Culture

When Donald Trump finally visits the John F. Kennedy Performing Arts Center next month to attend his first-ever show at the beloved Washington, D.C. cultural institution he will be treated to a performance of the musical Les Misérables that will be missing a number of key players. According to CNN, at least 10-12 of the show’s performers are expected to skip the June 11 performance Trump will reportedly attend on the same night as a high-dollar fundraiser at the Center.
CNN reported that the cast was given the option to not be on stage the night Trump is in the house, with both unnamed “major cast members and members of the ensemble” opting to take a night off in the midst of the Trump administration’s aggressive makeover of the venue. As part of his government-wide slash-and-burn effort to remake Washington his image, Trump installed himself as the chairman of the Kennedy Center with the help of a rebooted board made up entirely of his hand-picked appointees at the institution that has traditionally had a bipartisan mix of board members.

The Les Miz performance will coincide with the fundraiser featuring sponsorship levels selling for as much as $2 million according to ABC News, with the invitation noting that Trump will appear that night as “a special guest and friend of the Kennedy Center”; at press time it was not clear what the funds were being raised for as Trump is constitutionally barred from running for a third term. Trump played songs from the musical about the plight of the impoverished underclass during the French Revolution on stops of his 2016 presidential campaign, upsetting the co-creators of the stage musical, who requested that he stop blasting “Do You Hear the People Sing?” at his rallies.

In a statement to EW, Trump confidant and the Center’s new director, Richard Grenell, said of the reported boycott, “We haven’t heard this rumor. But the Kennedy Center will no longer fund intolerance. Any performer who isn’t professional enough to perform for patrons of all backgrounds, regardless of political affiliation, won’t be welcomed. In fact, we think it would be important to out those vapid and intolerant artists to ensure producers know who they shouldn’t hire — and that the public knows which shows have political litmus tests to sit in the audience.”

The cast boycott is the latest in an unfolding culture war between the Trump administration and some artists who were slated to perform at the Kennedy Center, a number of whom canceled shows in the wake of the Trump takeover. Among those who pulled gigs or resigned from their leadership roles at the Kennedy Center in protest were: Ben Folds, Renee Fleming, Shonda Rhimes, Low Cut Connie, Rhiannon Giddens, Issa Rae, as well as a performance of the Tony- and Pulitzer Prize-winning Hamilton, the lauded show Trump subsequently criticized, saying “I never liked Hamilton very much.”

Trump raged against the programming at the Center in February in a Truth Social post in which he wrote, “No more drag show, or other anti-American propaganda — Only the best.” In another post, Trump said he wanted to make sure the Kennedy Center “runs properly. We don’t need woke at the Kennedy Center. Some of the shows were terrible. They were a disgrace that they were even put on.”