SHERWOOD (AP) — Drama teacher Jennie Brown warned students last fall that her anti-bullying play wouldn’t be tame.

In an announcement seeking children to audition, Brown noted that she needed actors “not afraid to take risks.”

The audition form that went home with Sherwood Middle School students emphasized the point: “If you audition for this play you must be willing to put yourself out there and take risks as the content of the material is brutally honest and does not sugarcoat the way students often undermine or harass one another.”

Brown found her risk-taking actors, but she also found some risk-averse parents.

School administrators on Wednesday gave the thumbs down to “Higher Ground,” two days before the play was scheduled to open.

Brown, who wrote the play for her after-school drama class, said she wanted to portray how students taunt one another. But Anna Pittioni, the school’s principal, said the play exceeds the maturity of many students and needs to be toned down before it can be performed.

Steve Emmert, the school’s vice president, said administrators examined the script after hearing concerns from parents. He said the play exaggerates the kind of taunting at Sherwood, and some of the subject matter would have been offensive to the small children and grandparents in attendance.

“It’s overall a conservative community,” he told The Oregonian newspaper.

The central character in “Higher Ground” is a boy who gets teased and harassed after he shrugs off a misunderstanding about whether he’s straight or gay. Other characters in the play are bullied for a variety of reasons, such as being overweight, in special education or having a dad in prison.

Students and parents who want the show to open feel they’ve been bullied by a handful of opponents.

“These kids deserve their day in the spotlight; they’ve earned it,” said Brent Burrowes, whose 12-year-old son was to appear in the production. “Why can one or two voices shut down a play for all these kids?”

Genny Rorricelli, a sixth-grader in the production, concurs that the play deals with touchy subjects, but said parents who object can, “A) Take their kids out or B) just not watch the play.”

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Information from: The Oregonian, http://www.oregonlive.com