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Steve Martin, First Amendment Hero

Best news item I read all weekend: Steve Martin is financing an off-campus production of one of his plays because some parents at the Oregon high school where it was being staged have thrown a nutty about its "adult content."

The play, Picasso at the Lapin Agile, is about an imaginary meeting between Einstein and Picasso at a bar in Paris as both men are on the verge of great achievements in art and science.

Martin explained his reasoning in this letter to the La Grande observer.

Choice bits from the letter:

"I have heard that some in your community have characterized the play as "people drinking in bars, and treating women as sex objects." With apologies to William Shakespeare, this is like calling Hamlet a play about a castle."

To prevent the play from acquiring a reputation it does not deserve, I would like to offer this proposal: I will finance a non-profit, off-high school campus production (low-budget, I hope!), supervised and/or directed by Mr. Cahill and cast at his discretion, so that individuals, outside the jurisdiction of the school board but within the guarantees of freedom of expression provided by the Constitution of the United States, can determine whether they will or will not see the play, even if they are under 18.

I predict that the experience will not be damaging, but meaningful.

Mr. Martin -- you have officially made up for those Pink Panther re-makes.

In celebration, I offer this banjo breakdown with the Muppets.