Tuesday, August 9, 2022

The Texas Church performs Hamilton saga

I posted this to my Facebook account with fear and trepidation for negative feedback I might receive.  I tried to be as non-controversial as possible:


I've been watching the "Texas church illegally performs Hamilton with an anti-LGBTQ message" thing unfold over the last few days, biting my nails the whole time. I have a few things to say and I'll probably wish I hadn't.
 
1. If your church is going to perform a musical, make it The Music Man, Oklahoma, My Fair Lady...or some other vanilla, non-confrontational thing that everyone loves and all the little old ladies would love to come to. This is actually a cool thing for churches to do.

2. If your church is going to branch out and try to get attention with a piece of hot theatre, take the time to use Google and see if it is available from any of the publishing houses that own the rights.

3. If said piece is not available, maybe stick with one that is. It will save you tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees in the long run.

4. If you still want to do the show illegally, do NOT livestream it to Youtube.

5. Remember why you chose the show. If you need to change dialog to make it fit the message you want to send, then it isn't the right show. Maybe you could write your own show or parody, which is totally legal. Having a character "get saved" as part of the show is really cringey, in my opinion.
 
6. If you are going to touch on hot button topics...don't do a show illegally and stream it to Youtube to do so.
 
And if you STILL insist on doing all this illegal stuff but don't want court and legal fees, and a fine, and the wrath of the ENTIRE theatre community on you:
 
7. Don't pick Hamilton.

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