GAS CITY, Ind. (WXIN/WTTV) — After months of rehearsals and just two weeks before the show was set to premiere, Indiana school officials decided to cancel a high school performance of “Between the Lines,” a move best-selling author Jodi Picoult said is “the latest example” of encroachment on the freedom of expression.
Mississinewa High School Superintendent Jeremy Fewell said last week that the last-minute cancellation was due to content “not appropriate for a public school-sponsored performance.” He pointed to “sexual innuendos and alcohol references that I couldn’t, in good conscience, allow in a public school performance.”
The decision has drawn some national attention as the theater world takes note of the perceived censorship, while school administrators claim the play contains “inappropriate content.” Others, however, lambast the decision as “pearl clutching.”
“Between the Lines” — a young adult novel written by Picoult and her daughter, Samantha van Leer — follows a teenage girl, a “loner” who “loves books,” especially a certain fairy tale she has reread countless times. She ultimately learns the prince in the tale is alive and “wants her help escaping her literary existence.”
The show was set to premiere at Mississinewa High School starting next weekend.
Author speaks out
Picoult spoke out about the cancellation in an interview with Nexstar’s WXIN/WTTV.
She is a best-selling American author whose books — which include “My Sister’s Keeper,” “Mad Honey,” and “Small Great Things,” to name a few — have sold more than 40 million copies worldwide. She also isn’t a stranger to censorship. Last year, her novel “Nineteen Minutes,” a number one best seller about a school shooting in a small town, was the most banned book in the United States.
The author said she was in England when she heard about Mississinewa High School canceling the “Between the Lines” performance at nearly the last minute. She saw the superintendent’s claims of “inappropriate content.”
“There is absolutely nothing in ‘Between the Lines’ that a high school student has not seen on their phone every single day,” she said.
Worse, Picoult said the version of the play Mississinewa High School was set to perform was already a sanitized version.
“Which we offered as creators because we were well aware that some schools might be in climates that politically might not be as open as others, and we wanted to make sure that kids had the opportunity to hear the message in this story. So they already were performing a sanitized version of ‘Between the Lines,'” Picoult said.
With the “sanitized version” in hand, the school let the students rehearse and prepare for months until suddenly canceling it.
“Allegedly, the parent who complained was upset about a gay character, which is so interesting because it isn’t a gay character, it’s a non-binary character,” explained Picoult. “That character’s gender orientation, actually, with our own hands as writers, was edited out in the version that is licensed to schools so that it is never mentioned. So already there is some weird misunderstanding here.”
Nexstar’s WXIN/WTTV asked Fewell for clarification on whether the decision stemmed from a single parent’s complaint about a non-binary character existing within the original material the play is based on. Fewell has not responded to the inquiry.
In a statement, however, Fewell said the school is “implementing a more robust review process for proposed productions” moving forward to help prevent similar situations. He reiterated it was his decision to cancel the play, not any other member of the school’s staff or board.
“There is nothing wrong with a parent saying that their child should be allowed or not be allowed to read something or to perform in a show,” said Picoult. “There is a colossal problem when that parent makes a decision for everyone else’s children. And that is what we’re talking about. We are talking about a loss of freedom of expression, and we’re seeing it encroaching in many very dangerous ways in this country. And this is the latest example.”
Hope yet for a performance?
Despite Mississinewa High School canceling the performance, the students’ hard work may not all be wasted.
Picoult said she and her co-creators, along with the Educational Theatre Association, have reached out to the affected students to try and set up another location where the students’ performance of “Between the Lines” can take place.
“We are doing everything that we can to make sure that these kids get to have that moment on stage that they deserve,” she said.
And the message of this play that some have deemed inappropriate?
“The message of the play is to live the story you want if it’s not the story you’re in,” Picoult explained.
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