On The Censorship of Rachel Corrie

Andy Horwitz

We just got an interesting and thought-provoking email essay from Caridad Svich. Caridad is a resident playwright at New Dramatists, a contributing editor at TheatreForum, an editorial board member of Contemporary Theatre Review and the founder of NoPassport, a pan-American theatre & performance collective. Her essay is presented below, unedited, with her permission.

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“On The Censorship of Rachel Corrie” by Caridad Svich

My Name is Rachel Corrie is an affecting, thoughtful, personal and highly considerate play about one woman’s journey through activism. It is a play of contradictions, confusion, and the high price paid for sticking to your beliefs. On Feb 28, 2006, the Arts section reported on New York Theatre Workshop’s postponement of possible production of My Name is Rachel Corrie this March. NYTW is a theatre that has supported and championed extraordinary artists from abroad and here at home to do consistently challenging, sometimes radical artistic work. It is a company that has stood apart even through tough financial times by its commitment to daring work. At a time when a climate of fear is insidiously embedded in our culture, it is deeply troubling to witness one of NYC’s most adventurous and progressive theatres succumbing in some small part to this culture through the postponement of a play that examines the Palestinian side through Anglo eyes. Censorship and self-censorship has become embedded for some time in US discourse theatrical and not. It is increasingly of vital concern to address and re-dress the issue of censorship as to the wider interrelated effects of funding, access (allowed and disallowed), and the sleeping channels at the helm of many of the wheels of semi-commerce in our midst (good intentions or not).

What artists can do is make through their art work that stands apart and against what is allowed in a state of fear. If we can learn anything from our sister countries who undergo more overt arts censorship, it is that the fight to resist is an urgent one, and one that occurs even at the risk of death. Reinforcing a language of terror or one that bows to terror in its many insidious and co-opted forms (including not letting certain voices to be heard for fear of offending certain members of the audience) reinforces a weak culture. One of art’s jobs is to look at society’s ills and try to offer a diagnosis at the very least of where we are and why. At best, art goes further than a diagnostic and actually offers the possibility of transformation. At a time when privacy is being stolen from us and our public space is being sold to the highest bidder, does it not behoove our arts presenters to stand up for the multi-valent voice of the artist, and a text that simply, honestly and with compassion presents another view? Even at the risk of potential offense?

As artists and arts presenters, we have a stake in the future, and the society our children live in and their children will live in. If we teach our fellow citizens and future leaders that it is best to suppress a voice from the stage because it may appear as if we are taking a position by presenting it, then we are not only underestimating our audiences – our public – and their ability to glean from a work of art its shared humanity, but we are abandoning (or certainly putting on dangerous hold) our essential moral responsibility as citizens and artists to tell stories and allow stories to be told, even if they hurt.

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6 responses to “On The Censorship of Rachel Corrie”

  1. P Hamilton

    I don’t think this is purely a censorship issue – the play has not been censored in the pure sense of that word, it is not banned, it is simply not going to be done right now by one small, fearful, NY theater group. It is also not a self-censorship issue unless those who supported its creation decide to withdraw it or weaken it from fear or frustration. That has not happened thankfully.

    I believe in free speech and absolutely do not care for bullying tactics or threats of violence. Threats always provoke resistance. However, I do think it’s wise, not just to pick ones battles carefully, but to consider the most effective method of pursuing said battle. Much as we would like to think that art can be kept separate from politics, in this case, because of the subject matter and current events, to ignore the possible reactions of those with an axe to grind would be shortsighted. I’m not suggesting surrender … but a strategic retreat often leads to victory.

    The NY group backing out is a minor setback. This play will continue (it’s already booked for a new and bigger run in London). This play will also be performed in North America eventually. I have no doubt. The important thing is to fight the battle wisely: to avoid volatile rhetoric and name calling which really can’t do any good.

    This play is not the first work of art to have faced resistance, nor will it be the last. The New York Theater Workshop’s decision is not unique but neither is it universal. The point is that we keep trying to evolve, that we keep trying to understand, that we keep trying to tolerate .. that we keep trying period. Let the play speak for itself. Let it’s growing audience have the final word.

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  2. Heather Hayes

    People can fight official censorship.

    Self-censorship, however, has no solution, and is much more of a threat. Society needs art to force it into introspection. Once artists put financial or other interests above artistic concerns, we all start down a slippery slope. The point is not THIS play, and whether or not it has a bigger, better, run at a flashier theatre elsewhere. Rather, it is that this theatre let itself be intimidated, or has taken a cowardly attitude to begin with.

    Since when is art separate from politics? I never noticed.

    Heather Hayes

    Reply
  3. Miki

    Hi-

    I read the above article and the above comments about it, and felt the need to respond also. Despite my disapproval of the Israeli occupation of West Bank, Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem, I would probably not go to see “My Name is Rachel Corrie” for a number of reasons. However, I believe that it’s wrong to cancel the opening of the play, because that is clearly a muzzing of free speech right then and there. In fact, when I read/heard about it, I was reminded of the cancellation of a stage production of the beautiful musical, West Side Story, at Amherst Regional High School, in Amherst, MA several years ago. The production got pulled exactly ONE WEEK prior to its formal rendezvous. A petition, which argued that West Side Story presented a negative stereotype of Puerto Ricans, signed by some one hundred and fifty people circulated around the school, and, under duress and pressure, school officials finally caved in and pulled the WSS production, which was never rescheduled. The truth is, however, that the people who signed the above-mentioned petition were NOT representative of the entire Hispanic community in the Amherst area, or the Hispanic community, PERIOD. In fact, the Latino community in the Amherst area was very divided on this issue. The town of Amherst, MA, which is supposedly a liberal and progressive town, certainly gave itself a PAIR of big, black eyes over that one!! Having said all of the above, I believe that the reasons for cancelation of the opening of the play “My Name is Rachel Corrie” and cancellation of the school production of West Side Story are very much one and the same: fear of controversy and discussion which has pervaded this culture for some time and has been made worse by the Bush Administration. It is unfortunate to see theatres and/or school officials or whoever caving into this kind of fear.

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  4. IvanB

    The feelings and reactions stated above are commendable. However, I do not think it is a question of censorship. It is a question of fear. I believe it is excusable for NYTW to postpone a production whether their reason be the safety of its employees and audience or the fiscal survival of the theater itself. What is not excusable is our culture’s inability to objectively admit in any kind of artistic discourse that it is ignorant or terrified of the unknown. For example, is it possible to talk about this production without considering recent events in Palestine? I find it odd that nobody mention the rise of Hamas, the evacuation of the West Bank or the current health of Ariel Sharon. Should not these issues effect what a theater chooses to produce?

    There have been a great many cancellations of productions and tours the sort Miki sighted in her response. Like, “Rachel Corrie,” these are symptoms of our neglect, both political and pedagogical. So how do we make art as vital an issue as prayer in school? How do we deepen our understanding of theology and global politics when we are living under the mythological separation of Church and State? We don’t even understand our own class structure so how are we supposed to comment on somebody else’s? We have to set our sites on the sickness rather than the sick, if that is not too bold a statement to make.

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  5. Miki

    Hi, Ivan:

    While a certain amount of apprehension is understandable, and I’m not arguing that the rise of Hamas and Ariel Sharon’s recent illness has had intense affects on the ever-volatile climate in the Mideast, I DO believe that, although there’s an equal amount of blame on all sides, the Israeli withdrawal of their troops AND the settlers/settlements from the Occupied Territories is long, long overdue. Nonetheless, I stand by my position that NY Theatre Workshop’s cancelling the production of the play “My Name is Rachel Corrie” is wrong. I believe that the play should’ve gone on, and, if there’s some concern about possible safety of employees/audience, then perhaps the theatre could’ve beefed up security for a bit, or at least until things calmed down. As for financial survival, I’m sure “My Name is Rachel Corrie” would’ve been quite popular in NY and elsewhere here in the USA.

    Reply
  6. Sandra

    It seems to me that few commentators can bring themselves to say what is really going on here.

    First, the NYT reported about “local Jewish leaders” who had “an unease about the play’s message”. They remain faceless – the only attribute was they are Jewish.

    Second: While these “leaders may be Jewish, that is not relevant. Not all Jewish people oppose this play.
    These “leaders” have an attribute in common much more relevant to their repressive tactic than being Jewish. Their conduct here reveals them as “Leaders of groups motivated to oppose informed introspection by the American public about exactly what the US and Israel together are doing to the Palestinians”.
    Their unique and binding trait is their objective to obstruct informed awareness about something so grievously momentous as our nation’s role in the physical destruction of a people and their society – as evident from Rachel Corrie’s narrative.

    Third: The “green light” fact is that the oppression and suffering of the Palestinian people reflected in Rachel Corrie’s narrative is a joint venture by both Israel and the United States. Israel is the violent occupier, the trigger-man and land-confiscator, the United States officially is its facilitator in the international community and political-financial proponent on the home front. This is a unique historical horror deserving of portrayal in the world of art: a joint venture by two rich high-tech military powers thousands of miles apart, to crush and plunder a defenseless and helpless agricultural society.

    Fourth: Rachel Corrie’s narrative is among the recent conscience-raising messages to the US public about the reality of this co-sponsored horror. Others include the films “Palestine Now” and “Munich” – which have likewise met with fierce efforts to suppress their rightful stirring of American moral consciousness.

    Fifth: This instance of repression is but one of many – all of which have one thing in common – to prevent that high level of awareness in the American public necessary to public argument about our nation’s instrumental role in Palestinian suffering. The horrors Rachel Corrie witnessed and struggled against should be an expressive theme free of fear of vengeful financial reprisal or even physical attack by those who don’t want Americans to be touched by the inhumanities Rachel Corrie witnessed, and died as a truly brave American heroine to prevent.

    Reply

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