Doubt

Wednesday night I went to see "Doubt" at the Playhouse with Jimmy and Erin. I saw the movie in the theater last month and loved it. My head buzzed for hours afterwards thinking about who was right, who was wrong, how situations are affected by those in power, sexism, racism, etc. I was completely devastated by Viola Davis' performance as the mother. It's those times when you think you understand someone's perspective, and then you find out you have no idea about their lives and ideas that they really have. That scene was one of those moments. I'd never thought about having to chose between two kinds of abuse from two different powers. She knew for certain her husband would kill her son if provoked, and so she chose to allow her son to be with someone who might be sexually abusing him because that person was "there" for the boy--and wouldn't kill him. "It's only 'til June." I always want to know what the boy thinks about this. It's obvious he would chose Father Flynn over his father, but what is he thinking? And Sister Aloysius assumes that the mother will want to join her crusade to get rid of Flynn because the Sister sees this sexual abuse as so awful, but she has no idea about the boy's life outside of school. The sister is fighting for what she thinks is right, and the mother is fighting for the boy's life.
Anyway, the play was pretty good for community theater. The acting wasn't as strong, but the extra dialogue and the scenes that weren't in the play as compared with the movie also gave the play a completely different feel. The play's director allowed the actors to portray the story so that at the end I felt bad for Father Flynn and almost hated Sister Aloysius. In the movie, I'd felt more ambiguously about Father Flynn's guilt and Sister A's poorly shown good intent. Whatever the case, I don't know who's right and who's wrong. All I have are my doubts, which is probably the point.