Will Ragtime be performed in Cherry Hill? Decision soon
The Cherry Hill school district will announce soon its decision on whether the spring musical Ragtime will be performed and whether it will contain the N-word.
Cherry Hill school officials are expected to announce next week whether the Broadway musical Ragtime will be performed with the N-word.
Camden County NAACP vice president Carey L. Savage was among more than a dozen community and school leaders who met with Superintendent Joseph Meloche on Thursday afternoon to discuss the upcoming production at Cherry Hill High School East.
Meloche told the group that a decision was expected Tuesday on whether the show will go on, according to Savage. The school chief gave no indication whether he would rescind his decision announced last week banning the use of the N-word, Savage said.
"We have to wait and see," said Emma Waring, president of the Cherry Hill African American Civic Association, who also attended the meeting.
Because of copyright and licensing laws, it appears that the South Jersey school district has only two viable options: allow students to perform the script as written with the racial slur or choose another play. Ragtime is scheduled to open March 10.
The New York-based Music Theatre International, the leading theatrical license agency, said Wednesday that it would not approve any changes to the script. "Anyone who wants to do Ragtime has to do it as written," president Drew Cohen said.
The controversy has brought national attention from Broadway stars, people affiliated with the arts, and civic groups. The mother of a black student at Cherry Hill East, one of two high schools in the district, objected to the N-word and filed a complaint with the NAACP.
More than 100 people attended a school board meeting Tuesday where appeals were made by both sides. At the meeting, Meloche said giving voice to the N-word "continues to breathe life into it."
Meloche could not be reached for comment Thursday. A district spokeswoman confirmed that Meloche met with "stakeholders" but declined further comment.
Ragtime depicts the fictional story of a black family, a Jewish immigrant family, and an Eastern European family in New Rochelle, N.Y., at the turn of the century. It includes themes of racism, intolerance, and injustice. The N-word is uttered several times by a white character.
Last week, Meloche proposed substituting another word for the racial slur, or eliminating it along with other derogatory words for other ethnic groups. That prompted a backlash from theater groups and students in the play, who launched an online petition.
In a statement, the National Coalition Against Censorship, the Dramatists Guild, and the Arts Integrity Initiative at the New School for Drama argued that including the N-word "reflects a historical reality and its inclusion will help to educate students about the ugly reality of racism."
The NAACP argued in part that artistic rights should not outweigh the civil rights of black students and the community who find the racial slur offensive. "My position is that they should not put it on," Savage said Thursday after the meeting.
Cherry Hill was embroiled in another controversy about race in 1996 when black parents complained about the use of the novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, which uses the N-word more than 200 times. The district pulled the Mark Twain classic from the curriculum.
The school board later voted to reintroduce the book as an option, but incorporated the novel into a new unit on slavery, stereotypes, and racism. That approach won academic acclaim and was included in a PBS documentary as a model for educators.