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John Proctor is the Villain will be open admission for all Brightpoint students, faculty, and our community! Please consider making a gift for the Arts at Brightpoint. Under the question "I want my donation to be designated toward," choose "The Arts at Brightpoint."

About the Play

At a rural high school in Georgia, a group of lively teens are studying The Crucible while navigating young love, sex ed, and a few school scandals. Holding a contemporary lens to the American classic, they begin to question who is really the hero and what is the truth, discovering their own power in the process. Alternately touching and bitingly funny, this new comedy captures a generation in mid-transformation, running on pop music, optimism, and fury, writing their own coming-of-age story.


John Proctor Is the Villain is presented by special arrangement with Broadway Licensing, LLC, servicing the Dramatists Play Service collection.

Director's Notes

In John Proctor is the Villain, the students are studying Arthur Miller's The Crucible, a fictional play based on the Salem Witch Trials in 1692. It tells the story of a village that becomes embroiled in a witch hunt as more and more people are accused of witchcraft and those who are found guilty, the "witches," are ultimately sentenced to death, either by hanging or by flame.
Fire has been used to represent both the end or the beginning of something–if a house goes up in flames, it’s gone; if a forest burns down, it allows for new growth; if a woman is burned at the stake…what then? Is she like a phoenix who gets to rise from the ashes? Or just another “witch”, a bad influence, whose thoughts and ideas were too scary, too much; someone, something that had to go?
The thing is: witches weren’t being burned, women were. A lot of us could trace our lineage back to these women, back to these “witches.” There is a lot to be learned about that time in history, a lot of modern-day parallels–the mass hysteria, the false accusations–but what is glaring at me is how quickly women turned on other women, how they were pitted against each other and pointed the finger. 
What this play has helped me see is the life-saving power and grace that comes from the women around us, from the women who believe us. How different would Salem have been if when our friend, sister, or mother was accused, we stood up there with her? Maybe said we were a “witch” too? They can’t burn all of us, right? 
Love the women in your life, cherish them, believe them, dance in the fire with them.
Katherine Moore
Director

Special Thanks

Firehouse Theatre Project, Alex Moore, Matt Scantling-Sharp, Mike Sullivan, and Emily Vial