I don't exactly know where to start with this, so let's dive straight into the headline:
This new musical in New York City imagines Holocaust victim Anne Frank as every intersecting woke category under the sun.
But here's the catch:
It's mocking everything woke.
The production, titled 'Slam Frank,' is a satirical play that exaggerates current cultural trends around inclusivity and identity politics, applying them to one of history's most tragic stories to critique how performative 'wokeness' can distort storytelling.
So many recent TV shows, games, and films have flopped because they started preaching to the audience about climate change, capitalism, feminism, systemic racism, and/or sexual identity.
In short, disciples of woke torpedoed multi-billion-dollar franchises by becoming cheesier than direct-to-VHS Christian media of the '90s.
The show began as a viral Instagram parody by Jewish composer Andrew Fox, who joked about creating a production to make 'Latinx girlies feel included in the Holocaust.'
The video spawned a full production built around a play-within-a-play conceit: a fictional theatre troupe trying to 'decolonize' Anne Frank's story.
From there, the humor spirals into absurdity as characters discover new marginalized identities in musical numbers, swap yellow stars for pronoun pins, and even commune with ancestors lost at border crossings.
[Warning: Language]
The show has sold out most of its 34 performances and has spent only $60 on marketing.
The idea for the show started in 2022, when tweets about Anne Frank's "white privilege" went viral.
It seems that was a wake-up call for Jewish composer Andrew Fox, who decided to get rid of Anne Frank's "white" identity and recast her as a Hispanic girl named Anita Franco who lives "in the barrio of Frankfurt" so "Latinx girlies feel included in the Holocaust."
Throughout the show, Anita Franco and her friends take a journey of self discovery to learn more about a "stack of identities that they are exploring."
The show has gotten backlash, of course - especially from those who don't understand that its point is to mock wokeness, not Anne Frank. Fox defends his use humor
"I think that terrible things are absurd, and I think absurdity is funny," said Fox in an interview with i24 News. He added, "'Did Anne Frank have white privilege' is the funniest sentence I've ever heard in my life, and I hope we've been able to take that concept and really run with it."
The publicity, however, has caused the producers to consider a longer run (the show was supposed to wrap up October 26).
Andrew Fox responded to his critics with this tongue-and-cheek reply:
Speaking to Daily Mail about the petition, he said: 'Besides the devastating effect this tidal wave of criticism has had on my mental health (I have RSD - Rejection Sensitivity Disorder), the petitions and outcries have been extremely bad for our sales.
'When our shows started selling out weeks in advance, we had hoped that we would be able to turn away dozens of hopefuls in our standby ticket line - but now, due to all the negative coverage, we only turn away half-dozens.
'We request some privacy, so that we may grieve with our chosen family. We hope the haters are happy with themselves.'
If anyone sees this, let us know if it's a work of genius ... or trash.
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