Letter to Scott Eckern

Mr. Scott Eckern
Artistic Director
California Musical Theatre
1510 J Street, Suite 200
Sacramento, CA 95814
November 11, 2008

Dear Mr. Eckern:

I have just come across the news that a boycott is mounting against the California Musical Theatre because of your $1000 contribution to the Yes on Proposition 8 Campaign.

I went to your website at http://cfac.byu.edu/index.php?id=1421 and found this highly personal account of the place of the Mormon Church in your life, alongside your love of the theatre. I read the sentence, “I am engaged in a life long pursuit of becoming a better me.” with great sympathy. I don’t doubt your sincerity, just as I don’t doubt you believed you were on the side of God when your threw your support behind Prop. 8.

My guess is that the California Musical Theatre, in order to survive financially, will want to disassociate themselves from you. I am a great fan of local theatre and hope they succeed in this. They should not have to suffer because of a political misstep by their artistic director.

But it was a misstep, Mr. Eckern. A terribly hurtful one. Yours is a perfect example of the old saying that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. You showed a devastating lack of civic responsibility in pushing your Church’s doctrine at the expense of your fellow Californians’ civil rights. You have forgotten that your religious freedom might not last long in the face of so many people like me who believe your doctrinal beliefs are pure idiocy, but does exist because we support your right 100% to live by them and act on them. It’s just that you failed to remember that your rights, like mine, end where others’ begin.

I hope you come to understand just what harm you have done, good intentions notwithstanding. I hope your theatre survives and prospers.

I hope you do, as well.

But please, Scott. Don’t hit me with your doctrine again. I don’t live by Mormon rules.

And I shouldn’t have to.


Yours sincerely,



Alan J. McCornick