When I was a teenager, back in 2001-2002, I was rehearsing for a play called "Les Bouffons" at an acting summer camp.
It was an attempt to recreate a dark past of theater history, where the outcast of society; The hunchbacks, the deformed, the socially deviant, survived by making a living as fools in a circus, and made a mockery of "the beautiful people" who were allowed to stay within polite society.
**NOTE: To fully understand what the Bouffons were, and this story, you must read this article about the Bouffons.**
But if a clickbaity headline was made of it today, it would read: "non disabled actors made mockery of disabled, and marginalized people"
Ahead of her time.
Part way through rehearsals, the playhouse owner called a special meeting. She was very concerned about what was going on in this acting class, and brought the students and our teacher together. The director outlined what she felt was wrong with this play, and how this could be perceived as very offensive.
The teacher made his case for why this was not mocking disabled people. It was recreating a point in time, where the literal outcasts of society, who were not allowed to live in the cities, survived and made a living by acting like "fools" for the entertainment of "the beautiful people".... but in fact were mocking society, or "the beautiful people"... and they paid for the privilege. (It's rather complicated....if you havn't read the linked article, please do so now! )
It was also a chance for the students to explore their own selves, and what parts of them they felt made them an outcast.
While she was incredibly shocked at the optics of this situation, she did not use her authority to ban it. She had a conversation with all the kids and the teacher, then let the kids do a vote if we would continue with it or not.
We decided to continue.
The general consensus from all the students was that while the optics of this looked bad, we understood we were not making fun of people.
She came back and let us know how disappointed she was in our decision. But she let the show go on as she did not want to enforce any kind of censorship.
The Show Must Go On
I have memories of the teacher asking us to create a character that personified how we felt about ourselves. The smallest kid made himself smaller to play a dwarf, some self conscious of their looks made masks to hide their "deformed" face, and we all got into the role of being "outcasts" in some creepy form or another. The term "disabled" wasn't even used, or on our minds. It was "outcast", and finding a way to symbolize our own insecurities.
Which for a bunch of teenagers, being an outcast was probably not so hard to channel!
The play included us "outcasts" controlled by the circus ringmaster. He played the part of the narrator and storyteller, calling the audience the beautiful people, and contrasted them to us horrible people. The audience was encouraged to "play along" in the jeering and mockery, and there were insults thrown at us, and I think even things thrown at us.
We acted at time scared, and at others, proud of our deformities and like the Bouffons of the 16th century, found strength in the group.
By the end of the play, there was a song number where the Bouffons finally revealed that it was not us being mocked. It was us mocking the audience.
All in typical dramatic fade to black style. Probably with a line like "We are you" or something significantly cliched.
Could we do this in 2019?
"in 2019", if someone leaked a photo about what we did, everyone would share that headline: "Able bodied Students mock disabled people in summer camp play" And the outrage would be incredulous.
But that headline would only exist if you ignored what we were actually doing. It was obvious to us WHY we did what we did. And we determined that if some were offended by the play, that would be on them not understanding, and not us being offensive.
A case could be made that some might take it as literal mockery of the disabled/outcast, and would be used to perpetuate mockery of "the outcasts" of our society.
But a bunch of teenagers decided that this line of reasoning did not outweigh the benefits of exploring what the Bouffons were actually doing. We related to the characters as teenage actors that felt like outcasts ourselves. The teacher made clear that this was a darker past of acting, but by exploring that, we were able to learn more about ourselves.
There is a possibility that some didn't get it, and we were having fun pretending to have some ailment or socially distasteful lifestyle. But I feel that most of the students understood what was going on.
Our past did not haunt us
Until now, I didn't appreciate how serious that round table talk with the director was, and how lucky we were that she chose to not censor what she didn't understand.
I recall some of us not really understanding why this director was so offended by what we were doing. But I appreciate now more than ever that while she didn't understand why we students voted to continue with the play, she still let us do it.
I never paid much attention to this memory until just now, as the whole "2001 Trudeau Blackface" kerfuffle brought it back up. While Trudeau's situation made me think of my own memory, and both situations happened around 2001, I don't think the two situations are comparable directly in any way, and if you use this story for either attack or defense of our apologetic leader, I think you are missing the point.
I'm also not saying there is any context to his story like mine.
But this blackface situation did make me remember this part of my life. A quietly pivotal moment in my life, that if I had become a politician or public figure, could have been used against me. It makes me wonder what other situations do we lose the context of.
What happens in the past in the age of unlimited information, does not always stay in the past. And context is rarely respected, let alone even brought up.
How would I have reacted if a story were made of my past? Would I defend myself and explain this nuanced version of the story?
Or would I simply say I was wrong and I'm sorry because the pain of the mob's judgement is not worth trying to defend the truth?
What would be different had that play been cancelled?
