use strict;
use warnings;

my $str = "<some> text with';*()/? nasty chars. scripted is ok, but not script";

sub cleanup
{
  my $p = shift;
  return '' unless defined $p;
  $p =~ tr|<>;()"'?/*||d;
  $p =~ s/\bscript\b//g;
  return $p;
}

sub cleanup2
{
  $_[0] =~ tr|<>;()"'?/*||d;
  $_[0] =~ s/\bscript\b//g;
  return $_[0];
}

print "\$str is: $str\n";
print "Cleaned up: " . cleanup($str) . "\n";
print "\$str is: $str\n";
print "Cleaned up: " . cleanup2($str) ."\n";
print "\$str is: $str\n";

##</code><code>##

$str is: <some> text with';*()/? nasty chars. scripted is ok, but not script
Cleaned up: some text with nasty chars. scripted is ok, but not
$str is: <some> text with';*()/? nasty chars. scripted is ok, but not script
Cleaned up: some text with nasty chars. scripted is ok, but not
$str is: some text with nasty chars. scripted is ok, but not