The Politics of Performance đ«đ·
Inside the Les Mis boycott and what it reveals about the relationship between theater and politics today
Happy Friday đđŒ Iâve been thinking a lot lately about the space between art and ideology.
About how theater isnât just a form of storytellingâbut a site of negotiation. Between what we believe and what we perform. Between who funds the work and who makes it.
And this week, that tension broke the fourth wall.
A group of Les MisĂ©rables cast members have chosen to sit out a performance at The Kennedy Center this June, scheduled during a high-profile fundraiser for President Trump. Itâs a bold actâand one thatâs sparked backlash, protest, and a much larger conversation about the politics of performance.
So this week, weâre looking at what this moment reveals. About the state of our institutions, the systems that shape what we see onstage, and the role of theater in our culture right now.
Letâs go.
The Castâs Conundrum
On June 11, Les MisĂ©rables is scheduled to perform at the Kennedy Center. But at least a dozen cast members wonât be stepping onstage.
Theyâre not injured. Theyâre not sick.
Theyâre refusing to perform for President Donald Trump
That nightâs performance is a centerpiece of Trumpâs fundraising efforts for the Kennedy Center, which is seeking an unprecedented $257 million in federal funding for repairs and expenses (even as the administration proposes eliminating the NEA and other cultural agencies??)
But for the Les Mis cast, this isnât just about one performance or one political figure. Itâs about navigating impossible tensions between art, commerce, personal values, and professional obligation.
The boycotting performers were reportedly given the option to abstain, specifically due to Trumpâs attendance and the broader political climate. Some of fhose who will perform plan to donate their June 11 salaries to charity, while a separate cabaret is being organized to support Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDSâturning what could feel like complicity into something more generative.
Iâve been thinking a lot about these performers and the impossible position theyâre in. Their choices are deeply personal. Deeply political. And totally impossible to untangle.
The Revolutionary Irony
Of course, the symbolism here isnât subtle. If this were a musical, the metaphor would feel too on-the-nose. But thatâs the thing about theaterâit tends to mirror the world whether it means to or not.
Because Les Mis has never not been political. Itâs a story about justice, inequality, and the human cost of systemic power. And now, the act of performing it has become just as charged as the story itself.
The whole thing reads like fan fiction: a show about standing up to corruption becomes the backdrop for standing up to corruption.
But the tension onstage is only part of the story.
Power Play
While the actors are facing tough choices in the wings, the Kennedy Center itself has undergone a transformationâand not just in tone. In structure. In leadership. In who gets to decide what the arts are for.
Since Trumpâs takeover, the Kennedy Center board has been fully replaced. Its programming has shifted. LGBTQ+ events have been canceled. And at the helm is Richard Grenell, a Trump appointee who called the boycotting actors âvapid and intolerantâ and suggested they be blacklisted.
âAny performer who isnât professional enough to perform for patrons of all backgrounds, regardless of political affiliation, wonât be welcomed,â he said.
Itâs not just a jab. Itâs a threat.
Critics have likened the rhetoric to the Hollywood blacklist eraâbut now itâs playing out in real time, online, and out loud. And Les Mis isnât alone: more than two dozen events have been canceled since Trump stepped in, including a planned engagement of Hamilton in 2026.
This isnât just about whoâs on stage. Itâs about whoâs pulling the strings.
The Invisible Scaffolding
In theater, we love to talk about values.
Land acknowledgements. Inclusive casting. Audience accessibility. Thereâs lots conversations about the kinds of stories we tell, and who gets to tell them.
But we rarely talk about the money.
We donât always know who our investors are. Or what ideologies are attached to the corporations that employ our funders. We just know the show needs to be funded.
The truth is that our work doesnât exist in a vacuum.
Itâs held up by systems we donât always see.
And sometimes the art is doing the work.
But sometimes itâs just dressing up the scaffolding.
So should we refuse money from people whose politics clash with our art? Should we stay offstage when we know the audience includes people actively working against our rights? Should we draw linesâor keep performing and hope the message lands anyway?
I donât have answers to those questions. But I do think they matter. And I think we should talk about it more.
The Final Act
Theater has always been political.
The Greeks knew itâusing amphitheaters as public forums for civic debate.
Shakespeare knew itâhiding critiques of monarchy in metaphor and soliloquy.
Brecht knew itâtearing down the fourth wall to demand action from his audience.
Even here in the U.S., weâve seen the stage rise to the occasion. The Federal Theatre Project in the 1930s staged bold, progressive work until Congress shut it down for being âtoo political.â Angels in America dared to speak truth during a plague of silence. Hamilton reframed a founding myth in the voice of the excluded.
So noâwhatâs happening with Les Mis isnât new. But it is revealing.
Because the conflict isnât just in the story.
Itâs in the institution. The contract. The audience. The paycheck.
Itâs in the choice to performâor not performâwhen the space itself feels compromised.
So when the curtain rises on June 11, it wonât just be a show. Itâll be a cultural Rorschach test. Some will see a performance. Others will see a protest. Some will hear revolution in the music. Others will notice whoâs not singing at all.
Theater, at itâs best, can confront, shapes, and disrupt culture.
It doesnât just reflect who we are.
It reflects who weâre becoming.
âđŒ One last thingâŠ
Iâm back in rehearsals for a new musical that opens this summer off-Broadway. Itâs a piece Iâve been part of for seven yearsâthrough readings, rewrites, pauses, reinventions. Itâs about identity, music, love, and revisiting it now, after everything thatâs shifted in my own life, feels different. Deeper. Stranger. More human.
Because Iâve seen what it takes to get a show up. Iâve lived through the almosts, the maybes, the high-highs, and low-lows. And Iâve also had the joy of seeing something make it all the way. All the Worldâs a Stage closed last weekend, and it was one of the most grounded, satisfying processes Iâve ever been a part of. That sense of closure was real.
But later that same night, my dog Penny was attacked by another dog right outside our building.
Sheâs okay. Sheâs healing well and acting like her normal, crazy, loving self. But that moment reminded meâagainâthat no feeling is permanent. That the things we carry rarely fit into one sentence, one post. That (most of the time) life doesnât pause so you can take a bow.
And I guess thatâs the thing I keep learning over and over: nothing is just one thing.
The work is meaningful and exhausting.
The process is fulfilling and messy.
You can feel proud and still scared. Safe and still shaken.
We live in the âboth.â
Art lives there too.
Itâs never just performance. Never just protest. Never just pretend.
So maybe the best thing we can offer each otherâonstage, offstage, online, in real lifeâis the willingness to hold the whole picture. To stop flattening people into single moments. To honor the fact that being human is weird, contradictory, and constantly shifting.
And maybe thatâs what theater is for: not to simplify who we are, but to remind us that we were never simple to begin with.
See you next week â„ïž
âMatt