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A Proud Member of the Reality-Based Community
About Me :
I'm a grownup nerd living in the Boston burbs. I write computer programs for a living and plays for fun.
I'm married to a wonderful woman, and we share a nice little house with our daughter and our cats.
I'm a humanist, a technologist, an artist, and an idealist. I believe in reason, freedom, love, equality,
and democracy. (Did I mention that I'm
an idealist? I did, OK.)
I'm also a pragmatist and an empiricist. I reject ideology and dogma, especially when they conflict with
practical facts (i.e., pretty much always). I particularly hate willful ignorance, which tends to go hand-in-hand
with ideology and dogma.
Like the alignment of the planets, this blog gets updated as I have the time, inspiration, and inclination to do so.
Like the alignment of the planets, this blog gets updated as I have the time, inspiration, and inclination to do so.
Thursday, July 24, 2003
More on the Madness of George Dubya
In my last post, I documented what seemed to be an open and shut case of plagiarism. Since then, I've spoken to the production's press relations person, who doesn't know if they have the rights to the Strangelove script, but has passed the question along to the producer and the playwright. However, she did mention that the Kubrick family "has given their blessing to the production".
Does this mean that there's nothing wrong with the production of The Madness of George Dubya? No! As I explained in my previous post, the playwrights' responsibility does not end at securing a legal permission. Copyright infringement is not the same as plagiarism; one may commit infringement without plagiarism, and one may, incredibly enough, commit plagiarism without infringement. I wouldn't have thought that possible, but it seems to be what's happened here: Butcher most likely is not guilty of infringement, but he is definitely guilty of plagiarism.
When a playwright is not the sole author of a play, he is under a moral and artistic obligation to point that fact out, whether he has the rights to the material or not. As it is, Butcher is explicitly claiming to have written every word, when this is manifestly not the case. Why should I need to call the play's PR rep in order to get some sort of grudging acknowledgement that Kubrick et al. had something to do with the dialogue?
Butcher doesn't reference Doctor Strangelove in the play. Butcher doesn't quote a paragraph or two. Butcher lifts entire scenes from the movie, all without the slightest hint of attribution!
It would be much more appropriate, and honest, for the writing credit to read, for example: "written by Justin Butcher, Stanley Kubrick, and Terry Southern; based on the movie Doctor Strangelove and the book Red Alert by Peter George III." In that case, I would have had nothing to complain about, except, as I noted, that the material is actually pretty dull once you take Strangelove out.
The point I'm trying to make is just this: if Justin Butcher wants people to regard him as a brilliant playwright, then he should write his own brilliant play.
Update: Their PR person never did get back to me.
In my last post, I documented what seemed to be an open and shut case of plagiarism. Since then, I've spoken to the production's press relations person, who doesn't know if they have the rights to the Strangelove script, but has passed the question along to the producer and the playwright. However, she did mention that the Kubrick family "has given their blessing to the production".
Does this mean that there's nothing wrong with the production of The Madness of George Dubya? No! As I explained in my previous post, the playwrights' responsibility does not end at securing a legal permission. Copyright infringement is not the same as plagiarism; one may commit infringement without plagiarism, and one may, incredibly enough, commit plagiarism without infringement. I wouldn't have thought that possible, but it seems to be what's happened here: Butcher most likely is not guilty of infringement, but he is definitely guilty of plagiarism.
When a playwright is not the sole author of a play, he is under a moral and artistic obligation to point that fact out, whether he has the rights to the material or not. As it is, Butcher is explicitly claiming to have written every word, when this is manifestly not the case. Why should I need to call the play's PR rep in order to get some sort of grudging acknowledgement that Kubrick et al. had something to do with the dialogue?
Butcher doesn't reference Doctor Strangelove in the play. Butcher doesn't quote a paragraph or two. Butcher lifts entire scenes from the movie, all without the slightest hint of attribution!
It would be much more appropriate, and honest, for the writing credit to read, for example: "written by Justin Butcher, Stanley Kubrick, and Terry Southern; based on the movie Doctor Strangelove and the book Red Alert by Peter George III." In that case, I would have had nothing to complain about, except, as I noted, that the material is actually pretty dull once you take Strangelove out.
The point I'm trying to make is just this: if Justin Butcher wants people to regard him as a brilliant playwright, then he should write his own brilliant play.
Update: Their PR person never did get back to me.
