Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in a packed room of about 500 people gathered in the Grand Ballroom of the Manhattan Center on Friday afternoon, “There is a lot to worry about in our country and the world right now.” Said. “And I think we need more theater and art than ever before.”
Clinton spoke at the 7th Broadway Con, an annual shelter for the most enthusiastic theater enthusiasts who hosted a panel celebrating women on Broadway. This was the first face-to-face version of a three-day event that lasted until Sunday since 2020. (The 2021 version was virtual.)
At this event, musical enthusiasts (many wearing the costumes of their favorite characters such as Wicked’s Elfaba and Six’s Ambulin) can meet and take pictures with their favorite show stars. ..
Clinton led a one-hour panel titled “Here’s to the Ladies.” This is a riff of Stephen Sondheim’s lyrics for the song “Here’s to the Ladies”.Woman having lunchFrom the musical “Company”. Participants include actress Vanessa Williams (starring as the first lady in “POTUS: Or there are seven women trying to save him behind all the great Danbus”), Julie White (“POTUS”). Included (playing the White House staff chief), Donna Murphy (a veteran stage actress who recently appeared in the television series The Gilded Age and Inventing Anna) and La Chanze (“Trouble.” In Mind “).
After Clinton entered the room, with applause and a 20-second standing ovation, he sat down in a luxurious white chair lined with a sparkling Hollywood-style Broadway Con sign. Clinton, a prominent theater fan, said he had attended “Plaza Suite” and “POTUS” performances last week and “I’m looking forward to seeing more shows in the coming weeks.” .. (she Received applause At “POTUS” on Wednesday night after the scene where Lily Cooper, who plays the White House reporter, looks back on the achievements of the First Lady played by Williams. you president? “)
Clinton then had LaChanze and Williams discuss their work with the non-profit Black Theater United. The group was formed at a Zoom meeting for six months during a pandemic and aims to combat racial discrimination in the theater community.
“There are many things we can be proud of,” Clinton told them. “It is most effective in having change, awareness and awareness, and actually adopting, maintaining and adopting more diversity.”
The discussion then turned to the experience of maternal women, including balancing life and work. She said White extended the conversation beyond the stage, and women with careers had to organize her childcare and rely on her family when nothing was available. “This is a continuous problem,” she joked, saying that one of the two breastfeeding mothers in “POTUS” (one of whom was on stage) “actually during the audition.” I was excited, “she joked.
White and Williams also discussed what it was like to work primarily with a female creative team for “POTUS,” written by Serena Philinger and directed by Susan Stroman.
“It’s a feeling of peace. You’re in the room and you have all the women,” Williams said. “You can relax, be entertaining, ask questions, look up and find out that you have no judgment because you are a woman.”
White added: There wasn’t a subtle patriarchy that was always there. “Correct answer, lady‘—In other words, what is my vision’is right.
Clinton talks about her own experience as an up-and-coming lawyer navigating Washington’s working environment, leaving the door closed when she goes out for dinner, and everyone says she’s still working. I shared the story of an older male lawyer who told her as he wanted.
“I said,’But they don’t eat?'” She said. “He said,’No, no, you don’t understand, it’s all perceptual. When you get back from dinner, walk around the office and announce to people loudly. Is there anything you can do to help?” Even if they were at dinner for two hours, they would think you were back. They think you never left. “
“My God” Clinton applauded. “It’s exhausted — just get your work done and then go home!”
White said defending himself became more comfortable as his career progressed. When she was young, she said, “You were always looking at the director and saying,’I hope he likes me.'” “Then you grow and evolve and you become more interested in what you want to convey.”
She said she was notorious for not taking notes from the director, “because I have the power, and the creation is in me,” and added, “I’m really frustrated right now!”
Clinton concludes the event by asking each of the women that they haven’t done what they want to do yet.
“Besides the show where you and I solve the crime?” White asked. “I want to play the President of the United States.”
“Well, I can give you a lot of notes about it,” Clinton said.
“You know I won’t take them!” White responded with applause.
Elexa Bancroft, a 35-year-old artist from Atlanta, attended the panel during a break from selling mixed media art in the downstairs market. “I needed the woman’s empowerment so badly in my life,” she said. “I’m a young female entrepreneur myself, trying to spread my art to the world and seeing how far those women are working, it’s really exciting.”
Other events set for the weekend include “When Broadway was Black: Celebrating a Black Artist Who Rewrote the Great Whiteway Rules.” A presentation on Saturday afternoon by writer and cultural historian Kasengains to celebrate the 100th anniversary of one of the first successful all-black Broadway musicals, the 1921 musical comedy Shuffle Along. “Dreaming the Future of Queer: TGNC Expressions and Playwrights in American Theater”, including actress L Morgan Lee and playwright Roger Q. Mason, who were nominated for Tony in “The Strange Loop” on Sunday morning. Gender incompatibility expression in trance and theater.
“I definitely feel this year is more comprehensive,” said Bancroft.
