Third through eighth grade students at Santa Rosa Charter School for the Arts are putting on a play about bullying for the school and wider community this week and next, but the show is not without controversy.
One segment of the many vignettes in the production that students have been developing since November dealt with a portrayal of a student who was being bullied for being gay. The piece used the word “faggot.”
“The story is about a child being bullied about being a homosexual and there is some intense language and it’s just an intense piece,” said Principal Anna Guzman who made the decision Tuesday to pull the vignette from the show’s opening performance on campus Thursday.
At least one parent called me to say the omission of the piece sends to wrong message to the 13 third through eighth graders involved in the program.
The message is tolerance, said parent Jennifer Stark. The scene that was pulled from the production was about being bullied for being different, not about being homosexual, she said.
The production runs taped interviews of prominent people talking about bullying intermixed with students portraying those relationships.
Superintendent Sharon Liddell backed Guzman’s decision Thursday and said parents are welcome to see the piece in a version of the production being staged for the public next weekend.
Guzman’s viewing of the piece on Tuesday and decision that parents should be given a heads up about the play’s content did not give the school enough time to send out and collect permission slips, so the segment was pulled, Liddell said.
“Anna found out about this late Tuesday in the evening,” Liddell said. “She did not have enough turn around time” to distribute permission slips.
“It simply gives parents an option to make a choice for their own kids,” she said.
Guzman was given the opportunity to see the segment by Walking Elephant Theatre Co. founder Brian Bryson Tuesday.
“Anna knew what was going to be in the play but didn’t know the extent that some of the things might be played out,” Liddell said. “(Bryson) came to the conclusion that there might be some controversy over it because he wanted to show it to her.”
Bryson did not return a call and email seeking comment.
The production is an enrichment course held after school, Guzman said.
No parents objected to the material while it was being developed and rehearsed, according to Liddell.
The show is open to the public and will be staged at Santa Rosa Charter School for the Arts, 756 Humboldt Avenue at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 19 and at the Glaser Center, 547 Mendocino Avenue on March 25 and 26.
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