's going on. not to mention, there's a certain degree of added irony with a black huck.
Posted by: tracy | May 23, 2005 6:45:51 PM
I go to Glenelg Country School. I was Mary-Jane in that production of Big River. Our High School has about 250 students. I am part of a graduating class of 46. Nick and Jay are the best performers in the school. Obviously they were to be cast in the roles best for them.
And I agree, in its essence, Bit River is a terrible show...
Posted by: Anna | May 24, 2005 1:50:33 PM
I saw the Glenelg production of Big River. The casting was absolutely perfect. There is more to an actor than his/her skin color. Jay Frisby captured the essence of Huck brilliantly, and you could not have found a better Jim than Nick Lehan. The director was correct when she said a reversal of the two student actors would have been a stage disaster.
Evidence that her casting decision was correct can be found in the critical acolades this production received. Jay Frisby was awarded "best actor in a musical", Nick Lehan got "best featured actor in a musical", and the song "Muddy Water" got best song by the Cappies, a national asociation of high school drama departments. (and the "Anna" who sent in a comment to this website on May 24th was nominated for "best female vocalist") And these awards were given BEFORE the casting controversy hit the fan.
Posted by: Bob | May 26, 2005 4:28:34 PM
were i the copyright peeps i wouldn't intervene so aggressively as they did, but i do think in the enactment of somebody's story which is related to specific characters in specific situations in a specific time period where race is a major part of the storyline, yeah it should fit the characters otherwise it's an inconsistent and flawed recreation. if i were the producer i would probably enforce the original details save a lack of actors...
generally speaking, actors only apply for positions they fit. i.e. if a script calls for an anorexic teen girl who's 90 pounds, you don't hire a 300 pound actor who can say the lines and get in character unless you don't care about making yr produxion realistic.
in conclusion, pulling the race card on "keeping the black actor in chains" is BS.
Posted by: die bene tleilax | Jun 1, 2005 3:31:11 PM
to clarify further, i don't think mixing the races up in this situation is a big deal at all. just some blahblah to freak out about for anal peeps.
Posted by: die bene tleilax | Jun 1, 2005 3:37:11 PM
