Turlock High adults stumble badly in deciding the show must not go on

Turlock High School administrators have provided a really good example of how to botch oversight of a spring play.

Pulling the plug after opening night — and canceling three remaining shows — is a gutless, knee-jerk reaction to complaints about mature content in “Be More Chill.”

It suggests an inexcusable lack of interest in screening when the Broadway-performed musical theater piece was chosen months ago. It suggests an unnerving lack of attention paid during the ensuing weeks of rehearsal, costume design, set construction, promotions and everything else that goes into a production like this.

It suggests a disturbing preference to placating a few prudes at the expense of dedicated teens. When is it good policy to heap shame on students rather than accolades for their hard work?

By bungling this entire episode, Turlock High administrators managed to embarrass themselves, not student actors.

To anyone who has spent any time on a high school campus — or those who can summon the energy to remember what it was like when they were teenagers — it’s a puzzler why some would complain. Do they think watching a play with some cussing and mentions of sex could be the audience’s first exposure? Or that hearing and seeing such material will corrupt those watching? And that erasing the show will somehow protect them from the world’s evil?

Does it matter at all that the central message in “Be More Chill” is being true to oneself rather than seeking popularity?

Did these same people complain when “Grease,” which contains umpteen references to sex — and songs about sex — appeared in how many local high schools over how many decades? Including Turlock High, in 2005, believe it or not.

Of course, things can go too far. That’s why sharp-thinking schools have competent adults vet scripts before they’re chosen. If one is deemed too edgy, you simply discard it and move to the next before you hold auditions and start work on everything else.

If you’re unwilling to put in the time and effort to screen content before the ball starts rolling, fairness dictates that you at least have the students’ backs if someone starts whining. If students set goals and work hard to achieve them, they deserve your support — and your loyalty.

Shame on Turlock High adults

If you cave after a single performance, as Turlock High did, you deserve to be pummeled by critics — including the musical’s dumbfounded playwright. Joe Iconis, who created “Be More Chill,” understandably scoffed at the news in a Modesto Bee report, tweeting that the cancellation is “absolutely horrifying” and “disturbing.”

He’s right.

How many student athletes missed games, and perhaps scholarship opportunities, during COVID-19? How many scholars had no academic decathlons to sharpen skills in the pandemic? How many kids endured mental and emotional trauma from isolation and remote, substandard instruction? Have they not suffered enough, without yanking the rug out from under them after the bright lights came on and the curtain went up just once?

With the pandemic’s sting still smarting, it’s a particularly bad time to waste weeks of hard work and preparation just because someone wasn’t paying attention.

Theater is supposed to get you thinking and talking. That’s part of the allure of the performing arts. It sounds like the students involved in “Be More Chill” were succeeding.

When adults fail to do their job, it’s doubly disgraceful to punish kids for doing theirs.

This story was originally published April 11, 2022 at 11:30 AM with the headline "Turlock High adults stumble badly in deciding the show must not go on."