As I was not able to see this production in person, this will not be a review of the play that was performed on campus this past weekend.

I was able to gain access to a copy of the script of The Thin Tweed Line, written by Armstrong’s own Jack Simmons.

In short, the play seems detached and is narrow-minded at best.

One of my main issues from the start of the play was that it seemed like there were too many things going on that didn’t further the plot.

The main thing happening in the show is that Professor Sarah Morgan needs to find a date for another professor in order to secure a grant she needs for her research. All the while there is an ongoing protest debating abortion rights.

While the main arc of the story was entertaining to read, I think that this could have stood alone. I don’t think that everything else (mainly the protest and commentary on feminism) was needed in order to make the piece. If anything, it was the unnecessary fluff that drew me away from the script.

This show follows two groups of women, those who lean far left and those who lean far right. Neither group is portrayed well.

Two characters, Professors Morgan and Linda, the dean with whom Morgan’s grant relies on, are so-called “liberated women.” However, the writing does not paint them in the best light. The script makes it seem as though these are shallow characters that are not open to conversation about what feminism really is.

The characters Tracy and Margot are painted in a bad light as well. Throughout the duration of the show, they fight for more safe spaces for conversative values. They go about this by attempting to get a gender studies professor fired simply because her beliefs don’t align with their own, even though this same gender studies professor comforted Tracy and tried to talk her counterpart down at a boiling point between the two opposing groups.

The ending in itself was a bit lackluster as well. I found myself coming to terms with the ending only to have it revoked.

At first, Linda simply calls it quits on trying to protect her values and allows the liberal arts division of the university to be shut down. There was nothing that her character did beforehand that made this decision make sense. In a moment shared between Stanley and Tracy, Tracy ends up deleting the video effectively saving the liberal arts department before it’s shut down.

At the end of the day, these are all simply my opinions that I took from reading the script. I have no doubt that the production itself was of value and that there was hard work and effort put into it by all parties involved.