I've always been taught to write what I know and the thing I know best is theatre. An art form. An art form that, contrary to popular belief, cannot ever truly be done "wrong". When I heard that our president was considering cutting funding to the National Endowment of the Arts (NEA), I went through a range of emotions, most of them synonymous with horror. But, now that I've had some time to think about what this means to me, an artist, I have a few things to say.
When I first really discovered that theatre was what I wanted to do, I was in a real interesting place in my life. I was a freshman in high school when I auditioned for my first play. It was Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. While Shakespeare really isn't my first theatrical cup of tea, it did instill a love of performance for me. It made me feel like part of a team and I craved that in high school. As I grew up (well, as much as you can in high school), I discovered that the biggest joy of my high school life was playing an Egyptian pharaoh, a put-upon servant to Shakespearean royalty (with one of the most famous lines in all of the Shakespeare canon), a wealthy playboy, and a larger-than-life pachyderm with a heart of gold and a propensity for collecting clovers. In college, thanks to my arts exposure, I have played everything from a 60s teen heartthrob, a dead 50s crooner, a highly sexualized member of Frank-N-Furter's house, and a villain from a Stephen King novel. I could never have done that without exposure to the arts.
Arts departments, according to a report from US News and World Reports, are being cut at the rate of more than 80 percent. As a child who needed the arts, this just confuses me. I get that a career in the arts isn't necessarily "employable", but as one who is employed by an arts organization to make art and learn how to make good art, I can say that being a performer is a job that employs me in real world situations. Had it not been for theatre, I wouldn't know how to adapt to situations. I wouldn't know how to think on my feet. I would not have know how to channel all my creativity into positive change in my life. At this point in my life right now, I am about to graduate from college, I have a wonderfully loving girlfriend (who likes the fact that I am an actor and performer), and a family that supports my art. If we cut the NEA, we lose that little spark of madness that Robin Williams (bless his soul) told us never to love. That's what's lacking right now in the world: sparks of madness.
Cutting the NEA would drastically decrease someone's access to the arts. Trying to imagine a world where art wasn't accessible is kind of unfathomable to me. Some of the people who value most in this life have been artists. I would not be where I am right now if it weren't for strong advocates for the arts and humanities, organizations that our favorite human in the world is trying to obliterate. So, Commander-in-Chief, by all means, keep obliterating things. But. Obliterate the right things. Obliterate injustice in the world. Obliterate negativity. Don't obliterate creativity. Please. I beg of you. Creativity is really the one thing holding us together right now. Everyone needs a little Lin-Manuel, a little Spielberg, a little Beyonce in their lives. None of those can be achieved if the NEA goes away. So, sir. The NEA needs to NE-Stay.
