Our American Theatre Culture Enables Abusers of Power
Alice Ripley (Getty Images)
CW: suicide, mental illness, grooming, sexual assault
When I heard the Alice Ripley story on Brie Lynn’s TikTok a week or so ago, I felt sick to my stomach. My girlfriend sent me a link and said, “I’m sorry, I’m about to send you the most upsetting thing. I apologize in advance but you must know…” She was right. It was upsetting but I did need to know. I was immediately sent back to my own story of sexual assault as a minor, believing that I had asked for it because I had gone to his house in the middle of the night. The ever-prevailing societal trap of believing, “What else did I expect to happen?”
The pain of this revelation was made worse by the fact that Next to Normal was one of my favorite musicals, one that spoke deeply to me. When I watched the story of Diana Goodman and Natalie Goodman, I saw the story of my grandmother and my mother. Next to Normal was the first musical to deal so candidly with mental illness, specifically bipolar disorder. My grandmother, who was a bipolar depressive person, took her own life during Hurricane Irene in 2011. Seeing and hearing the voice of a character who dealt with mental illness while also trying to be a mother and a wife was deeply validating to the experiences I had heard my mother describe from her upbringing and young adult life.
Both Next to Normal and Fun Home provided a catharsis that other musicals didn’t quite capture, perhaps because they both tackled subjects that I felt so deeply on a personal level. Yet, even though Alice Ripley did not create Next to Normal, and even though I did not know her, I felt irreparably betrayed by her breach of trust and abuse of power.
If you aren’t on TikTok, the Daily Beast reported thoroughly on the subject here. These events brought up the question for me, how does one separate the art from the artists? Especially when Broadway artists often feel forced to create elaborate and interactive social media presences to grow their career. It becomes difficult to forcibly separate yourself, as a fan, from the art created–especially when you feel emotionally connected to it–and the artists themselves.
Based on the allegations not just against Alice Ripley, but against James Barbour and others, young people growing up with both social media and access to theatre viewing and performing opportunities seem particularly vulnerable to potential boundary violations or abuse of power. When Brie told her story, she emboldened others to do the same, many of who were finally validated that they weren’t the only ones and that they weren’t at fault. I realized that adults had behaved inappropriately with me when I was a young teen exploring the local theatre world.
A substitute teacher I had in freshman year, supervising us while my teacher was on maternity leave, stands out to me. This individual, whom I’ll call Jessie, was friendly with all the students. First-name basis friendly. But I see now that, looking back, she might have felt a particular kinship with me, as a young queer girl.
She told me extremely personal details about her life, including her and her wife’s efforts to have a baby. She texted me through her personal phone number. She once called me over to the teacher’s desk, where she was sitting, during a drama club meeting during lunchtime, and asked, “Are you a horny girl?” I don’t know what it was about my behavior that made her say this, while I was minding my own business, talking to my friends in the classroom. In truth, there’s nothing I could’ve been doing that would have made that comment appropriate. And I never really dwelled on this event much, only bringing it up to a few people, a handful of times. But the Alice Ripley story brought it all flooding back into my immediate focus.
In a profession where one’s greatest strength is attributed as being open, vulnerable, and expressive, abuses of power can abound if boundaries are not clearly understood and respected by all parties. This leads me to another point: why was I so personally wounded by the stories about Alice Ripley? For one, I saw someone who had experiences that I recognized from my own adolescence. For another, I recognized that I was capable of these same parasocial relationships that her other fans were. Because she had originated the lead role in a thing I loved, I subconsciously associated her with goodness. This new information caused cognitive dissonance and pain which led to my feelings of betrayal.
However, in my personal opinion, these feelings of hurt are valid because after learning that bad behavior has taken place at the center of a show which addresses sensitive social subjects–like Next to Normal does with bipolar disorder and grief–the themes they introduce are rendered less potent when major players in the shows are found out to be perpetuating harm in some way. Of course, no one can be perfect, but certain things are beyond a certain line of forgiveness.
Some things reflect a pattern, with one person’s behavior at the center as a common thread. Some things take time, acknowledgment, and commitment, and progress towards something better. Not a defensive Instagram post and a legion of apologists, which has been the industry backlash to the grooming allegations so far.