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ARAB TIMES, WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 25, 2021 NEWS/FEATURES 13

People & Places

Broadway

‘’ revival NY theater leaders agree on New Deal

NEW YORK, Aug 24, (AP): A wide Broadway coali- tion of theater owners, producers, union leaders, crea- tors and casting directors have hammered out a series of reforms and commitments for the theater industry to ensure equity, diversity, inclusion and accessibility. The New Deal for Broadway emerged following a summit of industry leaders organized by Black Thea- tre United earlier this year. It outlines reforms that are short-term — to be implemented prior to Broadway’s reopening this fall — and long-term over the next few years. “Just as we are all committed to create safe envi- ronments free from discrimination, sexual harassment and bullying, we are committed to create environ- ments that are equitable, diverse, inclusive, accessible and in which everyone has a sense of belonging,” the docu- ment states. The focus is on Black theater members. The changes range from the abstract — “to push for more diversity” — to the specifi c, like that artists with visual disabilities be offered Braille materials and that the Shubert, Nederlander and Ju- jamcyn chains have at least one of their theaters named after a Black artist. (Jujamcyn already has the August Wilson Theatre). “We had meetings for six months with everyone in the industry and we pretty much formed this togeth- er. We knew what we wanted and what we wanted to change,” Tony Award-winner LaChanze and a founding member of Black Theatre United, told The In this Jan. 7, 2013 fi le photo, an Afghan girl practices playing the sitar in a class at the Afghan National Institute of Music, ANIM, in Kabul, Afghanistan. (AP) on Monday ahead of the document’s release. “This is the fl oor. This is not the ceiling. This is just the beginning for us. We’re hoping with this docu- ment that it will have a ripple effect throughout our Music industry for all other members of the community.” Directors and authors have agreed to insist on diver- sity riders — to include members of underrepresented communities — in all new contracts they work on and Music stops at Afghanistan’s LaGuardia “will never assemble an all-white creative team on a production again.” Producers have agreed to widen the talent pool to more diverse candidates. Diversity Afghan ‘happy place’ falls silent One thing the groups all agree to is that they will each adopt “an EDIAB policy” — which stands for equity, By Zeina Karam casting music, except for Islamic songs to be admitted to a US university mu- diversity, inclusion, accessibility and belonging — and — though it was not clear if the change sic program. post it on websites, theater lobbies and audition rooms, few years after the Taliban were in programming was a result of Taliban The institute’s musicians traveled making it clear to everyone before rehearsals begin and Aousted in 2001, and with Afghani- edicts or an effort by the stations to avoid all over the world to represent their mandate its training. But what that exact policy will be stan still in ruins, Ahmad Sarmast left potential problems with the insurgents. country, presenting a different face is still to be determined by each group. his in Melbourne, Australia, on a “Each organization is going to create their own pol- Sarmast, 58, the son of a famous for a place known in the West only for mission: to revive music in the country Afghan composer and conductor, had war and extremism. Fanous himself icy that we will be monitoring to make sure that they of his birth. are in accordance to the New Deal,” said LaChanze. sought asylum in Australia in the 90s, performed at concerts in Poland, Italy The school he founded was a unique a time of civil war in Afghanistan. and Germany. “We are not the ones writing out what the policy is go- experiment in inclusiveness for the ing to be. We established guidelines for what it must In 1996, the Taliban swept into In 2013, the institute’s youth or- war-ravaged nation — with orphans power. The ultra-religious movement chestra embarked on its fi rst US tour, include, but each has to provide the exact Dylan Scott performs during an open- and street kids in the student body, it language.” ing act on the Proud To Be Right Here banned music as sinful, with the sole appearing at the Kennedy Center and 2021 tour at the Hollywood Casino sought to bring a measure of joy back exception being some religious vo- selling out . Members of The New Deal for Broadway has been endorsed by to Kabul. The Taliban had notoriously many of Broadway’s biggest organizations and individ- Amphitheatre on Saturday, Aug. 21, cal pieces. Cassette tapes were ripped the orchestra included a girl who not in Tinley Park, Ill. (AP) banned music. apart and strung from trees. long before had sold chewing gum uals, from the producers’ group The Broadway League Last week, he watched in horror to the labor organizations Actor’s Equity Association But after the US-led invasion top- on the streets of Kabul. An all-female from his home in Melbourne images pled the Islamists, Sarmast dreamed of orchestra called Zohra, named after a and Make-Up Artists and Stylists Local 798. of the Taliban taking over the Afghan The biggest theater owners — the Nederlander Or- renewal. After obtaining a doctorate in goddess of music in Persian literature, capital, capping a lightning offensive was set up in 2015. ganization, Jujamcyn Theaters, Shubert Organization that restored the religious militia to musicology, he returned to Afghani- and Disney Theatrical Productions — are on board, power and stunned the world. stan and in 2010 founded the Afghani- In 2014, Sarmast was attending a as well as casting agencies like The Telsey Offi ce and Sarmast’s two mobile phones stan National Institute of Music. concert in the auditorium of a French- run high school in Kabul when a huge Tara Rubin Casting, plus playwright Doug Wright, di- haven’t stopped ringing since. Many Instruments rector , director-choreographers Sergio of the calls are from panicked stu- bomb went off. He partially lost hear- Trujillo and Jerry Mitchell, and composers Kristen dents asking him what happens next. Donations from foreign governments ing in one ear and has had numerous Anderson-Lopez and Jeanine Tesori. Will the school be closed? Would the and private sponsors soon poured in. The operations to remove shrapnel from The unions have agreed to appoint a full-time Chief Taliban outlaw music again? Are their World Bank gave a cash grant of 2 mil- the back of his head since. The Taliban Diversity Offi cer. Casting agents have agreed to re- treasured instruments safe? lion US dollars. Almost 5 tons of musi- claimed responsibility for the suicide move “stereotypical language.” And producers will “I’m heartbroken,” Sarmast told cal equipment — violins, pianos, guitars attack, accusing him in a statement of “commit to hiring creative talent from historically Robertson Hamzy The Associated Press. “It was so un- and oboes — were trucked in, a gift from corrupting Afghanistan’s youth. excluded and underrepresented groups in our industry expected and so unpredictable that it the German government and the Ger- That only increased his determina- on every new creative team, regardless of the subject was like an explosion, and everyone man Society of Music Merchants. Stu- tion, and he continued to split his time matter of the show.” was caught by surprise,” he said of the dents learned to play traditional Afghan between running the school in Kabul, Enforcement will be conducted by a committee Variety Taliban takeover. string instruments like the rubab, sitar and Australia, where his family lives. consisting of Black Theatre United and members of Sarmast had left Kabul on July 12 and sarod. The tabla drum was among Today, he aches when he thinks of each leading group that are signatories. Egregious vio- the favorites. ELON, NC: Jeanne Robertson, who for his summer holiday, never imagin- the melodies once echoing down the lations could lead to parties being removed from the parlayed her appearance in the Miss ing that just few weeks later the whole “It was such an amazing school, eve- school corridors and the lives of boys document, LaChanze said. America pageant into a career as a speaker project and everything he’d worked for rything was perfect,” said Elham Fanous, and girls now being upended. Black Theatre United was formed in response to and humorist, died unexpectedly Saturday. the past 20 years would be endangered. 24, who was the fi rst student to graduate “We’re all shattered, because my the wave of national unrest over racial injustice that She was 77. He’s terrifi ed for his 350 students and from the music institute in 2014, after kids, they’ve been dreaming. They had followed the police killing of George Floyd in Min- Her death was announced by Elon Uni- 90 faculty, many of whom have al- spending seven years at the school. huge dreams to be on the biggest stage neapolis in 2020. It has hosted town halls on activism, versity, where she served as a trustee. ready gone into hiding. Reports of Tal- “It changed my life and I really owe of the world,” Sarmast said. “All my bolstered census participation and developed mentor- “We have lost one of Elon’s greatest iban searching for adversaries door-to- it to them,” he said of the school, which students had been dreaming of a peace- ship programs for aspiring young Black theater art- friends,” university President Connie door have fanned their worries. he describes as Afghanistan’s LaGuar- ful Afghanistan. But that peaceful Af- ists. In addition to LaChanze, its founding members Ledoux Book said in a statement. “Jeanne “We are all very, very fearful about dia, a public high school in New York ghanistan is fading away.” include Audra McDonald, Billy Porter, Norm Lewis Robertson loved to tell the Elon story the future of music, we are very fear- specialized in teaching music and arts. Still, he hangs on to hope, believing and Vanessa Williams. wherever she went.” ful about our girls, about our faculty,” A visitor once called it “Afghanistan’s young Afghans will resist. He is also Data from Broadway indicates vast inequities. Ac- She died at her home in Burlington, said he said. Sarmast, who spoke in a Zoom happy place.” counting on the international artistic Al McCree cording to the annual study, “The Visibility Report: her manager, . A cause of death interview, requested that additional de- “I cannot believe this is happen- community to put up a fi ght for the Af- Racial Representation on NYC Stages,” nearly 80% of was not released. Robertson became Miss North Carolina tails about the students and school not ing,” Fanous added, speaking from ghans’ right to music. Broadway and off-Broadway show writers were white be published, because he did not want New York, where he recently received “I’m still hopeful that my kids will as were 85.5% of directors during the 2017-18 season, at age 19, and won Miss Congeniality at the 1963 Miss America pageant. to endanger them. his master’s degree in piano from the be allowed to go back to the school the latest time frame analyzed. In a sign of what the future holds, School of Music. He was and continue and to enjoy from learn- On stages, over 61% of all roles in Her pageant experience, and her 6-foot- 2-inch frame, often provided fodder for her radio and TV stations stopped broad- also the fi rst student from Afghanistan ing and playing music,” he said. (AP) went to white actors, a rate double the population of comedy routines, delivered in her Southern white people in New York City. Data on designers is accent. even more unbalanced: In the 2018-2019 theatrical She wrote four books, the most recent the band’s new songs. “I said, ‘Yeah I’ll on her transistor radio introduce the new and partying along the way begins: “Out on season, 91% of Broadway design slots were fi lled with being “Don’t Bungee Jump Naked and oth- have to see it to believe it,’” she said. song, and note that a local girl was in the the road for forty days. Last night in Little white designers. er important stuff.” Her YouTube channel But that summer while she was at the fi rst few lines, she said. Rock put me in a haze. Sweet, sweet Con- LaChanze said the killing of Floyd and last sum- has received more than 114 million views. lake with friends she heard an announcer The song that’s about the band touring nie, doin’ her act. She had the whole show mer’s protests galvanized the industry to change. In one popular routine, “Don’t Send a Man and that’s a natural fact.” “Everyone wanted us to go back into the theater not to the Grocery Store,” she talked about her Grand Railroad’s Don Brewer, the way we left it,” she said. habit of making 7-Up pound cakes and the who wrote and sang lead vocals on “We’re diffi culty her husband, whom she always An American Band,” told The Associated Also: called “Left Brain,” had in interpreting her Press: “So sorry to hear of Connie’s death. NEW YORK: A Broadway revival of “Funny Girl” is grocery list. My memory of her is of a very outgoing aiming to open next year with Beanie Feldstein in the She taught physical education in North ‘sweet’ girl that wanted to be famous. starring role originated by . Carolina for eight years after graduating That was her goal in life. May she rest in Producers have announced recently that Feldstein, from Auburn University in 1967. peace!” the “Booksmart” and “Lady Bird” actor, will star as She was a one-time president of the Hamzy told the television station that Ziegfeld Follies comedian in spring 2022 National Speakers Association and was in- she fi rst got backstage at the age of 15 after at a Broadway theater to be announced. ducted into its Hall of Fame in 1981. (AP) her mother, who didn’t want to deal with “Funny Girl” has a score by Jule Styne and Bob ❑ ❑ ❑ traffi c, dropped her off early to see Step- Merrill, with a book by Isobel Lennart. This will be LITTLE ROCK, Ark: Connie Hamzy, a penwolf at Barton Coliseum. the fi rst Broadway revival of the 1964 musical. Strei- rock ‘n’ roll groupie from Arkansas who “We’d go out there and then we’d sand won an Oscar for the fi lm adaptation. was immortalized as “sweet, sweet Con- wander around the backstage area, and This will not be the fi rst time Feldstein has tackled nie” in the 1973 Grand Funk Railroad hit one thing would lead to another,” she told the part: “The fi rst time I played Fanny Brice was at “We’re an American Band,” has died. She KTHV. my third birthday party, in a head-to-toe leopard print was 66. Hamzy, who worked for a time as a outfi t my mom made for me. So, it’s safe to say that “I was determined to become a famous substitute teacher, hung out with groups stepping into this iconic role, on Broadway and not groupie,” Hamzy, who lived in Little Rock, that included Queen, the Eagles and Kiss, in my family’s backyard, is truly my lifelong dream told KTHV in 2019. “I really was.” KTHV reported. Hamzy told the televi- come true,” she said in a statement. An obituary posted by Griffi n Leggett sion station though that Van Halen was a Healey & Roth Funeral Home in Little particular favorite. Rumors of a “Funny Girl” revival have swirled for Michael Hibblen, the news director at years, with performers like and Lady Rock said she died Saturday. The Pulaski County Coroner had a report on her death Ukraine’s Eurovision winner singer Jamala performs a song about Soviet dicta- KUAR, told the Arkansas Democrat-Ga- Gaga speculated to be connected to the show. Songs but did not immediately release any details. tor Josef Stalin’s 1944 deportation of the Crimean Tatars during the Crimean zette that he used to run into her sometimes include “People” and “Don’t Rain on My Parade.” Hamzy told KTHV that she was fi nish- Platform Summit in Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, Aug. 23. The Crimean Platform, an at a Little Rock bar. Feldstein made her Broadway debut in 2017 in the ing her senior year of high school when the international summit called by Ukraine to build up pressure on Russia over the “She would sit there at the bar at The -led revival of “Hello, Dolly!” manager of Grand Funk Railroad called to annexation that has been denounced as illegal by most of the world, opened in Town Pump and openly share her esca- tell her that her name would be in one of Kyiv on Monday. (AP) pades with rock stars,” said Hibblen. (AP)