Omss-Culture: Culturebox: The Scottsboro Boys



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curtain call The Scottsboro Boys Is the most ambitious new musical of the Broadway season racist? By Jason Zinoman Posted Monday, Nov. 29, 2010, at 4:11 PM ET Is the most ambitious new musical of the Broadway season racist? You could get that impression from reading the press coverage of The Scottsboro Boys, a wildly entertaining coda to the rich collaboration between composer John Kander and the late lyricist Fred Ebb, the duo that produced sly crowd-pleasers like Chicago and Cabaret. The provocative new show employs blackface and minstrel-show tropes to tell the tragic story of the 1930s rape trial of nine innocent African-Americans, and many critics have worried over the tension between the show's toe-tapping style and its grave subject. The Freedom Party, an activist group, was more explicit, calling the musical racist in a press release and protesting the Lyceum Theater, creating a minor media circus. Ticket-buyers have also struggled with the dramatization of pernicious stereotypes of black men, judging by the muffled, anxious laughter on both nights I attended. To continue reading, click here. Jason Zinoman writes about theater for the New York Times. His book Shock Value: How a Few Eccentric Outsiders Gave Us Nightmares, Conquered Hollywood, and Invented Modern Horror will be published in July. He lives in Brooklyn, N.Y. Join the Fray: our reader discussion forum What did you think of this article? POST A MESSAGE \| READ MESSAGES Also In Slate Obama Is Expected To Respond to Every Emergency, Instantly. Maybe He Shouldn't. What Happened to All That Republican In-Fighting the Tea Party Was Supposed To Cause? I Took a Vacation to Iraq. I Don't Recommend It.	Advertisement
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Now playing: *Slate V, a video-only site from the world's leading online magazine. Visit Slate V* at www.slatev.com.
curtain call The Scottsboro Boys Is the most ambitious new musical of the Broadway season racist? By Jason Zinoman Posted Monday, Nov. 29, 2010, at 4:11 PM ET Is the most ambitious new musical of the Broadway season racist? You could get that impression from reading the press coverage of The Scottsboro Boys, a wildly entertaining coda to the rich collaboration between composer John Kander and the late lyricist Fred Ebb, the duo that produced sly crowd-pleasers like Chicago and Cabaret. The provocative new show employs blackface and minstrel-show tropes to tell the tragic story of the 1930s rape trial of nine innocent African-Americans, and many critics have worried over the tension between the show's toe-tapping style and its grave subject. The Freedom Party, an activist group, was more explicit, calling the musical racist in a press release and protesting the Lyceum Theater, creating a minor media circus. Ticket-buyers have also struggled with the dramatization of pernicious stereotypes of black men, judging by the muffled, anxious laughter on both nights I attended. To continue reading, click here. Jason Zinoman writes about theater for the New York Times. His book Shock Value: How a Few Eccentric Outsiders Gave Us Nightmares, Conquered Hollywood, and Invented Modern Horror will be published in July. He lives in Brooklyn, N.Y. Join the Fray: our reader discussion forum What did you think of this article? POST A MESSAGE \| READ MESSAGES Also In Slate Obama Is Expected To Respond to Every Emergency, Instantly. Maybe He Shouldn't. What Happened to All That Republican In-Fighting the Tea Party Was Supposed To Cause? I Took a Vacation to Iraq. I Don't Recommend It.	Advertisement
Manage your newsletters on Slate Unsubscribe \| Newsletter Center \| Advertising Information Please do not reply to this message since this is an unmonitored e-mail address. If you have questions about newsletters, please go here.
Ideas on how to make something better? Send an e-mail to newsletters@slate.com. Copyright 2010 Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive Co. LLC \| Privacy Policy Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive \| c/o E-mail Customer Care \| 1150 15th Street NW \| Washington, D.C. 20071

Culturebox: The Scottsboro Boys

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