N.Y. satire appalls Smarts

Coming soon to the Great White Way: Elizabeth Smart.

An off-Broadway play called "Right as Ron" is scheduled to open Jan. 29 at the Bank Street Theater in Manhattan. The play has been billed in at least one publication as a satiric spin of the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping.

The Smart family, however, isn't laughing.

"I think it's so stupid," Elizabeth's father, Ed Smart, said. "I can't believe anyone would think that it's an issue that would be funny or could be funny."

But the play's author, Judd Bloch, stresses the key word is "satire." Furthermore, he said, what is really being satirized is popular culture.

"I don't think there's very much from the actual story," he said of his play compared to Elizabeth's ordeal.

"Right as Ron" follows the homecoming of a young kidnapped girl named April Starr. After movie deals start rolling in following her return, the Starr family doesn't meet expectations of the all-American family, according to Playbill magazine.

"I was absolutely dumbfounded. I couldn't believe it," Ed Smart said of learning about the off-Broadway play. "A kidnapping isn't something that you want to make a satire over. I can't imagine how a kidnapping situation or what a family had to deal with in a kidnapping situation is something you could make fun of."

Bloch agreed with Smart.

"I didn't think the story of Elizabeth Smart was funny at all," he said. "I don't wish to exploit their ordeal. I don't dispute they went through an awful ordeal. This is purely through my imagination of what a family similar to theirs might go through."

The play isn't meant to be a satire of the Smarts, he said. Rather, many of the jokes are aimed at the media and the way it covered her ordeal.

Bloch said he was inspired to write the play after watching the media frenzy surrounding Elizabeth's kidnapping while other abductions that happened at the same time didn't receive as much attention.

The Smart family was "under siege" by the media and their every move was put under a microscope, Bloch said. In some cases, the media, whom he compared to a "relentless predator," deliberately distorted things, he said.

In addition to the media, the play also pokes fun at police.

"I took creative license with what I perceived were numerous mistakes made by the cops in the investigation," Bloch said.

In his fictional account, the main character Starr comes from a wealthy suburb and a family of eight children. The play is not set in Salt Lake City, he said.

Furthermore, Bloch stressed the play stays away from religion. It does not make any references to the Smarts' religious beliefs or those of accused kidnapper and self-proclaimed prophet Brian David Mitchell.