The day of his second inauguration, President Donald Trump handed down an executive order requiring agencies to end federal funding of so-called “gender ideology.”
Following the president’s edict, the National Endowment for the Arts delivered an ultimatum to arts organizations: cease programs promoting “diversity, equity, and inclusion” and “gender ideology,” or else lose eligibility for federal funding.
At Baltimore Center Stage, leaders and staff saw the order as asking their theater to betray their core values. In a message to its patrons, the theater gave their response to the Trump administration’s question: “no, thank you.”
Baltimore Center Stage’s decision to reject federal funding was less about standing against the Trump administration and its position on diversity, equity, and inclusion – or DEI initiatives – and more about standing for the theater’s values, said managing director Adam Frank.
“Baltimore Center Stage is a company that has, for decades, been a leader in breaking ground in the American theater industry and art form for a more diverse community and a more inclusive vision for both art-making and community-building around art,” Frank said.
The order also runs contrary to many of the values America is meant to uphold, including freedoms of speech and expression, Frank said.
“I think that the theater is a place, and the arts in general are places, where we gather to be with people who are maybe not exactly like us, to experience stories of people whose lives are like our lives and not like our lives,” he said. “And that makes the theater a place where we build empathy and where we understand each other better, and where we can build each other up and build society up to be a place that has better space for more kinds of people.”
Center Stage, a historically white theater, has had three artistic leaders of color in a row, including current Artistic Director Stevie Walker-Webb, former Artistic Director Stephanie Ybarra, and Ken-Matt Martin, who served as Interim Artistic Director between the other two leaders’ tenures.
“We really see ourselves as a theater for everyone and as a theater that is committed to diversity and cultural leadership, that looks like the city of Baltimore and the region,” Frank said.
In addition to leadership and staff, Center Stage’s efforts to uphold diversity, equity, and inclusion extend to the theatrical productions they produce for the stage as well as community engagement beyond the stage – programs they feared would be under threat if the Trump administration were to withhold funding.
The vagueness of the language in the orders from the president and the National Endowment for the Arts also lent to the uncertainty. Center Stage didn’t want to take any chances with programs that could potentially fall under the new requirements, so they decided to detach themselves from any financial control the federal government could have over them.
Under Walker-Webb’s leadership, Center Stage launched the Juvenile Justice Theater Program at the Baltimore City Juvenile Justice Center, “where we work with young people who are incarcerated, using the power of theater to help them have a moment of brightness and a moment where art can help them think about taking control of their lives in positive ways,” Frank said.
In February and March, Center Stage presented “Everything That Never Happened,” a retelling of William Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice” from the Jewish community’s perspective and with a trans storyline.
Last year, the theater showcased “Mexodus,” a two-person hip-hop musical about the Underground Railroad that went south across the border to Mexico, a show that “was fundamentally about Black and Brown solidarity,” Frank said.
“It was a show that literally everyone loved,” he said. “It did not matter who you were, what age you were, what race you were, what demographic you were. That show was so good and so joyful that it lived its message of solidarity in a way that was manifestly for everyone in the audience. But that kind of storyline and that kind of content might be considered against an executive order that, culturally in the country, is tied into banning books in schools, is tied into what kind of history can be taught.”
And recently, Center Stage launched the Trans History Project, spearheaded by Center Stage artist-in-residence Bo Frazier, in collaboration with the Breaking the Binary Theatre. The project will commission 10 plays from transgender and gender nonconforming playwrights about trans and gender nonconforming history.
“It serves a dual purpose to support trans writers and artists in the making of the things, and then for everyone to just expand our sense of history and our sense of ourselves across time, which I think is a really important role for the arts to serve in society,” Frank said. “That’s something that performers have done for a really long time, and so we’re proud to be in that tradition, working with Bo on this project.”
In order to continue delivering unrestricted programming, Baltimore Center Stage turned to its community for support by asking them to purchase tickets, make donations, and contact their legislators.
The public’s feedback has been overwhelmingly positive and wide-reaching, coming not only from Baltimore and Maryland, but across the nation and even from other countries, according to Frank.
The most recent federal grant that Baltimore Center Stage received before the federal restrictions was for $30,000. Nearly two months since announcing its decision, Baltimore Center Stage has surpassed that amount in donations, Frank said.
“The community has really stepped up to replace what we would have lost this year from the federal government,” he said. “As we continue to sort of lean into our programming and focus on building a sustainable theater for the future, people have donated beyond that.”
In March, the National Endowment for the Arts rescinded its requirement. But arts organizations like Baltimore Center Stage aren’t breathing a sigh of relief yet.
Under an administration that has sought to dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion in schools, the military, and various federal agencies, Baltimore Center Stage plans to continue relying on its community for support so it can put on the theatrical productions it wants without uncertainty about whether they will have the funds they need.
“The community has really stepped up to replace what we would have lost this year from the federal government,” Frank said. “And then, as we continue to sort of lean into our programming and focus on building a sustainable theater for the future, people have donated beyond that.”
He hopes that support will continue in the months ahead.
“Our core values are the guiding light for everything that we do, and the good feedback that we’ve gotten from our community is because we are staying true to our values, so staying true to our values is the thing that will guide us through each new challenge,” he said.
Center Stage is preparing to present “Mad Men” showrunner Matthew Weiner’s “John Wilkes Booth: One Night Only!” (which notably runs not for one night only, but an entire month, from May 15 to June 15). The play is a historical dark comedy about John Wilkes Booth, the Maryland actor who assassinated President Abraham Lincoln, and his theatrical family.
Although set in the 1800s when the Booths were alive, the production will resonate strongly with today’s audiences, said Tyrone Manning, Center Stage’s director of marketing and communications.
“I won’t spoil it, but what it is structurally is not what you expect,” Manning said. “It starts off as a ton of fun. It’s funny in a way that helps you engage with one of the darkest moments in our American history…. You really engage with what the desire for fame means in American history, and the way that it threads through history to today.”
Regardless of current or future restrictions, Frank said theaters and other cultural spaces will continue doing what they have always done: make art.
“Through all of human history, it doesn’t matter what society looks like, artists tell stories and make their work,” Frank said. “Art-making is immutable, and so the artists in our society are not going to stop playing their role, no matter what happens. It’s our job as an arts institution to keep providing the space to lift up their work so that many people can experience it, and we can do those core things of building empathy and providing paths to each other as we move through history and build our society over time.”
