Controversy Breeds Controversy as
My Name Is Rachel Corrie
May See NY Stage

From Playbill:

The London play, My Name Is Rachel Corrie, penned by actor Alan Rickman and journalist Katherine Viner, about the death of an American protestor killed in the Gaza Strip, may now see the New York stage, according to The New York Times.

Amid dueling press statements between London's Royal Court Theater and the New York Theatre Workshop — where a planned Off-Broadway run of the work was scheduled then postponed — the UK-based company has fielded offers from other stateside producers interested in transferring the work.

And

"We always try to minimize the distractions around the production so our constituency can hear the artist's voice. This takes a great deal of planning and listening to accomplish. In the less than two months we had to mount the proposed production of the Royal Court's My Name Is Rachel Corrie, we found that there was a strong possibility that a number of factions, on all sides of a political conflict, could use the production as a platform for their own agendas. We were not confident that we had the time to create an environment where the art could be heard independent of the political issues associated with it."

Click here for the rest.

On the surface, this whole controversy makes very little sense.

Rachel Corrie was a young American activist protesting Israeli brutalities against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip: in 2003 she was standing in front of a Palestinian home to prevent if from being demolished by the IDF; the Israeli soldier operating the bulldozer ran her over and killed her. My bet is that it was an intentional act of murder, but, of course, Israel's government calls it an accident. Anyway, good old Alan Rickman, a.k.a. Severus Snape from the Harry Potter movies, wrote, produced, and directed a one-person show about her life, based on her diaries and letters.

It did well in London and was about to open in New York, but was abruptly cancelled for vague and mysterious reasons--the final paragraph from the excerpt above is one of the various explanations offered by the artistic director of the theater that was going to perform it. Another explanation offered had something to do with Israeli Prime Minister Sharon's recent stroke, and Hamas' gaining control of the Palestinian Authority, and how doing the show right now would be perceived as being in bad taste. Or something to that effect. (More on the controversy, as explained by Vanessa Redgrave in an interview by Democracy Now, here.) Anyway, it's obviously all bullshit. Clearly, something has happened behind the scenes that's intimidated the hell out of the New York Theatre Workshop. There are rumors, apparently, that the mayor's office had something to do with the cancellation, but we'll probably never know what the deal is.

But here's something I do know, which makes me speculate. The pro-Israel lobby in the United States is extraordinarily strong, stronger than the NRA, strong even when compared to the lobbying efforts of major corporations. Further, these organizations' strength isn't simply directed toward Congress: they're also bigtime into public relations activities, and have been fairly successful in muting criticism of Israel by branding it as anti-Semitism--obviously, Jews and the government of Israel, while related, are not at all the same thing, and criticizing a state is perfectly reasonable political and artistic speech, but that matters little to the pro-Israel lobby, which is as vicious and relentless as Karl Rove in smearing their opponents. Coincidentally, the pro-Israel lobby has a strong presence New York, with a lot of political influence and money at it's disposal. See where I'm going? I'm not saying they made this theater company "an offer they can't refuse" or anything like that. But if NYC's mayor really did intervene in the situation, it was either at the request of the pro-Israel lobby, or Bloomberg was simply trying to placate some potential political upheaval.

Anyway you look at it, this whole thing stinks. I understand political pressure and I understand how difficult it is to keep a theater company on its feet and functioning even without that pressure. But this company shouldn't have chickened out; they've failed in their mission as artitsts and dealt their own credibility a serious blow. After all, the political heat makes this show all the more significant. It means they're dealing with extraordinarily important issues. Instead of being inspired by the controversy, they backed down. What the hell kind of artists are these people?

Good thing there are other offers to produce it.

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