A gay arts group in Milwaukee is suing the city for forcing it to shut down a racy show. The Milwaukee Gay Arts Center alleges its free speech rights were violated when the city closed the show Naked Boys Singing! while the center's application for a theater permit was being reviewed, the Associated Press reports.
A gay arts group
in Milwaukee is suing the city for forcing it to shut
down a racy show. The Milwaukee Gay Arts Center alleges its
free speech rights were violated when the city closed
the show Naked Boys Singing! while the center's
application for a theater permit was being reviewed, the
Associated Press reports.
In August 2005
the center opened a run of performances of the show,
which features nude actors singing musical numbers, even
though it hadn't yet received a permit. The local
police department soon received a complaint of
"illegal nude theater," the Associated Press reports,
and when a detective visited the center, he said the
participants could be arrested for performing without a
permit. Consequently, the show's director decided to
cancel the remaining performances.
Larry Dupuis,
legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of
Wisconsin, who's representing the center, told the AP that
he thought the way the city handled the
matter was extreme. "I think the title made it
kind of controversial," Dupuis said. "But of course, The
Full Monty has nudity in it, and that doesn't
get it threats to shut it down."
Dupuis added that
Milwaukee's theater permits process is so vague
that it can be used in political ways. "It could be used to
discriminate," Dupuis told the AP, "and we suspect that
there was some sort of discriminatory thinking that
went into the decision-making somewhere along the
line."
A spokesperson
for Milwaukee mayor Tom Barrett declined to comment
to the AP, and a call to the city attorney's office went
unanswered. (The Advocate)
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