Rights to A Chorus Line pulled after theatre removes black role from show

[morosco]

Posted: 8/3/23 at 6:19pm

https://www.onstageblog.com/editorials/2023/8/2/rights-to-a-chorus-line-pulled-after-theatre-removes-black-role-from-show

Updated On: 8/3/23 at 06:19 PM

[Dom P]

Posted: 8/3/23 at 6:53pm

They are blaming the cancelation on a hard working volunteer due to an unfortunate mistake. Might there have been something a little deeper going on?

[ACL2006]

Posted: 8/3/23 at 6:53pm

Did they not know Richie could be switched to a white actor? It's been done plenty of times before.

[everythingtaboo]

Posted: 8/3/23 at 8:45pm

While I think it's good that the blog brought this to light, did we really need 2/3 of the piece being him finger-wagging about what he would've done?

[dramamama611]

Posted: 8/3/23 at 8:45pm

I think we SHOULD hear about these things....there are too many theaters that think its perfectly all right to make changes, just because they want/need to. They never thing the rights holder will know.   

 

CAN Ritchie be played by a whit actor? With permission? (I'm not saying your wrong, just that I don't know that to be true.)

[ACL2006]

Posted: 8/3/23 at 11:23pm

Richie can be played by a white actor. it's happened countless times. The line "and I'm black" just gets removed. Even professional productions have used a white actor in the role. The equity tour back in 2009 had to use a white actor to cover the role as both Donald C. Shorter Jr. and Kevin Curtis were both out sick/injured.

[dramamama611]

Posted: 8/4/23 at 2:06am

Intetesting, tbanks for the info .

[Impeach2017]

Posted: 8/4/23 at 4:11am

 Instead of blaming the messenger, it would be interesting to find out more about the management and backers of this theater group.  Some very strange things have been happening with censorship and cancellation of minorities as of late around the country, so this shouldn't just be dismissed out of hand.

[Dom P]

Posted: 8/4/23 at 6:58am

Simply check the website or history of the area theaters in that community.  This appears to be a quite large community theater headquartered in a former vaudeville theater. Community theater or not, they have a certain responsibility to audiences and rights holders. The rights holders, Concord Theatricals, apparently found legal reason to pull back the rights.  I'd like to hear thier rational for removing the role of Richie. What happens to the characters storyline, songs ?

 

Just because it's community theater doesn't give them license to  be bad or do bad. I've seen some very good community theater. They also charge for thier tickets. So if people are paying to see "A Chorus line" ,they deserve to see "A Chorus Line", not "A chorus Line jr" or sans Richie.

 

[The Distinctive Baritone]

Posted: 8/4/23 at 9:33am

Dom P, I agree. I just don’t think that pulling the rights mere days before opening and throwing out the time and effort of all of the non-guilty parties is the solution in this kind of situation. And I find Peterson’s continued “how dare they!” online takedowns of amateur organizations to be punching down rather than up.

[Moderator]

Posted: 8/4/23 at 10:12am

Several posts were removed for violating our personal attacks rule. We welcome discussion on the situation as long as the conversation remains on topic - but kindly ask you refrain from making posts disparaging specific individuals. We appreciate your cooperation. 

[ggersten]

Posted: 8/4/23 at 10:33am

Dom P said: "I'd like to hear thier rational for removing the role of Richie. What happens to the characters storyline, songs ?"

Their rationale was they couldn't find anyone who was AA to play the role. The blog post suggests they didn't try very hard after the first round of auditions. According to the blog, a month before opening, the company was advertising it was looking for a Mark - but did not, at the same time, seek out people for Richie. 

It's not clear what they were going to do with the Richie parts.

 

[ACL2006]

Posted: 8/4/23 at 12:31pm

The script literally notes the alternatives for:

1. Non-African American Richie
2. Non-Asian Connie
3. Non-Hispanic Paul & Diana
4. Alternative if Judy isn't a tall, skinny redhead.

Makes me wonder if they didn't have the authorized script?

[dramamama611]

Posted: 8/4/23 at 1:36pm

If they didn't have an authorized script, they couldn't have the rights pulled, and would have rec'd a cease and desist order.

 

Perhaps, they felt they were doing a morally correct thing by not casting a traditionally black role with a white actor (regardless of what notes might say around permissions.)  Dont get me wrong, what they did violates their agreement, so their rights SHOULD have been pulled.