Monday, March 05, 2007
Fo academic freedom
The University of Minnesota is currently running The Pope and The Witch, a play that some consider anti-Catholic. When Catholics complained, President Robert Bruininks replied that there would be a panel to discuss the play ... but the panel had no Catholics. It opened to a half-full theater Friday, a day late (due to the weather) and with 70 seminarians singing hymns and praying outside in protest. But the PioneerPress's theater critic takes the prize for outrageousness today.
The play is an irreverent sprawl, sometimes nonsensical, frequently tangential and generally less ha-ha funny than things-look-weird-in-a-funhouse-mirror funny. Those who find it offensive will not be convinced otherwise, but watching "The Pope and the Witch" suggests a play less interested in sacrilege and more interested in comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable.What's that word again? 'Beclowned'?
Labels: higher education
