"But," we may fancy the producer objecting, "you can't take that out; Shakespeare wrote it, and it belongs in the play."
"I don't care who wrote it," the censor could answer. "It can't be shown in Pennsylvania."
And it couldn't. The little fat man with the blue pencil—and censors always become fat in time—can stand with both his feet upon the face of posterity; he can look Fame in the eye and order her to quit trumpeting; he can line his wastebasket with the greatest notions which have stirred the mind of man. Like Joshua of old, he can command the sun and the moon to stand still until they have passed inspection. Cleanliness, it has been said, is next to godliness, but just behind comes the censor.
Perhaps you may object that the censor would do none of the things mentioned. Perhaps he wouldn't, but the Pennsylvania State Board of Censors of Motion Pictures has been sufficiently alive to the possibilities of what it might want to do in reëditing the classics to give itself, specifically, supreme authority over the judgment and the work of dead masters. Under Section 22 of "Standards of the Board" we find:
"That the theme or story of a picture is adapted from a publication, whether classical or not; or that portions of a picture follow paintings or other illustrations, is not a sufficient reason for the approval of a picture or portions of a picture."
As a matter of fact, it is pretty hard to see just how "Macbeth" could possibly come to the screen in Pennsylvania. It might be banned on any one of several counts. For instance, "Prolonged fighting scenes will be shortened, and brutal fights will be wholly disapproved." Nobody can question that the murder of Banquo was brutal. "The use of profane and objectionable language in subtitles will be disapproved," which would handicap Macduff a good deal in laying on in his usual fashion.
"Gruesome and unduly distressing scenes will be disapproved. These include shooting, stabbing, profuse bleeding——" If Shakespeare had only written with Pennsylvania in mind, Duncan might be still alive and Lady Macbeth sleep as well as the next one.
But at this point we recognize another gentleman who wishes to protest against any more attacks upon motion-picture censorship being made which rest wholly on supposition. He has read "Standards of the Board," issued by the gentlemen in Pennsylvania, and he asserts that all the rules laid down are legitimate if interpreted with intelligence.
It will not be necessary to put the whole list of rules in evidence since there need be no dispute as to the propriety of such rules as prohibit moving pictures about white slavery and the drug traffic. Skipping these, we come to No. 5, which is as follows:
"Scenes showing the modus operandi of criminals which are suggestive and incite to evil action, such as murder, poisoning, housebreaking, safe robbery, pocket picking, the lighting and throwing of bombs, the use of ether, chloroform, etc., to render men and women unconscious, binding and gagging, will be disapproved."