Mike Daisey Audience Protest, Walkout and Attack

Mike Daisey was performing his monologue INVINCIBLE SUMMER at American Repertory Theatre on April 19th when the show was disrupted by eighty seven members of a Christian group who walked out of the show en masse to protest the content, and chose to physically attack the work by pouring water on and destroying the original of his show outline. For a full account of the experience please visit http://tinyurl.com/3cq5wu and http://mikedaisey.com

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  News & Politics

[person15575129]

Watch how he addresses the audience.. how could you not sympathize with him? Never before has a protest been so counterproductive. Not only did it improve the way the audience viewed this man, but it also caused his show to be seen by, as of right now, 160 thousand other people who may or may not have known about him before this. It also leaves many thinking "is destroying this man's original work the christian thing to do?" And lastly, they paid 87 times the admission cost to do so.

Fail.

[pharmacopaeia]

Wow, that was really uncool. It's one thing to be against or protest a performance, and another to willfully and childishly disrupt a performance without even being willing to enter into discourse over the (perceived?) problem. What un-Christian behaviour, and what an embarrassment. Well done to Daisey for handling it so professionally.

[Stairc]

As my grandfather told me... "If they're shooting at you, you must be doing something right."

[billyguns2]

These narrow minded intolerant bigots show their true colors!

[SlappyThePenguin]

Like so many others have already stated, that was very well handled.

[shutemdwn]

its people like that, that gives organized religion a bad name.

[Taylor Robbins]

love your stuff mike

[ClearMindMeditation]

He handled that very well. I'm glad this happened, because I might not have heard of him otherwise. I was watching "Spalding Gray", when this came up as a related video.

Great work Mike. Like your site too.

[aratiism]

Just saw you at UNC Playmakers Theatre last night doing THE LAST CARGO CULT. I am a Hospice Nurse; you made me feel life again!!!....:-)

[val3]

Katefromcolby; someone put a "thumb down" for your post. Most people that are anti-art, also are anti-education. It's a sorry state of affairs.

[jopiano]

To the person who posted that religion and arts don't mix very well. That does indeed seem to be the case. I agree with you. It's also ironic that theater began with a religious impulse. In caves, where early man gathered around the sacred circle around a fire to eat, for protection, and to watch someone re-enact the hunt. In ancient Greece theater began as a way of giving thanks to the gods for the bounty of the harvest. The earliest theaters had an altar! Very strange how things change