"Gee, Lt. Schrank - Krup YOU!"

I have always found the song “Gee, Officer Krupke!” to be one of the most fascinating and poignant songs in the entire musical. The fast pace of the song combined with the clownish antics of its singers make it appear light-hearted, almost like a carnival. In reality, however, the lyrics are describing some of the more horrifying aspects of growing up in an impoverished, urban setting. Although Riff and the gang adopt a very flippant attitude towards these domestic tribulations (to show how they can “snow” the officers and gain their pity – instead of jail time), this is probably more of an attempt at escapism: they are trying to laugh off their troubles instead of admitting that they actually cause real emotional/psychological pain. For example, the line “My parents treat me rough/ with all their marijuana/ they won’t give me a puff” must bother A-Rab more than he lets on in the song – after all, he gets upset when Officer Krupke later asks him “How’s your old man’s DTs?” (meaning delirium tremens, caused by drug withdrawal). And the line “They didn’t wanna have me/ but somehow I was had” could refer to Action’s parental problems, which Krupke later refers to when he says “How’s the action on your mother’s side of the street, Action?” (implying that Action’s mother is a “street walker”, or prostitute). Before the musical number even begins, the Jets conversationally comment on their own familial sufferings. Anybodys declares she will never get married because it’s “too noisy,” and even Baby John grows bold enough to insult her by ordering her to “go walk the streets like [her] sister.” Clearly, the lyrics in this song hit closer to home than the Jets would like to admit.
The song also grabbed my attention because of its cyclical nature. Riff gets shunted around from Krupke to a judge to a “head-shrinker” to a social worker – then ends up back where he started, as Krupke’s burden. He is correspondingly labeled “delinquent” then “psychologically disturbed” then a sufferer of a “social disease” – and finally “no damn good”, a delinquent once more. This cycle implies that the adult figures who are supposed to be responsible for Riff’s (or any member of the Jets’s) welfare are merely circling the solution. Instead of trying to understand these youths, they shove them along from person to person, each one avoiding the duty of finding and fixing the real reason for their “delinquency”. Even the lieutenant, the adult (other than their parents) most responsible for the well-being of the kids on his beat, refuses to understand them. He tells Doc, “Oh sure. Understand them. That’s what they keep telling me down at headquarters. You try keeping hoodlums in line, and see what it does to you.” After he leaves, Doc comments, “It wouldn’t give me a mouth like his.” And the lieutenant does have quite an offensive mouth – instead of even trying to understand what it must be like to grow up in such a totally fractured family environment, he brutally insults the Jets by calling them “stupid hooligans” and descendents of “tinhorn immigrant scum”. Essentially, he reinforces their feeling of inadequacy and isolation (which they already get from the fact that their parents are unwilling or unable to devote the time needed to raise them to be socially acceptable adults).