Bucks
Pumpkin Ball, Smerconish Rev.Phelps, R Films Schools, Met Opera in Warrington
Dear Friends,
Good morning. My topics today are: the Pumpkin Ball in Quakertown, R- rated films shown in public schools, Michael Smerconish’s poll on Reverend Phelps’ First Amendment case before the U.S. Supreme Court, and an inexpensive visit to the Metropolitan Opera Company via the Regal Warrington Cinema.
Let’s start with the Pumpkin Ball. Ten days ago, 200 in formal attire gathered in an unlikely place to raise more than $30,000 for “Quakertown Alive,” an organization promoting its hometown.
Lynn Kraft, the retired Quakertown High School director of art, transformed Steve Tobin’s sculpture studio and foundry on California Road into an impressive art gallery for the event. We’re lucky to have Steve Tobin in our midst. The famous artist was a generous host. Normally in that space, you’d observe men wielding acetylene torches as they create giant sculptures seen around the world. But not that night. Kraft used orange and black to decorate the foundry’s interior. Even the seats were in orange and black colors.
Jann Paulovitz (Chair) and Robyn Coajezzi (Co-chair) led the committee which pulled off the dinner dance and auction so successfully. The Pumpkin Ball had lots of help from its committee: Nancy Cygan, Cathy Gillahan, Carole Groves, Francis Kennedy, Lynn Kraft (Quakertown’s eminent exterior and interior designer), Greta Mast, Naomi Naylor (Quakertown Alive Executive Manager), Dawn Premaza, Kathy Reichley, Tami Rittenhouse, Rich Slabinski, Mike Walsh, Sue Wilsey, and Mighty Betsy Meredith
The party ran from
Item.
Did you see the Inquirer article
about
“The district’s two high schools show dozens of R-rated movies- which those under 17 aren’t allowed to see in theaters without an adult,” Boccella continued. “That bothers some parents, who say the films are too violent or raunchy for teens.”
Parents are fighting back. Parents Active in Responsible Education (PARE) are lobbying Council Rock to ban R-rated films from classes such as English, world history, philosophy, and psychology. Diana Nolan, a parent, says that the Al Pacino movie about Shakespeare’s “Merchant of Venice” has 10 nude scenes.
Council Rock contends that the movies are educational and that high school kids have seen it all anyway. In advance of showing R-rated films, Council Rock notifies parents who have to sign permission slips for their children. Those not allowed have to leave the class.
Pennridge high school bans R as well as PG-13 movies. “Even PG movies have to get approval from the principal and superintendent and have to inform parents,” the Inquirer reported.
I recently had breakfast with Dennis Helf, QNB’s Chairman of the Board of Directors. Because he used to be a public school teacher, I asked him about Council Rock’s policy of excluding students from R-rated films if their parents objected? Helf disagrees with the school’s policy.
“Students will be ostracized [if they don’t attend the R-rated films],” Helf began. “Kids will become out casts [from their peers if parents refuse to let their children see those films]. What’s the likelihood of having every kid’s parents agree to allow R-rated films shown,” Helf asked? “Zero,” he answered. “Teachers need to find another way to discuss sensitive issues without graphics,” Helf concluded. “They should use old fashioned [printed] text.”
He’s right.
Last week, Michael Smerconish ran a listeners’ poll on the Snyder v. Phelps case, which the U.S. Supreme Court heard last week. Justices listened to arguments in a highly charged case involving protesters objecting to homosexuality who picketed a military funeral. Does the first Amendment protect protestors carrying signs with messages like “Thank god for dead soldiers” and “God hates you?”
Reverend Fred Phelps is the leader of a very small church whose members are mainly his children and relatives. Opposed to homosexuality, Phelps’ congregants have picketed funerals of murdered gay people. In my opinion, Phelps is a nut case.
“Nation, hear this little church,” Margie Phelps, Reverend Fred Phelps’ lawyer and daughter, pleaded before the Justices. “If you want them [military personnel] to stop dying, stop sinning.”
During the oral argument, every Justice asked questions except Clarence Thomas…no surprise.
Smerconish, the talk radio host on 1210 who grew up in Doylestown, asked his listeners to respond to a question about hate speech. Do protestors have a right to shout hate speech or carry hate signs at a private military funeral, he wondered?
I wasn’t surprised that the majority of the respondents said “no.”
What surprised me was that 40 percent of them answered that this hate speech case should have First Amendment protection. Those listeners, me included, believe that even though the Reverend Phelps case is disgusting, there’s a constitutional right to be disgusting.
“During the oral arguments, there were persistent questions seeking help in striking a balance between privacy and protest in the Internet age,” the New York Times lead editorial said (Oct. 7). “One friend of the court brief called the protesters’ message “uncommonly contemptible.”
“True,” the editorial concluded, “but it is in the interest of the nation that strong language about large issues be protected, even when it is hard to do so.”
And now for the last topic.
Last Saturday, my friend and Perkasie lawyer J. Lawrence Grim and I saw the Metropolitan Opera Company’s performance of “Das Rheingold,” the first of four music dramas which comprise “Der Ring das Niberlungen” (The Ring) by Richard Wagner. Our mothers used to take in the “Met” so it was rather like a trip down memory lane for Larry Grim and me, a generation later…
…Except we didn’t spend the money to see “Das Rheingold” in New York. We took in “Rheingold” at the Regal Warrington Cinema for $22 each. Most of the stadium theater’s 458 seats were filled. Larry and I met at the cinema one hour early to get a good seat. We could smell the garlic and onions wafting from the hoagies, which many of the patrons had brought (illegally I presume).
Since 2006, the Met has simulcasted several performances for movie theaters across America. Its first simulcast was on a huge screen, high above Times Square. Thousands occupied the pavements and spilled into the streets, bringing the intersection to a standstill. That performance was so popular that the Met began to broadcast several performances during the opera season. In this season, the Met will present 12 operas via the silver screen.
Before “Rheingold” began, the Met treated the audience to a behind the scenes look at the performers and the new set…a 45 ton contraption which stage hands call “the machine.” It cost $16 million just to reinforce the stage. It was fascinating to see the singing Rhinemaidens, in flimsy looking harnesses, floating high across the stage.
And the music was glorious. A megalomaniac, Wagner’s four music dramas (he refused to call them operas), that comprise the “Ring”, take 15 hours to see. There must have been 125 in the orchestra pit!
“Die Walkure,” the second part of the “Ring,” will play at the Regal Warrington on May 14. I’ll be there…you should too.
Sincerely,
Charles Meredith
PS. Here’s the rest of the Met at the movies’ schedule: Oct. 23, Boris Godunov; Nov. 13, Don Pasquale; Dec. 11, Don Carlo; Jan. 8, Girl of the Golden West; Feb. 12, Nixon in China; Feb. 26, Iphigenie en Tauride; Mar. 19, Lucia di Lammermoor; Apr. 9, Le Comte Ory; Apr. 23, Capriccio; Apr. 30, Il Trouvatore; and May 14, Die Walkure.