Maureen Dowd

Americans for the Arts presents The 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy

An evening with

Maureen Dowd

March 24, 2014 Concert Hall The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Washington, DC

C 0 C 0 Sponsored By: M 53 M 2 Ovation The Rosenthal Family Foundation Y 100 Y 0 Special thanks to Google for its partnershipPAN inTON live-streamingE the event and thePAN TONE K 4 K 68 National YoungArts Foundation for its support7413 of the artist performers. Cool Gray 11 March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy 1

from all across the United States will walk the halls of Congress OPENING REMARKS BY to meet with your Representatives and your Senators to make ROBERT L. LYNCH the case for federal support for the arts and for arts education. And I’m here to say that advocacy works—your advocacy works—because last year alone we, together, not only prevent- ed a 49 percent funding cut to the National Endowment for the Arts, but we saw that agency’s budget grow by $8 million. That’s huge. And that’s only one of some dozen issues that we will be bringing up to Capitol Hill tomorrow. We will certainly face new challenges this year; however, our biggest objective is to strategically position the arts front and center before Congress and before the White House as an important economic and educational policy issue in America.

Our biggest objective is to strategically position the arts front and center before Congress and before the White House as an important economic and educational policy issue in America.

We’ll have a chance to do just that tomorrow, and you’ll be able to keep track of our activities by following us on Twitter and using the hashtag #AAD2014. The real potency of Arts Advocacy Day is the coming together of 85 of the most important national and state arts and civic advocacy organizations representing more than 100,000 President and CEO of Americans for the Arts Robert L. Lynch non-profit cultural organizations of every discipline throughout every region of this country. And they come together to develop a united policy platform for the arts in America. ood evening everyone and welcome to the 27th Annual Could I now ask the Arts Advocacy Day national cosponsors Nancy Hanks Lecture on the Arts and Public Policy. I’m and the state arts advocacy groups to please all stand and be GBob Lynch, President and CEO of Americans for the Arts, recognized? and I want to thank every one of you for joining us tonight here I also want to thank the hundreds of grassroots advocates at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. who have come from across the country to help make this We have another great and large crowd this year with 2,200 week a success. Also in the audience tonight, we have several guests here in the audience, and many more watching on our artists who have joined us, including dancers, Liz Lerman and Americans for the Arts YouTube channel as we live-stream this Dianne Brace, Damian Woetzel and Graham Lustig. event for the second consecutive year thanks to the support Actors Alec Baldwin and Nancy Stephens are also here from Google. to help us, and Nancy also representing Rosenthal Family We have a very special evening ahead of us, but first I’d like Foundation, a generous sponsor of tonight’s event. We’re also to take a moment to talk about a related event that will take joined by several of our artist committee members tonight via place tomorrow, National Arts Advocacy Day. Hundreds of you Twitter and Facebook, including Yoko Ono, John Legend, Kerry 2 March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy

Highly acclaimed Irish stepdancers Declan Crowley, Kiera Daley, Ashley Smith, and Kieran Coleman perform at the 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture. The dancers are alumni of YoungArts, an organization that identifies and supports the next generation of talented young artists in the literary, visual, design, and performing arts.

Washington, Ben Folds, and Josh Groban. And they have all you for being here tonight. tweeted out about the important advocacy work ahead of us I want to say a special thanks to NEA Acting Chair Joan this week. All in all, their combined tweets have reached over Shigekawa, who for 14 months has managed the National 12.5 million people. Endowment for the Arts as we wait for a new chair. Joan, thank I would like to thank personally the great Americans for the you for the great work that you have done. Arts Board of Directors who along with our staff are enabling We also have with us the heads of several of our public our organization to do these kinds of things—National Arts sector partner organizations, including the incomparable Advocacy Day, the Nancy Hanks Lecture—and to work in differ- Tom Cochran of the United States Conference of Mayors and ent kinds of areas for advancing the arts in America. Linda Langston and Matt Chase of the National Association of We also have a number of members of Congress and other Counties. key guests in the audience tonight, including the co-chair of And, of course, our sponsors for the Hanks Lecture, the the Congressional Arts Caucus, Leonard Lance of New Jersey; Rosenthal Family Foundation and Ovation, the nation’s only Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut; Senator Ed Markey arts television network. And I would like to specifically thank from my home state of Massachusetts; and Congressman Ovation’s CEO, Charles Segars, for serving as the honorary co- James Moran of Virginia, who will be receiving our 2014 chair of Arts Advocacy Day this year. Congressional Arts Leadership Award tomorrow. Also with us And, finally, I would like to recognize one more individual tonight are the co-chair of the Congressional STEAM Caucus, who actually may not be here yet but who is retiring this year Suzanne Bonamici of Oregon, Congressman David Cicilline after a lifetime dedicated to the arts and stepping down from of Rhode Island, Congressman Ted Deutch of Florida, and our Board of Directors after 26 years. Fred Lazarus began his Congresswoman Chellie Pingree of Maine. Thanks to each of career as a young assistant to Nancy Hanks, who our lecture March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy 3

is named for. She was then the Chairman of the National nationwide. Please enjoy. Endowment for the Arts who famously grew that agency’s [Performance: Zan McLeod and Celtic Borders with YoungArts budget by over 1,400 percent. As President of the Maryland Alumni Irish Dancers] Institute College of Art for the past 35 years, Fred transformed Thank you so much, and were they not spectacular? There’s that institution, and many believe the city of Baltimore itself, a book that I want you all to get, it’s called How the Irish Saved into a global leader for art, design, and creativity. And as the Civilization. Very good reading. founding board chairman of Americans for the Arts, he set forth I want to thank Zan McLeod on guitar, Patrick Cavanagh our path to become the largest arts advocacy and research on banjo, Alex Boatright on the concertina and accordion, and organization for the arts in the country. Please join me in recog- Katie Henderson on the fiddle. nizing Fred for his arts leadership. I also want to thank Young Arts for assembling such a And now for tonight’s program. When we started putting talented group of dancers from across the country to perform the components together for this evening, we quickly realized tonight. Thank you to Kieran Coleman, Declan Crowley, Keira a strong Irish theme taking root with Maureen Dowd, Alec Daley, and Ashley Smith. Baldwin, and even myself, presenting this event all within just Now, I have many pages prepared for the next introduction, a week of St. Patrick’s Day. Additionally, many of us never had but I have very clear instructions from the person I’m supposed a chance to truly celebrate because of the snowstorm, but to introduce about how that introduction should happen, and we’re going to fix that tonight with the inspiring music of Zan so this is it. There’s no “It’s always my great pleasure,” no unfor- McLeod and Celtic Borders. They will be joined by a dazzling gettable skits, no “Ladies and gentlemen, 25 years.” No—it is, performance of Irish stepdancing by highly acclaimed alumni “Here to introduce our featured speaker is the Y chromosome.” of YoungArts, our great partner that honors young performers

The performance also featured the talented Washington, DC-based group Zan McLeod and the Celtic Borders. (L-R) Alex Boatright, Katie Davis Henderson, Patrick Cavanagh, and Zan McLeod. 4 March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy

Talk about gridlock. They walk along the halls of Congress INTRODUCTION OF MAUREEN and, forgive me, four abreast—never thinking that other people DOWD BY ALEC BALDWIN need to move more quickly to their destination, others with a greater sense of spatial relationships, others with a Y chromosome. Whether it be to vote, or have lunch, or golf, men are simply more purposeful and more aware of time and space. Now, Maureen Dowd has never written that, but I think she would agree with me because she understands the real differ- ences between men and women.

A lot has been made lately about the negative effects of male aggression and maleness in general. This concerns the Y chromosome community a great deal.

Let’s take the simple task of deciding what restaurant a cou- ple might go to. Why is it that the surest way a man could get to eat what he wants is by pretending he’d rather eat anything Alec Baldwin (in character as the “Y Chromosome”) introduces but that? I think you men in the room understand what I’m talk- Maureen Dowd. ing about. You’re driving along. She says, “What time is it?” You say, “It’s 6:30.” She says, “I feel like I’m a little hungry.” “What are hank you. Thank you all, my thanks to Bob Lynch, to Nina you in the mood for?” you say coyly. “I don’t know,” she lies. Ozlu, and everyone at Americans for the Arts for the op- Pretending to factor in your input. You’ve been down this road Tportunity to come to Washington and introduce my friend, more than a few times, so while you are craving Japanese food you Maureen Dowd. That’s right, I said my friend. say, “Anything but sushi.” She stares out the window and blithely Because as I will make abundantly clear over the next few exhales, “How funny. That’s exactly what I’m in the mood for.” minutes, Maureen Dowd has been a friend to me and my fel- Now, you end up getting what you want, but can you imag- low Y chromosomes throughout her career. ine how this would play out in governmental affairs? A guy from Dowd wrote a book called Are Men Necessary?, but if you the gun lobby says, “I will not agree to any legislation that does read that book, you’ll learn that Maureen’s take on men and not include trigger locks.” And Senator Double Xer says, “Forget their relationship with women is as fair and evenhanded as— it, I can’t agree to that.” “Bingo,” he whispers to his colleague. Or well, I can’t think of anything fair and evenhanded in this town some coal guy says, “This Clean Air Act is an abomination. It just to compare it to. isn’t tough enough.” “Watch this,” says Congresswoman Double X, But, anyway, a lot has been made lately about the nega- taking her pen to it and cutting provision after provision. Is this tive effects of male aggression and maleness in general. This what we’re headed toward, more women stacked four abreast concerns the Y chromosome community a great deal. holding the menu of the Members Dining Hall hostage to some There was talk recently about the shutdown of the gov- silly game of reverse psychology? ernment having been averted due in no small part to back- Wait, that’s my phone ringing. It’s Maureen, hold on. Maureen, channel dialogue between female members of Congress. It was what’s wrong? No, you turn right at the Lincoln Memorial. Do suggested that overly prideful, macho posturing of men on the you see it? What’s on your right? Some body of water and a Hill had led to the intractable gridlock. Let me ask you, do you food cart? Okay, Bob is going to come get you. Bob, would really think it would be any better if women ran the show in the you send somebody to pick her up, please? Oh and, Maureen, House and the Senate? where do you want to have dinner later? What do I want? Well, First of all, women have no sense of spatial relationships. anything but Indian food.Oh, you do. Okay, well, then Indian March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy 5

food it is. And please don’t embarrass us, Maureen, about split- She dribbled Clinton down the sidewalk with one hand and ting the check. Okay, I’ll see you soon. George Bush with the other with equal dexterity and brutality. Now, an Australian biologist, Dr. Jennifer Graves, has re- She’s the Pistol Pete Maravich of political columnists. ported in recent years about the collapse of the Y chromosome. She knows both men and women in this town crave power, Three hundred million years ago, according to Graves, the Y and that the more women get it, and get used to it, the more chromosome had 1,400 genes to it; today, it’s down to 45. genes they’re going to start losing, too. She predicts that the Y will be kaput, extinct, gone in the way of Men-Only social clubs in around 5 million years. Now, why do you suppose that is? Could it be the strain and She dribbled Clinton down the sidewalk aggravation of living with someone who hates when you talk about an ex-girlfriend, but think it’s different when she men- with one hand and George Bush with the tions at parties what a great dancer Eduardo was. Or that Sasha other with equal dexterity and brutality. was so fit he could open a wine bottle with his abs. How Tim She’s the Pistol Pete Maravich of political was so good looking he couldn’t even walk through the Miami Airport without 25 women and men giving him their card. Could columnists. it be that the Y is collapsing because it lives with an XX who wants to talk about something critical, a burning issue like new sweaters for the dog, or how Y is tired all the time because he Everybody knows Maureen won the Pulitzer, but with her eats too much wheat; she wants to talk about this at 1:30 in the it was no biggie. In fact, she uses it as a paperweight to hold morning when Y has to be up at 5:30 and give a breakfast meet- down her take-out menus in her kitchen cubbyhole. She ing speech where they’re serving a lot of wheat. doesn’t care about glory or money. She certainly could have It’s a miracle I have 45 genes left, and those 45 I have left are gotten rich writing Nora Ephron-esque screenplays and Tina exhausted, trust me. Fey-like TV shows. Maureen knows, Maureen understands. A Catholic school girl, But no, not Maureen. She didn’t care about money or her dad was a detective, a cop. Maureen knows the difference status. She could have married any number of famous men. between men and women warrants dishing out criticisms of Eventually, they couldn’t keep up. Their numbers ended up in both in the same measure, just like she spared no political party. that pile of Asian fusion menus underneath the Pulitzer. Wait, I got a text. Maureen is pulling up. Words are Maureen’s passion. Ideas, truth, putting the almost incomprehensibly incomprehensible world of American politics into some salient perspective, that’s what she does. And she does it better than anyone. It’s fitting she’s here today at this great gathering of art supporters because her writing is a work of art. And Y chromosomes love Maureen Dowd—a gorgeous redhead who can cut you to pieces in a single sentence—because Maureen, herself, is a work of art. She went to Immaculata High School. She’s a Capricorn. Her middle name is Bridget. Here is a woman who understands men and likes them anyway. A woman for whom the double X status may mean keep out, danger ahead; it only makes her more alluring. Ladies and gentlemen, the funny, the brilliant, the gifted Maureen Dowd.

(L-R) Robert L Lynch, Maureen Dowd and Alec Baldwin 6 March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy

House on Central Park South and begged him to do the tag MAUREEN DOWD line. In that remarkable Welch voice, Burton replied, “I won’t do it. I can’t do it. I’m too bloody big, bigger than you will ever be.” Alec, you’re too bloody big to come all the way down here to introduce me, but I’m so happy that you’re back in public life. Even if it’s only for tonight. More than anyone I’ve ever met, you’re in love with the arts. You are celebrated in the arts community both for your incredible talent and incredible generosity, not only with the millions you’ve given but with your own time and fierce lobbying efforts. And, of course, your signature voice. And now that you’ve played a caustic Irish Pulitzer prize- winning New York newspaper columnist on Law & Order, you can come write my column any time you want. I’d like to see you take on Ted Cruz and Paul Ryan. The only arts they’re into are the dark arts. It is a great honor to deliver the Nancy Hanks Lecture. I am humbled both by my theme and by my predecessors. And I must candidly admit I was quite surprised to be asked to give a lecture on the arts. The arts, after all, ruined my life. My love life, that is. When I was 10, my older brother Michael took me to see Hamlet at the Carter Barron Amphitheater in Rock Creek Park. I immediately fell madly in love with the moping and, like, really deep Dane. I couldn’t wait for that crazy girl Ophelia to get herself off to the nunnery. I just knew that if I were Hamlet’s girlfriend, everything would be fine. He would be my project. Who doesn’t love a fixer-upper – especially one haunted by a ghost? The guy just needed a good kick in the pantaloons. And a little Zoloft. And, of course, I’d have to pry him away from his other girlfriend— his mother. The 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy I grew into a fanatical groupie for Shakespeare’s tragic heroes. PEELING EELS AND OTHER LIFE My next fatal attraction was the hot Scot stuck with the cas- LESSONS FROM THE ARTS trating wife who gave him advice like “Look like the innocent flower but be the serpent under it.’’ hank you, Bob Lynch. Thank you, Irish dancers and mu- She reminded me of some scary Queen Bees I knew in sicians. My dad was a champion stepdancer from Ireland, Catholic high school. I was certain that if I were married to Tso that meant a lot to me. And, of course, thank you, Alec. Macbeth, instead of that word that rhymes with witch who was My favorite of the many show business stories that Alec has always taunting him about being “unmanned,’’ he would be told me is this one. Laurence Harvey was doing a Courvoisier content. No double, double, toil and trouble for us. We’d sit by ad and the ad guys wanted to do the tag line with a more the fire in the castle. He’d mention regicide. I’d give him a nice famous actor who had, as they say, a signature voice, who mushroom meatloaf and a foot rub. . . and a little Zoloft. . . . and could say Courvoisier at the end with a rolling R. Harvey was he’d forget all about it. on the publicity tour for Butterfield 8 with Elizabeth Taylor so he I even fantasized about being Mrs. Lear. Sure, he was old offered to ask Richard Burton. Burton was a little bit smashed and imperious and “as mad as the vexed sea.’’ And my dog- when Harvey went to the Taylor-Burton suite in the Hampshire hearted, serpent-toothed, vulture-eyed, tiger-clawed daugh- March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy 7

More than 2,000 educational, cultural, and civic leaders and grassroots advocates from across the country fill the Concert Hall to welcome Maureen Dowd to the stage. ters-in-law would have been a handful. But that was a family in I figured it was a way to lure them from auto-replies and shake desperate need of a no-nonsense matriarch. And a little Zoloft. out some spontaneity. Even howling at the storm, though, Lear seemed like a Culture has often been viewed with consternation in politics. better bet than Othello. Who’d want to double date with Iago? Gary Hart was not viewed skeptically by his fellow sena- What a buzzkill. And such an egotistical climbing operator, he tors because he dallied with a beautiful young blonde. He was should have worked on K Street. Besides, even I had doubts viewed skeptically because he read novels, and even worse, that I could instill confidence in the tormented Moor of Venice. wrote them. “They thought I was strange,’’ he told me, “because As someone once said of Barbra Streisand, we’re talking about I was caught reading Tolstoy and Kierkegaard.’’ Of course, if he’d the Grand Canyon of need. been caught with Kierkegaard on “The Monkey Business” yacht instead of Donna Rice, the course of American politics might have been very different. And yet my life—my professional life, my George Bush, father and son, were utterly flummoxed by requests to do cultural interviews. They both accused me emotional life, my spiritual life—would of trying to put them “on the couch.’’ For them, culture was have been impossible without the arts. synonymous with psychoanalysis. W. admitted to being “cultur- ally adrift.” Pressed to name his favorite cultural experience, he replied “Baseball.” That’s not even lowbrow. It’s no brow, and So the arts saddled me with a fixation on impossible men. I somewhat surprising in the light of his recent accomplish- console myself with the thought that the impact of the scienc- ments as a painter of semi-nude self-portraits. es on my romantic life would have been even worse. Imagine I knew that W. had a tenuous grip on the topic at hand mining data for love. And yet my life—my professional life, my when I brought up Sex and the City. He shot me a sharp look emotional life, my spiritual life—would have been impossible and I realized he thought I was asking not about a TV show he without the arts. wasn’t familiar with, but actually about sex IN the city. For example: Long before it became a staple of political He had one word for opera: “No.’’ reporting, I developed an arts quiz for presidential candidates. His favorite play is “Cats.’’ 8 March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy

corny. But given Ryan Murphy’s success in that area, 41 was just ahead of his time. He shyly confessed that while his fellow Navy fliers in World War II ogled sultry pin-ups like Rita Hayworth and Betty Grable, he had a yen for Doris Day. His favorite actress, he said, was “the woman in Mrs. Miniver.’’ Perhaps carrying his attempt to seem more red-blooded Texan than blue-blooded Greenwich guy too far, Poppy told me his favorite TV snack was pork rinds and his favorite show was Hee Haw, even though it wasn’t even on anymore. Maybe he just liked to hear himself say “hee haw.” I gave Michael Bloomberg the quiz when he ran for mayor of New York, and he admitted he had never seen the quintes- sential New York show. Steinfeld, as he called it. It turned out his cultural landscape was dominated by Bond girls. Especially Ursula Andress. The best present he ever got was when a girlfriend presented him with a white dinner jacket and a Goldfinger video. Maybe she did that he because he was the man with the Midas touch. I knew Michael Dukakis would never be president when I asked him what he liked to do in his spare time and he replied, “Black mulch. I like to spread black mulch on my lawn.’’ He con- fused culture with horticulture. When I pressed him, he admitted to having a crush on Meryl Streep when she put on a Polish accent. I know that Sophie’s Choice was a thinking man’s movie, but he was certainly the only man who came away from it thinking of eros. He had no literary heroes, but tellingly, he was drawn to Dukakis tanked in the arts quiz. He didn’t care about fiction movie anti-heroes. He loved Paul Newman’s self-destructive or poetry or theater. He said he fell in love with his wife, Kitty, at defiance in Cool Hand Luke and Jack Nicholson’s demonic ir- a performance of The Fantasticks in Boston when she agreed to reverence. leave early and go back to her apartment and talk politics. He liked the Beatles before what he called “their weird His idea of beach reading was a tome called Swedish Land psychedelic period.’’ Use Planning. Not even the Swedish bit could redeem it. He was smitten with Julie Christie in Doctor Zhivago. But I never got a chance to give Barack Obama the culture really, who wasn’t? Perhaps that early Russian crush was what questionnaire, but I did give him a DVD of the first season of made W. think he could see into Pooty-Poot’s soul, as he called Mad Men once. Vladimir Putin, and blinded him to the fact that Putin was really “You just think I’ll like this because there’s a lot of smoking in the villainous Rod Steiger character. it,’’ he said accusatorially. W.’s father, Ronald Reagan’s vice president, admitted to me “No,’’ I replied. “I think you’ll like it because it’s about solitude that he fell asleep while watching a Reagan movie, The Santa Fe and because it’s well-written.’’ Trail. This, of course, was not just a sin against the Gipper; it was He looked dubious, but a year later, at a columnists’ lunch also a sin against the cinema. Michael Curtiz’s historical epic cov- at the White House, he leaned back in his chair to talk to me ered Robert E. Lee, George Custer, John Brown, abolitionism, the over Paul Krugman. “I want to thank you for Mad Men,’’ he said. struggle over slavery, and the coming of the Civil War. If that can’t He had had his body man, Reggie Love, send for all the other keep an occupant of the White House awake, what can? seasons. “The character of Peggy Olsen,’’ he said, “gives me some Poppy Bush said he liked glee club music, which seemed insight into what my grandmother must have gone through in March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy 9

the man’s world of banking in those days.” As a character said in Jacques Tourneur’s hypnotic triangle The President may not have good taste in New York Times of Robert Mitchum, Kirk Douglas and Jane Greer in Out of the columnists—his favorite is David Brooks—and he may insuf- Past: All women are wonders because, like martinis, they reduce ficiently appreciate art historians, but he has a refreshingly all men to the obvious. edgy taste in TV. You’d think since his days are filled with power As a teenager, I would go around snapping off film noir struggles, he wouldn’t want to kick back with power struggles, lines, even when they weren’t apropos. but besides Mad Men, his favorites included Homeland, Breaking “Quite the hacienda,’’ I would say to my mother when she Bad, Boardwalk Empire, The Wire, Game of Thrones, and House of was cleaning our house. Cards. So, it’s true, my life would have been a desolate moonscape without the arts. My new cinematic muse was the My brother Michael, who introduced me to my beloved Shakespeare, also regularly took me to the American Film unparalleled Carole Lombard, who once Institute, where I saw Gene Kelly dance for the first time in An mused: “I’ve lived by a man’s code designed American in Paris and Ava Gardner pretend to sing in Show Boat to fit a man’s world. Yet at the same time, and Brandon DeWitt yell “Come back, Shane!” after Alan Ladd. My family was movie-crazy. My mother kept my brother I never forget that a woman’s first job is to Kevin out of school between first and third grades a total of 96 choose the right shade of lipstick.” days, pretending he was sick so that he could go to movie mat- inees with her. I once got in trouble with the nuns because my mom took me to see Doris Day and Rex Harrison in Midnight “You seem like you could be framed easier than Whistler’s Lace, a remake of Gaslight, not realizing it was on the Legion of Mother,’’ I would say to my father when he got home from work. Decency’s list of condemned movies. She was constantly land- “You look like you took a hayride with Dracula,’’ I would say ing in the confessional over movies. to my sister after she got back from a date. Kevin got so obsessed with Tyrone Power’s Zorro that he As I got older, I decided my film noir persona was a bit dark, scratched Z’s onto school desks, blackboards, and all the lamps so I blended in some bright screwball comedy. Being deadly, it in our house. He even wore a black mask when he served as a turned out, was not as much fun as being zany. grade-school safety patrol. It became my passionate goal to walk with a baby leopard His Zorro imitation ended abruptly one day when a nun, and Cary Grant into a Manhattan nightclub, wearing a gold furious at his scrawled Z’s, lunged at his backside with her lamé dress. And to own a black and white deco apartment on yardstick. As the nun turned ever more scarlet, Kevin parried Fifth Avenue full of ibexes. And to host a scavenger hunt on the her thrusts with his ruler. Bowery that ended with William Powell butling me. Becoming “You are a pig and a drunk, Luis Quintero,’’ he shouted at her my butler, that is. as they dueled, “and you shall not long escape the vengeance My new cinematic muse was the unparalleled Carole of my sword.’’ He did not long escape the vengeance of the Lombard, who once mused: “I’ve lived by a man’s code de- principal. signed to fit a man’s world. Yet at the same time, I never forget Even though I grew up in the shadow of the Washington that a woman’s first job is to choose the right shade of lipstick.’’ Monument, the jutting Freudian symbol of a capital under male I went from quoting Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity dominion for centuries, I knew long before Sheryl Sandberg to quoting Barbara Stanwyck in The Lady Eve. Who’s more that women could lean in – sometimes with a gun, or a rod, as fun than Preston Sturges? I wasn’t dating yet, but I practiced it was known in my favorite movie genre. Stanwyck’s great line about her plan to torment Henry Fonda: I was raised on a steady diet of femme fatales, who never “I need him like the axe needs the turkey.’’ And her inimitable worried about being called bossy and never hesitated to kiss-off: “Oh, tell ’em to go peel an eel.’’ Now that I think about pursue happiness—in all directions. Women down on their luck it, that’s probably what gave me a taste for peeling eels in print. but with inner resources—and outer resources to match. Film It’s not my fault that there are so many eels to peel. noir has one inviolable rule: Deadly is the female. You see, nobody invents their own vocabulary. We inherit 10 March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy

the categories and the forms and the expectations with which “In a few years,’’ she says, “when I haven’t been around to be we engage the world. There is no other way. Before you experi- on your tail about something or irritating you, you could remem- ence life, how can you learn about life? ber that time that I bought you the baseball glove when you The short answer to that is culture. You might say it is life thought we were too broke. Or when I read you those stories. Or pre-lived. These myriad experiences are delivered through when I let you goof off instead of mowing the lawn. And you’re books, plays, TV, dance, music, and movies. gonna realize that you love me. And maybe you’re gonna feel Before everyone got addicted to little screens, we were badly because you never told me. But don’t—I know that you mesmerized by big screens. Movies gave me and other love me. So don’t ever do that to yourself, all right?” Americans—and many people living in far-off lands where we The lessons aren’t always admirable. If you watched James export our movies—an existential vocabulary, a verbal one and Cagney smash a grapefruit into Mae Clarke’s face in Public a visual one. Enemy, you knew that men could be cruel to women. If you Long before we experience desire and sex, we learn about watched Barbara Stanwyck gun down Fred McMurray in Double desire and sex from men and women on the screen. It’s not Indemnity, you knew that women could be cruel to men. mere mimicry. You feel the romantic essence through some- Now that Hollywood has fallen into a Spiderman web of thing called mirror neurons, but don’t ask me to explain that. comic book series and hot rod narratives derived from video We are given models and anti-models, ideals and anti-ideals. games, spending much of its time trying to please 15-year-old My first kiss was preceded by thousands of celluloid kisses. I boys, as well as dystopian teenage girl warriors and vampires, hoped to live up to them. trying to please 15-year-old girls, TV has taken on the role movies once had for many people. The searching heart follows the talent and looks for instruction where it can. Before you experience life, how can you Long before I ever thought of being a writer, long before I learn about life? The short answer to that ever thought I would critique anything, much less leaders of the free world, I loved to imitate George Sanders playing the is culture. You might say it is life pre-lived. acerbic New York newspaper critic Addison DeWitt in All About These myriad experiences are delivered Eve, the scene when Anne Baxter flings open the door of her through books, plays, TV, dance, music hotel room to kick Sanders out and he sneeringly tells her: “You’re too short for that gesture.’’ and movies. And I loved to mimic Clifton Webb playing another tart New York newspaper columnist, Waldo Lydecker, in Laura, as he dis- missed the gorgeous Gene Tierney, playing a young ad executive Movies, like novels, compensate for the poverty of individ- seeking an endorsement for a fountain pen. “I don’t write with a ual experience. They compensate for the inevitable limitations pen,’’ he said. “I write with a goose quill dipped in venom.’’ of every existence, which is always geographically, physically, Long before I ever owned a cocktail dress or even tasted a temporally, and sometimes economically circumscribed. They cocktail, my taste in fashion was shaped by the movies of the include the excluded. Movies correct for the local. They enlarge ‘30s and ‘40s. How many men and women learned to wear the horizon and stretch the sense of possibility. They anticipate clothes from the movies, to walk and dress and wear your hair experiences and give you standards for judging them. and flirt? And in the bad old days, smoke and have your lover Movies are instructions in how to live and how not to live. light two cigarettes and hand one to you. And they also teach you how to get sick and die, because we My instruction in fashion echoed the scene in Now Voyager can’t experience mortal illness until we experience mortal when Bette Davis is humiliated when Paul Henried sees that illness. What better depiction of a child’s fury at a parent’s fatal her borrowed dresses have pieces of papers pinned on the illness than the scene in James Brooks’s Terms of Endearment, back from her friend, little notes about how to wear them. Like based on Larry McMurtry’s novel, when Debra Winger’s charac- Davis’s shy spinster, Charlotte Vale, some of us needed coaching ter tells her little boy that she knows he loves her even though in glamour, and who better than ‘40s Hollywood to do it? he’s acting like he hates her. Those days of real glamour—the glittering era of Chasen’s, March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy 11

The YoungArts dancers and Celtic Borders musicians meet backstage with Maureen Dowd and Alec Baldwin

Ciro’s, the Coconut Grove and Don the Beachcomber’s—have decades we spent being a nation that saw itself through the now sadly been replaced by Kim Kardashian and the Real prism of John Wayne and then Sylvester Stallone as Rambo. Housewives of Botox. Back then, Hollywood was the greatest We also had All Quiet on the Western Front and Platoon. That is mythmaker of all time—especially about itself. another way movies contribute to our understanding: They Without the arts, people would have underdeveloped frame the debate. After all, Rambo and Platoon cannot both be imaginations. With underdeveloped imaginations, they would right. We needed to think. not lead either meaningful lives or moral lives, because without Movies and TV have educated us similarly about politics, the representations of otherness in art, you cannot imagine the from the insane idealism of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and pain or the poverty that someone else is feeling. The West Wing to the insane cynicism of House of Cards. Think of Nobody experiences everything. Everybody needs supple- the number of people in my business who still can’t get Robert ments. Everybody starts out too small for certain purposes Redford and Dustin Hoffman out of their minds. When they and we need to be shown what’s possible. You can’t be a fully formed human being based only on your own experiences. We need to see other lives. Without the arts, people would have Art is precisely such a long and deep and disquieting tuto- rial for the individual imagination. You will not act to relieve suf- underdeveloped imaginations. With fering unless you understand it. And if you are not experiencing underdeveloped imaginations, they would it yourself, as I hope you are not, the only way you can under- not lead either meaningful lives or moral stand it is by seeing depictions of it in movies and elsewhere in the culture. lives, because without the representations When it comes to questions of war and peace, the repre- of otherness in art, you cannot imagine sentation of war in movies have had an enormous impact on the pain or the poverty that someone what Americans feel. We have learned about the nobility of war and the cruelty of war. else is feeling. We’re so war-weary now, it’s hard to believe how many 12 March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy

imagine their noblest selves, it’s not Woodward and Bernstein human attention ever devised.’’ We don’t ask what’s true or false but Redford and Hoffman. anymore, good or evil, beautiful or ugly. We just ask how things And President Obama says he only wishes members of work. We game everything now and measure everything, Congress were as “ruthlessly efficient” as Frank Underwood, the including our deepest feelings and impulses, for their utilities felonious politician in House of Cards. The President said wist- and outcomes. fully: “It’s like, Kevin Spacey, man, this guy’s getting a lot of stuff But as Leon observed, “there is no greater bulwark against done.’’ Actually Frank Underwood got a little too much done the twittering acceleration of American consciousness’’ than an when he killed a journalist. I know there are two sides to every encounter with a work of art or a book or an image. question, but I’m against that. And you, too, Alec, right? “Perhaps culture is now the counterculture,’’ he declared, Then you grow up and become an adult and you start adding that “as long as we are thinking and feeling creatures, to have experiences of your own. This introduces the second creatures who love and imagine and suffer and die, the hu- phase of a moviegoer’s life. You can compare kisses on screen manities will never be dispensable.’’ to real ones, imagined love and desire to actual love and desire. People sometimes complain that movies and TV distort reality. There’s some truth to that, but they also enable people to see others’ reality. Movies now do what novels did in the Movies now do what novels did in the nineteenth century: They shake us out of a complacent acceptance of our given circumstances. They demand of us a greater nineteenth century: They shake us out of appetite for experience. Emma Bovary was absolutely right to a complacent acceptance of our given take romance novels as seriously as she did. How else would circumstances. They demand of us a she have escaped, even fleetingly, her provincial existence? What else could have emboldened her to take that carriage greater appetite for experience. ride in Rouen? Books set her up, but books also opened her up. Now Sandra Bullock gets out of her provincial life by climbing into a rocket. Space opened her up and set her up and opened You’ll still sit in a dark room and watch other people live, but her up some more. you’ll also leave the theater or click off the TV and live yourself. This is what I learned from film noir. Film noir is about The strength of the movies is that they allow us to live ordinary people fallen on hard times, generally with nothing vicariously. But that is their weakness, too. Vicarious living is not but their looks and sometimes not even that. Film noir is an im- the highest form of living. At some point, one must graduate portant chapter in the great Emersonian saga of American self- from one’s influences and live a life of one’s own. We must be reliance: their abiding subject is how to cope with challenges more than a bundle of references. when you can depend only on yourself, when you’re counting The enlargement of the self by culture, the correction of on lucky breaks, not privileges or connections, in unclear and individual limitations by the depiction of other lives, be it the treacherous situations. low life provincial New Jersey primitives on The Sopranos or the Film noir, ironically enough, taught me about feminism and seedy Louisiana lawmen on True Detective, is especially urgent fending for oneself. It taught me there are moments where you in a society that is obsessed with shrinking our world down to have to be hard-boiled, sometimes 20 minutes worth, even if smaller and smaller devices, spitting out smaller and smaller later you go upstairs and melt into a puddle of fear and self-pity. bites of information for people with smaller and smaller atten- It taught me that, if you pay attention and bake yourself in tion spans. the arts and open yourself up to the visions of visionaries, life As my friend Leon Wieseltier recently told the graduating can be “quite the hacienda.’’ class of Brandeis, the technology that has inebriated us, the ma- Thank you. chines that have enslaved us, “represent the greatest assault on March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy 13

CLOSING REMARKS BY AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS BOARD CHAIR ABEL LOPEZ

s we say in Spanish, buenas noches, good evening. I’m Abel Lopez. I’m Chairman of the Board of Directors of Americans for the Arts. What a terrific night this has been! How fitting Ain this month of St. Patrick’s Day that we were treated to such a stunning Irish-themed performance by the DC-based musical group Zan McLeod and Celtic Borders, as well as some of the most accomplished Irish stepdancers in the nation who came from across the country for this event. These dancers are all alumni of YoungArts, the national organization that exclusively admin- isters the Presidential Scholars in the Arts awards. Please join me in applauding these artists, and the incomparable Alec Baldwin for his wonderful introduction of Maureen tonight. I want to also thank all of you, our guests, for joining us tonight both here in the concert hall and those online who watched via the live webstream that Google provided tonight. And of course, we are extremely grateful to our venue host for tonight’s activities, the John. F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. If you would like to watch tonight’s event again, please visit Americans for the Arts’ YouTube site. And, finally, for those of you who would like to mix and mingle with your friends and colleagues here, the Kennedy Center will have food and beverages available for sale in front of the concert hall. We look forward to seeing you again next year at our lecture. Have a wonderful night, and have a safe trip home. Thank you.

ABOUT THE LECTURER

aureen Dowd, winner of the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for distinguished commentary, became a columnist on The New York Times Op-Ed page in 1995 after having served as Ma correspondent in the paper’s Washington bureau since 1986. She has covered four presidential campaigns and served as White House correspondent. She also wrote a column, “On Washington,” for The New York Times Magazine. Ms. Dowd joined The New York Times as a metropolitan reporter in 1983. She began her career in 1974 as an editorial assistant for The Washington Star, where she later became a sports columnist, metropolitan reporter, and feature writer. When the Star closed in 1981, she went to Time magazine. Born in Washington, DC, Ms. Dowd received a B.A. degree in English literature from Catholic University (Washington, DC) in 1973. 14 March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy

ABOUT THE PRESENTER ABOUT OUR SPONSORS

The Rosenthal Family Foundation The Rosenthal Family Foundation (Jamie Rosenthal Wolf, David Wolf, Rick Rosenthal, and Nancy Stephens) are proud to support the 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy. Established by Richard and Hinda Rosenthal, the Foundation embodies the belief that individuals fortunate enough to receive unusual benefits from a society have the distinct obligation to return ith more than 50 years of service to the field, meaningful, tangible support to that society—in the form of Americans for the Arts is dedicated to representing creative energy as well as funding. The Foundation encourages and serving local communities and creating oppor- activity and commentary concerned with constructive social W change and recognizes and rewards excellence in individuals tunities for every American to participate in and appreciate all forms of the arts. From offices in Washington, D.C. and New and organizations nationwide. Americans for the Arts is particu- York City, the organization provides programs designed to: larly grateful to Hinda Rosenthal, who approached the organi- 1. Help build environments in which the arts and arts zation about her foundation becoming a sponsor of the Nancy education can thrive and contribute to more vibrant and Hanks Lecture 14 years ago and whose extraordinary support creative communities. helped the program to flourish and grow into a pre-eminent 2. Support the generation of meaningful public and pri- national forum for dialogue about arts policy. vate sector policies and increased resources for the arts and arts education. Ovation is America’s only arts network, whose mission is to 3. Build individual awareness and appreciation of the value inspire the world through all forms of art and artistic expres- of the arts and arts education. sion. Ovation programming is a one-of-a-kind mix of original To achieve its goals, Americans for the Arts partners with and selectively curated art-centric series, documentaries, films local, state, and national arts organizations; government agen- and specials. Ovation’s signature programming includes The Art cies; business leaders; individual philanthropists; educators; and Of, A Young Doctor’s Notebook, and The Fashion Fund. Ovation funders. While local arts agencies comprise Americans for the reaches a national audience of over 50 million homes and is Arts’ core constituency, the organization also supports a variety available on cable, satellite, and telco systems, such as Time of partner networks with particular interests in public art, Warner Cable, Bright House Networks, Comcast Cable/Xfinity, united arts fundraising, arts education, local and state advo- RCN, DIRECTV, DISH, Verizon FiOS, AT&T U-Verse, Charter, and cacy, and leadership development. Hawaiian Telcom. Ovation is also available on VOD (in both Through national visibility campaigns and local outreach, standard and high definition). Ovation’s diversified viewer Americans for the Arts strives to motivate and mobilize opinion experiences extend across its linear network, the popular leaders and decision-makers. Americans for the Arts produces ovationtv.com, and active social presence on Facebook, Twitter, annual events that heighten national visibility for the arts, YouTube and more. Ovation is a cause based-media company including the National Arts Awards, the BCA 10, and the Public and is deeply engaged with the arts both nationally and locally, Leadership in the Arts Awards (in cooperation with The United providing more than $15 million in contributions and in-kind States Conference of Mayors), which honors elected officials support to community organizations, cultural institutions, and in local, state, and federal government. Americans for the Arts arts education programs. See the Ovation Facebook page for also hosts Arts Advocacy Day annually on Capitol Hill, conven- the latest information and conversations happening across the ing arts advocates from across the country to advance federal Ovation brand and the arts: www.facebook.com/OvationTV. support of the arts and arts education. For more information, please visit www.AmericansForTheArts.org. March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy 15

THE AFTER PARTY

(L-R) Alec Baldwin, Maureen Dowd, Ovation CEO Charles Segars, (L-R) Rep. David Cicilline (D-RI); Americans for the Arts Board U.S. Department of the Interior Special Assistant Zaina Javaid, Member Dorothy Pierce McSweeny; Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA); and Robert L. Lynch former United States Secretary of Labor Ann Korologos; and former United States Ambassador to Belgium Tom Korologos

(L-R) Robert L. Lynch, Maureen Dowd, and Alec Baldwin meet Rep. Betty McCollum (D-MN) and television journalist Andrea guests backstage at the Kennedy Center Concert Hall Mitchell

(L-R) Ovation Executive Vice President of Content Distribution (L-R) Rep. David Cicilline (D-RI), Maureen Dowd, Rep. Leonard Brad Samuels; Maureen Dowd; Director of Legislative Affairs for Lance (R-NJ), and Robert L. Lynch the Office of Vice President Joe Biden Tonya Williams; and AT&T Assistant Vice President of Federal Relations Lyndon Boozer 16 March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy

AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS LEADERSHIP

As the leading nonprofit organization for advancing the arts in this country, Americans for the Arts works with a broad range of leadership, including corporate, philanthropic, and artistic leaders from across the country. Under the leadership of President and CEO Robert L. Lynch, Americans for the Arts’ governing and advisory bodies and their leadership are as follows: Board of Directors Business Committee for the Patty Duke Matt Mullican Abel Lopez, Chair Arts Executive Board Pierre Dulaine Leonard Nimoy Ramona Baker Edgar L. Smith, Jr., Chair Todd Eberle Alessandro Nivola Maria Bell John F. Barrett Hector Elizondo Naomi Shihab Nye Madeleine Berman Albert Chao Giancarlo Esposito Yoko Ono Nolen V. Bivens Joseph C. Dilg Suzanne Farrell Harold Prince Leslie D. Blanton Lynn Laverty Elsenhans Laurence Fishburne Robert Redford Charles X Block C. Kendric Fergeson Ben Folds Michael Ritchie Susan Coliton Martha R. Ingram Hsin-Ming Fung Victoria Rowell Theodor Dalenson Parker S. Kennedy Frank O. Gehry Salman Rushdie Alessandra DiGiusto William T. Kerr Marcus Giamatti Martin Scorsese C. Kendric Fergeson Robert Lamb III Josh Groban Cindy Sherman Susan Goode Craig A. Moon Mary Rodgers Guettel Gabourey Sidibe Floyd W. Green, III John Pappajohn Robert Gupta Anna Deavere Smith John Haworth Kathryn A. Paul David Hallberg Arnold Steinhardt Glen S. Howard Suku Radia Hill Harper Meryl Streep Sheila Johnson Roderick Randall Arthur Hiller Holland Taylor Deborah Jordy Henry T. Segerstrom Craig Hodgetts Julie Taymor William T. Kerr Mark A. Shugoll Lorin Hollander Marlo Thomas William Lehr, Jr. Ken Solomon Jenny Holzer Stanley Tucci Liz Lerman Jonathan Spector Siri Hustvedt Edward Villella Timothy McClimon Steven Spiess David Henry Hwang Clay Walker Mary McCullough-Hudson Barry S. Sternlicht Melina Kanakaredes Malcolm-Jamal Warner Felix Padrón Bobby Tudor Moisés Kaufman Kerry Washington Dorothy Pierce McSweeny Jon Kessler William Wegman Julie Muraco Richard Kind Bradley Whitford Margie Johnson Reese Artists Committee Jeff Koons Kehinde Wiley Barbara S. Robinson Jane Alexander Swoosie Kurtz Henry Winkler Edgar L. Smith, Jr. Kwaku Alston John Legend Joanne Woodward Steven D. Spiess Dame Julie Andrews Liz Lerman Kulapat Yantrasast Michael Spring Martina Arroyo John Lithgow Peter Yarrow Nancy Stephens Paul Auster Graham Lustig Michael York Ty Stiklorius Bob Balaban Kyle MacLachlan Ann Stock John Baldessari Yo-Yo Ma In memoriam Michael S. Verruto Alec Baldwin Yvonne Marceau Ossie Davis Charmaine Warmenhoven Theodore Bikel Peter Martins Skitch Henderson Robert L. Lynch, ex-officio Lewis Black Marlee Matlin Paul Newman Lauren Bon Kathy Mattea John Raitt In memoriam Amy Brenneman Trey McIntyre Lloyd Richards Peggy Amsterdam Connie Britton Julie Mehretu Billy Taylor Peter Donnelly Blair Brown Richard Meier Wendy Wasserstein Kate Burton Arthur Mitchell Chuck Close Brian Stokes Mitchell Stephen Collins Walter Mosley Chuck D Paul Muldoon Jacques d’Amboise Kate Mulleavy Fran Drescher Laura Mulleavy March 2014 The Americans for the Arts 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy 17

ABOUT THE NANCY HANKS LECTURE

Nancy Hanks was President of Americans for the Arts from 1968–1969, when she was appointed chair of the National Endowment for the Arts, a position she held for eight years. Until her death in 1983, she worked tirelessly to bring the arts to prominent national consciousness. During her tenure at the National Endowment for the Arts, the agency’s budget grew 1,400 percent. This year marks the 27th Annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy, established to honor her memory and to provide an opportunity for public discourse at the highest levels on the importance of the arts and culture to our nation’s well-being.

PAST NANCY HANKS LECTURERS 2013 Yo-Yo Ma, acclaimed musician and arts educator 2012 Alec Baldwin, actor and arts advocate 2011 Kevin Spacey, actor and Artistic Director of the Old Vic Theatre 2010 Joseph P. Riley, Jr., Mayor of Charleston, SC 2009 Wynton Marsalis, Artistic Director, Jazz at Lincoln Center 2008 Daniel Pink, best-selling author and innovator 2007 Robert MacNeil, broadcast journalist and author 2006 William Safire, columnist and author 2005 Ken Burns, documentary filmmaker 2004 Doris Kearns Goodwin, journalist and author 2003 Robert Redford, artist and activist 2002 Zelda Fichandler, Founding Director of Arena Stage in Washington, DC, and Chair of the Graduate Acting Program at New York University 2001 Frank Rich, op-ed columnist for The New York Times 2000 Terry Semel, past Chairman and Co-CEO of Warner Bros. and Warner Music Group 1999 Wendy Wasserstein, playwright 1998 Dr. Billy Taylor, jazz musician and educator 1997 Alan K. Simpson, former U.S. Senator 1996 Carlos Fuentes, author 1995 Winton Malcolm Blount, Chairman of Blount, Inc., philanthropist, and former U.S. Postmaster General 1994 David McCullough, historian 1993 Barbara Jordan, former U.S. Congresswoman 1992 Franklin D. Murphy, former CEO of the Times Mirror Company 1991 John Brademas, former U.S. Congressman and President Emeritus of New York University 1990 Maya Angelou, poet 1989 Leonard Garment, Special Counsel to Presidents Nixon and Ford 1988 Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., historian and special assistant to President Kennedy Washington, DC Office www.AmericansForTheArts.org 1000 Vermont Avenue NW 6th Floor Photographer Washington, DC 20005 David Hathcox T 202.371.2830 for Americans for the Arts F 202.371.0424 Copyright 2014, Americans for the Arts. New York City Office One East 53rd Street 2nd Floor New York, NY 10022 T 212.223.2787 F 212.980.4857