I had no idea John Saltas was so familiar with musical theater [“Critical Thunkers,” July 19, City Weekly]. Bravissimo! He should add these to his list of musicals that also should be put under scrutiny:
Oklahoma: “I’m Just A Girl Who Can’t Say No,” sung by a teenage Annie, must be cut.
Sound of Music: Sorry, we can’t have soon-to-be nuns falling in love with rich barons or otherwise … gasp!
Chicago is out—the costumes and choreography alone will be enough to knock this one out for decades.
OK, let’s go highbrow with opera. Virtually anything Mozart wrote is out. Don Giovanni and Figaro—both are rogues of the worst kind. And all the frolicking in The Magic Flute—more gasps. And, oops, Wagner and Puccini are out, too. Tristan and Isolde, Mimi and Rodolfo—not married and carrying on (if you know what I mean). And the list goes on. There’s just too much kissing (some find that “act” a no-no). Actually, I can’t think of a single opera (where everyone is singing their socks off) that will make the cut.
Literature? Hmm. Maybe Lady Chatterley’s Lover should be banned again. D.H. Lawrence, for shame. And Lolita/Nabokov—oh, my goodness. Let this insanity continue and that book will never be found again in any public library.
What about art and sculpture? None of those seeking to censure a benign theatrical production had better set foot in the National Gallery of Art, or any art museum—there’s shocking stuff around every corner.
A policy of censure with the fine arts and literature sets in motion a serious precedent proven to be ineffective time and again. Such narrow-minded standards will find no end. By the time rational thinkers can resume sanity, all books will have been destroyed, the theaters burned to the ground (there goes The Globe again) and all the arts, shunned and banned. What kind of world will we be living in?
Again, and I say again, I am so glad I escaped the cuckoo’s nest many decades ago. Good luck to my friend in his attempt to restore level-headed thinking.
Leeanna Xanthos McQueen
Via the Internet
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