Thinking About Theatre – 1

I grew up taking in vast amounts of banal, foolish, and sometimes unwholesome television and movies. My church during some of that time was one of those that placed a prohibition on attending a place that projected the movie on a screen, but had no problem if such a movie were viewed on a VCR a few years later. I heard a few exhortations on discernment regarding the content of movies and television programmes, but no one ever exhorted me to consider the actual medium of television, to say nothing of the medium of drama itself. No Christian I met in the first 20 years of my Christian life made me think about the medium of enacted drama itself, and the questions related to the form of drama. Questions such as, What if the problem with the Jesus film was not the content of the film,  but the whole notion of acting out the life of Jesus in front of a camera? What if the problem with film is not just immorality and swearing contained therein, but the manipulation of an audience’s emotions, creating phoney substitutes for Christian affections? In other words, what if the real danger of film is not merely what it portrays, but what it does? What if the real problem with drama is contained in what it actually is, not merely in what it says?

Like most, my view was simply that a Christian should be discerning regarding the content of filmed stories, not wary of the form itself. And to be clear, I don’t object to visual media. No conservative I know of sees a problem in watching a documentary, or a sports contest, or a political debate, or a symphony, or other such things on a screen, small or big. If objections exist to those, they would probably have to do with the content of such things, or perhaps the propriety of using one’s time to view them. The argument I’m considering has to do with the wisdom and morality of dramatising a story, whether live or filmed, whether fictional or true.

My first exposure to anything like a consideration of these matters was probably A.W. Tozer, with his essay, The Menace of the Religious Movie. Tozer got me thinking about what it is that actors actually do. I would later read Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves To Death, and consider how visual media is affecting our intellectual maturity as a society. I recall some things written by John Piper about television that went beyond the usual warnings against profanity, violence, blasphemy and nudity. By that point, I was thinking not merely about what movies and television say, but also what they do.

I’d later read some of the meatier works like Richard Weaver’s chapter “The Great Stereopticon” in Ideas Have Consequences. I read Blaise Pascal’s view of theatre in Pensees. I read small portions of people like Tertullian, Lactantius, Cyprian, Novatian, and Augustine. I read Aristotle’s Poetics.  I read some of William Law’s views, along with some of Spurgeon’s. I followed the conversation on these matters over at remonstrans.net. Kevin Bauder did a series on the Christian and Theatre in his In the Nick of Time.

At the same time, there are important works I haven’t read. Nietchze, Hegel, Hume, Wilberforce are just a few of the names who’ve written on the topic, whom I haven’t read. I’m far from having a comprehensive grasp of the subject.

However, within the reading I did complete, I was being confronted for the first time with more than just the issue of the content of enacted drama, but a consideration of the medium of enacted drama itself. It was reminiscent of my first exposure to arguments that considered the language of music itself, not merely the lyrics that sometimes accompany it. For most people, this is breaking new ground altogether.

However, lest I be accused of being disingenuous, or worse, hypocritical, I should make my current views clear. My position towards enacted drama is currently somewhere between guarded suspicion and overt scepticism. On most days, it’s moving more towards the latter. I can’t claim that my views or practices are entirely settled. It’s not as if I’ve had a big DVD-bonfire. It’s tough leaving your culture.

At the same time, I recognise that not all conservatives agree on this matter. Roger Scruton would be a contemporary example of someone who does not object to the dramatic form itself; he calls for an aesthetically responsible use of it. Others, and their number seems to be very few, object to the form of enacted drama itself, regardless of the content. It’s a minority view, and will no doubt stay that way unless a massive solar flare in the next few years destroys all electronic equipment on Earth. A day with unexpected blessings, no doubt.

It wasn’t always a minority view, though. That’s what’s disturbing about our current confidence that enacted story is harmless. Most Christians throughout church history, from the Patristics to the Puritans, have stated some sort of objection to theatre. Very often, they write as if every other Christian has inherited the same objections. That’s what unnerves me. Why did the Christian culture of nearly two thousand years exist with a sometimes unarticulated and assumed objection to theatre, while our generation hardly even raises the question? I often want to dismiss objections to the form of theatre as silly and off-the-wall. But to do so, I’d have to dismiss a parade of ancient and not-so-ancient pastors, reformers, martyrs and philosophers. Not the kind of group you chuckle at while munching another handful of popcorn.

This series will lay out some of what I have read on the matter, for your consideration. This will be attempt to trace the argument against enacted drama as a medium, while attempting to suspend judgement on that view, for the most part, so that you can at least consider it. I may not convince anyone – I don’t actually aim to. I’ll probably only solidify some of my own views (and I hope those who are better read on this matter will interact with me and help me do so). I do hope it will advance the discussion beyond checking how much R-rated content each film has.