In the wake of Monday's massacre at Virginia Tech in which a student killed 32 people, Dean of Student Affairs Betty Trachtenberg has limited the use of stage weapons in theatrical productions.
Students involved in this weekend's production of "Red Noses" said they first learned of the new rules on Thursday morning, the same day the show was slated to open. They were subsequently forced to alter many of the scenes by swapping more realistic-looking stage swords for wooden ones, a change that many students said was neither a necessary nor a useful response to the tragedy at Virginia Tech....
Brandon Berger '10, who plays a swordsman in the show, said the switch to an obviously fake wooden sword has changed the nature of his part from an "evil, errant knight to a petulant child." ...
Do Yale students have a hard time telling theater from reality? Are they so emotionally fragile that they would be traumatized by seeing a realistic sword on stage?
Is the administration contemplating some weird scenario in which a cunning and patient mad killer-actor decides to kill people by substituting a real sword for the fake one (and would be stopped by this rule from bringing a real sword, or a real gun, in a bag)? Is it afraid that one of the actors will run off-stage waving a fake sword, and lead the police to shoot him for fear that it's a real sword? Or am I missing some other, less far-fetched, justification?
Thanks to Instapundit and Power Line for the pointer.
UPDATE: Commenter Nikki points out: "I wonder if Dean Trachtenberg realizes that elsewhere, the university encourages sword-wielding psychos to practice their craft." Let's make them use wooden swords, too.
Related Posts (on one page):
- Yale, realistic-looking stage weapons, and the prospects of zero tolerance policies:
- Yale Rescinds Ban on Realistic-Looking Stage Weapons:
- Zero Tolerance Comes to Campus:
- Yale Bans Realistic-Looking Onstage Swords:
Goodness gracious, no. But that’s not the reason. The reason is that the administration has a hard time telling theater from reality. So, you see, it’s perfectly justified.
Risk management decisions aren't just about the probability of bad things happening; the consequences of making the wrong decision are also a factor.
Yale's overreaction makes them look like overweening dolts. On the other hand, if they didn't do this and one of those "weird scenarios[s]" were to actually come true, they would come off looking much like VT's administration does now; that is, much, much worse than overweening dolts. Given the importance of a university's public image, it's no surprise that they chose a self-inflicted but minor PR hit over the remote odds of a catastrophic one (not to mention the liability risk on top of that).
What ultimately lies behind this sort of bizarre overreaction? Uncontrollable fear? An inability to cope with pressure of any sort? Simple stupidity?
Becky Trachtenberg clearly needs to take a class in Common Sense 101.
I gotta ask: I assume this Yale policy extends to the on-stage display of realistic, but properly marked, fake guns? and that drama students now are going to brandish bananas, or guns which ala Bugs and Elmer, extend a flag which reads "Bang!"?
I really like the light-saber idea. Why not Hamlet in Star Wars costume?
Maybe "Encounter-bats" (or whatever they called those foam-padded whackers that therapists used to encourage people to belabor each other about the head and torso with, as a means of expressing themselves)? Would make for a great Richard III: "Advance thy foamy
bat-thingy higher than my breast, or, by Saint Paul, I'll strike thee to my foot, And spurn upon thee, beggar, for thy boldness!"
Back in college campus security responded to a call of a gun in a building. Someone had left a realistic looking plastic gun that was a prop in a play out on their desk in the drama department. Campus security told them to put it away when not in use for a play and that was the end of it.
Compulsory diets low in carbs and protein would also go a long way to preventing murder by draining students of their muscle and energy. We wouldn't want them to be able to use body-weight exercises like pull-ups and push-ups to compensate for their of a gym. Dangerous muscles and what not.
As others have pointed out, wooden swords are potentially lethal weapons, too. I hope that such an obvious fact causes Yale to rescind their ridiculous ban rather than ban wooden swords as well.
In England they've gone over the top, as well, and are planning on banning Katanas, or "Samurai Swords." Antique swords from Japan will be exempted, of course, so that the law will not have an affect on rich people but the less expensive modern swords used by martial artists, historical re-enactors and other collectors will be banned.
That being said, there's a certain amount of joy in seeing the Yale theater department have to interact with the real world every once in awhile.
This doesn't appear to be a collective decision, so it seems to cut against your rule.
We didn't have a real stage then so the performance was done in the dining room of Stevenson College. I was one of several people who ran immediately for the kitchen to fill a bucket with ice to put the severed nose tip in.
The nose was sewn back on at the local emergency room.
Does the VT administration really look that bad, or are you talking about typical hindsight tunnel vision perception problems typically turned into "news." To clarify in anticipation - the VT murderer raised flags, but how many thousands of students similarly concern their teachers and authorities yet remain innocent of serious crime. Yale would not look bad if they failed to protect against bizarro scenarios which rarely come true in favor of treating their students like adults and granting the commensurate freedoms of adults in the real world.
First off, fencers are not sword-wielding psychos. They aren't real swords. I'll be the first to admit that there are a whole lot of Tolkein reading nerds among most fencing groups. But psycho might be a bit harsh. Granted their view of reality and actual reality only intersect rarely, but these people aren't dangerous...just imminently mock-worthy.
And foils and epees probably look less like the real thing than a wooden sword.
The administration's rationale is probably grounded in the idea that a popular culture that portrays violence is likely to encourage actual violence (but see, Japan) and that, as a matter of principle, Yale should lead by example by discouraging portrayal of realistic violence. Presumably, Trachtenberg also believes that the media and Hollywood should reduce depictions of violence. It is also worth noting that the YDN article said that Yale also bans realistic-looking but fake guns; this is obviously about making a statement rather than preventing violence.
Of course, this is a completely silly reasoning, and this kind of reasoning could be used much more convincingly to promote conservative ends. I don't see the Yale administration attempting to ban condoms, pornography or homosexual rallies on campus on the ground that a culture that emphasizes sex too much creates a culture where rapes are more frequent, even though this argument is at least a bit more reasonable than the "violent popular culture leads to actual violence" argument.
Interesting. I wonder how many actors and stagehands have been hurt by ordinary props and set pieces--or even just physical movement. I'm guessing a lot more than by stage swords.
Generally, stage combat with swords is planned to keep the path of the swords away from the faces of the combatants as an extra layer of safety. Accidents can and do happen in any kind of physical activity, but proper, professional stage combat choreography can make the combat scenes as safe as the rest of the play's blocking. However, a "fencing master," an instructor of sport fencing, is not in and of itself a qualification for stage combat any more than being a real assassin qualifies you to stage safe, pretend gun battles. Fencing and stage combat are overlapping but separate skill sets. Stage combat is about story telling, creating the illusion of violence in a way that advances the story. Sport fencing is about winning a game within the rules of that game.
As any student of military arts or of swordsmanship will tell you:
"The point beats the edge"
The only place that edged swords survived on the battlefield after the 1600's was in the Cavalry, where there is a different set of physics involved and edged swords are the preferred weapon. Next to pistols :)
Lee wasn't an artist -- he was a writer. Perhaps the costumes in the production you saw were designed by Jack Kirby, an artist who collaborated with Lee and who moved to southern California in the late 1960s?
I wouldn't be surprised. But it was advertised as a campus production with costumes by Stan Lee.
Betty Trachtenberg is on the Faculty Committee on Athletics. The reaccreditation web page lists Betty as the co-chair, and on Atheltics says
Looks like she forgot those little things.
I assumed you were kidding. But just for the record, I was defending those who engage in the sport of fencing. The "historical fencers?" They're all psychos....
Dean of Student Affairs Betty Trachtenberg has limited the use of stage weapons in theatrical productions.
The term 'weapons' covers a lot of territory.
This is the usual blogosphere tempest in a teapot. Is an exact quote of the Dean's directive available on the web?
Especially in the Dean’s office.
Er, what? Read the original article, please!
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“Red Noses” director Sarah Holdren ’08 said she first heard about the changes in a phone call from a friend as she arrived at the Off-Broadway Theater on Thursday morning. At the theater, technical director Jim Brewczynski told her about the new regulations. The pair then met with Trachtenberg, who initially wanted no stage weapons to be used in the show, Holdren said, though she later agreed to permit the use of obviously fake weapons.
In a speech made before last night’s opening show of “Red Noses,” Holdren said that Trachtenberg’s decision to force the production to use wooden swords instead of metal swords will do little to stem violence in the world.
“Calling for an end to violence onstage does not solve the world’s suffering: It merely sweeps it under the rug, turning theater — in the words of this very play — into ‘creamy bon-bons’ instead of ‘solid fare’ for a thinking, feeling audience,” she said. “Here at Yale, sensitivity and political correctness have become censorship in this time of vital need for serious artistic expression.”
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Yale school of drama (ANY department)vs. the rest of the planet?(bwa ha ha ha ha!)
modified Epee blades vs. anything EVER used for sport fencing?
ANY "Ye royal turky leg" venue weapons vs. the crap used in actual battle(exception for japanese swords, and pasta lances)
Any questions?
I evoke the names of ANYONE who's worked for B.H. Barrie
or ANY gunsmith at Center Firearms NYC.
You BET I worked in showbiz...
Also a Monk episode!
Well put. I'm actually on the board of a small non-profit called the International Order of the Sword and the Pen, and our mission is to train actors and directors in the field of staged combat. Fighting for actors is completely different from real historical fighting, as safely is the first concern, while historical accuracy and telling the story of the characters or the scene follows as a close second.
Part of our mission is to teach inner city school kids the difference between staged violence, which is fake, and the real stuff, using Shakespeare for examples. We show that real violence is a result of losing control, and it rarely if ever solves a dispute in a meaningful way.
Anyway, not only is this stupid to ban metal swords, it confuses the real lesson, which is that violence, as our literary masters teach us, solves nothing.
You'd be surprised how unnerved some people have become. Our local example is of a faculty member who left a box of discarded poetry near a trash can for recycling. An ROTC student reported that a man of Middle Eastern descent left a strange box in front of a building and drove away. He reported the incident to University Police (included the stuff about the guy who appeared to be of Middle Eastern descent), which called the Pennsylvania State Police, which brought the bomb squad. Unfortunately the student did not recognize the professor, who had an office in the same building as the ROTC Department.
It's strange how boxes of discarded poetry can suddenly become so threatening.
For further information you might want to see the following links:
www.cumberlink.com/articles/2007/04/21/shipp_news/news20.txt
http://www.kazimali.com/
Within a few weeks we hope things will return to normal!
Cheer up. At least someone thinks poetry CAN be threatening.
I still long for the days when new classical music or theater was taken so seriously, people would riot. (Ex. The premiers of Rite of Spring, and one of the Irish plays at the turn of the century...)