Caliente

'Spinning Into Butter' turns on political correctness

Political correctness can hide a world of bigotry. Carefully chosen language and deeply hidden prejudices are key to "Spinning Into Butter," a play by Rebecca Gilman opening at Invisible Theatre next week. "The subject is race," explained director Yolanda Lyon Miller. "The title comes from the most racist of stories, 'Little Black Sambo.' " "Little Black Sambo" is Helen Bannerman's 1890 tale about a group of tigers that take a little black boy's clothes in exchange for his life. Then they argue about which tiger looks the grandest. They argue so much that they start chasing each other around a tree, holding on to each other's tails and running so fast they spin themselves into butter. The boy puts the butter on his pancakes and eats 'em all up. Many of the principals in the play do so much spinning around the issues, one might think they would turn into butter, too. The story is set at a small, mostly white college in New England. A racist note appears on an African-American student's door, and the campus is thrown into turmoil. In the process of trying to solve the mystery of who placed the note, the oh-so-liberal principal character is forced to deal with her own hidden prejudices. "Spinning Into Butter" examines racism hiding under a veneer of political correctness, and touches on how political correctness can hinder, rather than promote, discussions about race and racism. "Our political correctness is so surface," said Miller. "We make all the right noises, but when it comes right down to it, we don't face what there is to face." This is a play designed to make you question your own behavior. The hope is you'll go off and think about and discuss the issues that the play touches on. "It raises many, many more questions than it answers, and leaves us to question if we have racist elements," said Miller. "If so, what should we do about it? It exposes our universal xenophobia. It doesn't come to a happy conclusion, but there is a glimmer of hope."