UK Theatre Criticized For "Sound Of Music" Content Warning

https://www.onstageblog.com/editorials/2023/7/8/uk-theatre-mocked-for-patronizing-content-warning-for-the-sound-of-music?fbclid=IwAR2cW8hquZLZMgJE94WF4EBov1NOLUB78sFDDcLpOdsB24SBUMz1dZtOhKQ

You never know what will or won't set people off. I had a similar experience at the workshop of my newest musical. It's set in the late forties/early fifties, and one of the characters is an heiress and industrialist who gradually is revealed to be a full-out fascist with secret police and all. The hero tells her off, saying "you're nothing but Hitler in heels." At which point, she completely drops her innocuous mask and smirks, saying "darling, is that such a terrible thing to be?"

After the show, one of the producers who had come to evaluate the material only had one note for me. "You have to cut the Hitler line. He's taboo. You can't talk about him, you can't joke about him. That one line completely disengaged me from the show." They had no other comments on the material, because the dismissive/flippant reference to the dictator had soured the entire evening for them.

There is something very wrong with anyone who is "triggered" by seeing Nazis in The Sound of Music. Not because we should like Nazis or something, but it's an extreme, infantile reaction to an image. And yes, I'm judging the the theater for believing there are such people, and any such people as exist. We're not talking vivid depictions of abuse and dehumanization in this work.

If the warning applies to you, great.

If it doesn’t, it doesn’t affect you in any way.

The content warning maybe a minor thing, but that argument works both ways. Why is it needed in the first place? I genuinely question how some people go about their daily lives sometimes.

If the generations actually impacted by the nazi regime managed to get through numerous war movies and shows, then it really shouldn't be an issue for modern generations. If anything they need to see it, a 20 something said on a TV interview a while back how unimportant ww2 was these days.

You will never ever be able to not upset someone. Everyone has their own triggers, and things they find offensive. I know myself they can be incredibly random and inconsistent.

I saw a crime programme with a content warning 'may contain scenes of crime scenes'. I mean, sometimes common sense should be applied.

Also, by brushing under the carpet certain aspects of life and history then you just end up with sanitised works (like it looks like the new Miss Saigon in the UK may be) or worse, eradicating and forgetting things that have happened in the past. No matter how uncomfortable they may be.

There are sites that tell you whether a piece of media contains sex, or queerness, or animal cruelty, or any number of things that apply to people across any number of religious, social, or political spectrums. Clearly there are many people who want to know what is in something before they see it, for whatever reason. You don’t have to think their reasons are legitimate, but their legitimacy is not yours to assess. You’re free to walk on by. C’est la vie.

I would rather have a content warning so sensitive folks can avoid it than have the media itself censored, bowdlerized, or altered.

Impeach2017 said: "joevitus said: "There is something very wrong with anyone who is "triggered" by seeing Nazis in The Sound of Music. Not because we should like Nazis or something, but it's an extreme, infantile reaction to an image. And yes, I'm judging the the theater for believing there are such people, and any such people as exist. We're not talking vivid depictions of abuse and dehumanization in this work."

my my people are so up in arms about the Nazis being picked on here."

Actually no one is. But "Nazis being picked on" (great) has zero to do with being triggered by seeing someone in a Nazi uniform in the second half of the second act of The Sound of Music.

You'd be amazed how many people rock up to the theatre (or cinema etc.) with absolutely no clue what they're about to see. Also, just because it's a classic, every performance will be someone's introduction to the material.

2022 Sound of Music at Paper Mill Playhouse did this too with their content warning. They said this production contains Na** paraphernalia

Updated On: 7/9/23 at 10:05 PM

The fact that theatre has existed forever without having to do this should speak volumes. Its pandering to the very very few but vocal voices on social media who get triggered by anything that could make them feel.....anything.

People do walk into the stage version and have no idea that it has a different script to the film, with a different tone, and has those two 'nasty' little satirical songs in, and seeing real people dressed up as stormtroopers and saluting Hitler has a VERY different effect in person than on a grainy film. The Palladium/ALW show for instance turns the entire auditorium into a Nazi rally with swastikas dropping down from the ceiling and the audience held at gunpoint.
Of course there needs to be a warning, it can be forgotten that it's about evil Nazis.

Oh please. Do they post these warnings before performances of Cabaret? This is beyond silly. To my knowledge, no actual Holocaust survivor has ever been triggered by a stage performance of The Sound of Music (and the Nazis actually have more, not less, menace in the film, so the whole "it's more powerful in the stage version" argument doesn't work), so I have no tolerance or empathy for some hypersensitive millennial going to pieces over it.

As Charley Kringas noted, they literally do this for all of their shows, the label it as a potential spoiler and there isn't anything noted as a 'trigger warning' or 'content warning.'

This seems like the dumbest thing to let raise your blood pressure. Come on now.