In ‘Thanksgiving Play,’ the Pageantry of ‘Well-Meaning’ White People

As Larissa FastHorse worked with the Broadway cast of “The Thanksgiving Play,” which centers on four white people trying to put on a “culturally sensitive” holiday production, one of the actors, Katie Finneran, spoke up in a rehearsal with a suggestion: Perhaps she could drop a swear word during one of her more exasperated lines?

“I’m the drama teacher!” Finneran’s character exclaims as her plan to make a socially progressive elementary school play begins to fall apart.

FastHorse politely declined. From the work’s conception in 2015, she had intended it to be curse-free, in the hopes of finally having a widely produced play. Her other work — including the play