When tolerance is merely academic

Although
its subject is controversial and its characters’ responses are emotional,
Shipping Dock’s current, challenging production is thoughtful, rather low-key, and
pleasant. Rebecca Gilman’s Spinning Into Butter takes its central character, Sarah Daniels,
the dean of students at an elegant, Vermont liberal arts college, through
conflicts with both minority students who feel discriminated against and the
conservative faculty and deans who want to keep a lid on any campus
controversy.

            Hate mail is
showing up in an African-American student’s dorm room. The resulting windy,
one-sided faculty “forums” and a new, self-congratulating
organization of students for “tolerance” — the faculty-advised
version — just make things worse. Caught in the middle of the controversy,
Sarah is led to question her own hidden racism. Ultimately, the establishment
blocks any progress, the students who truly want to understand and communicate
with each other learn to avoid faculty involvement by meeting secretly, and
Sarah’s honesty is rewarded with dismissal. This scenario doesn’t sound like
much fun, but in Gilman’s witty and honest treatment, it plays out
entertainingly.

            Meanwhile, the
day after the play opened, Felicia R. Lee’sNew York Times article on Arab-Jewish
conflict on campuses reported the following: “Amid these tensions
on campuses, a group that includes leading academics… and students has
created a new organization they hope will dampen the ill will.” So this
play is not only topical but, perhaps, cynically relevant to simplistic efforts
to solve ancient conflicts.

            Observed sharply and revealingly,
the warring participants here are developed characters, not stereotypes or
walking points of view. Barbara Biddy’s relaxed direction brings out portrayals
that have depth and understanding. In other plays, Meg Devine has demonstrated
an ability to suggest vulnerability even in sharp-tongued characters. Her
self-tormented Sarah is a likable protagonist honest enough to expose her
genuine failings. She shows us how painfully Sarah flails about to try to
define what she understands, yet lets Sarah’s comments and attitudes ring true
against the others’ self-deluded, smug articulateness. It’s an involving
performance.

            Joe Tinkleman earns similar empathy
playing a bright student frustrated by Sarah’s efforts to help him because of
his ethnic background, rather than seeing him as he is or hearing what he is
trying to say. Sean Michael Smith manages surprising sympathy playing an art
history professor who was no more honest when he was briefly Sarah’s lover than
he is now as a cowardly “crusading liberal” who avoids confrontation.
Trish Ralph and Roger Gans are fun in their roles as more stereotypical
“establishment” types. They bring out some unexpected complexities
Gilman has given their characters. In a smaller role, Tim Goodwin [a City contributor] plays a self-serving,
ambitious student who organizes the “tolerance” group mostly because
doing so will look good on his law school application, but who learns that he
harbors genuine impulses to do good. And Ed Scutt is reassuringly solid as an
uncomplicated security guard who may be the one simply honest, decent person on
campus.

            I like John Jaeger’s simple set,
which suggests a real place. And the whole production has a nice sense of
reality. As for the title: One hate note called the young man “Little
Black Sambo” — if you know that annoying story, you’ll get Gilman’s annoying
reference.

            Spinning
Into Butter, by Rebecca Gilman, directed by Barbara K. Biddy, plays at
Shipping Dock Theatre, 151 St. Paul Street, Fridays at 7:30, Saturdays at 8
p.m., and Sundays at 2 p.m. through October 27. Tix: $16-$18. 232-2250 or www.shippingdock.org.

Dance Note: Fans
of Timothy Draper’s Rochester City Ballet and its most recent  alumna, Sarah Kathryn Lane, can take pride
in noting the two-page spread on Sarah in the October issue of Dance Magazine, the world’s largest
magazine on dance. DM‘s New York
editor, Wendy Perron’s, article includes a full-page colorphoto of Lane and a glowing description of her medal-winning
performances at the Youth America Grand Prix and USA International Ballet
Competition. It also discusses her current appointment to American Ballet
Theatre’s studio company and the Outstanding Teacher award that Draper won in
New York.

This article appears in Oct 9-15, 2002.