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Since our last update, we’ve continued working hard to transform The Public Theater, while navigating the very real challenges of a difficult year - dark theaters, staff furloughs, uncertainty about when we will be able to return.
In our last update, we had contracted with a consulting firm to support our cultural transformation work. We are sobered to report that we have now completed an in-depth, organization-wide equity assessment of our systems, structures, policies, and procedures. In late October, the staff, artists, our freelancer and production community, our Board, stakeholders, and community members we work with all engaged in confidential focus groups, surveys, and individual interviews. The findings reflected a culture that is far less healthy, supportive, and progressive than The Public Theater we aspire to be. Both the staff and the Board spent time understanding, reviewing, and discussing the findings.
We established two important internal groups to support the work coming out of the findings. Our Board created an anti-racism committee built out of the existing Diversity Committee to specifically develop and lead the Board through the development of a Board-specific action plan. And we established a Cultural Transformation Team - made up of racially and ethnically diverse staff from every department and representing a diverse cross-section of the team that makes up The Public.
Both of those groups have been tirelessly working over many weeks to develop a comprehensive plan that addresses the issues the assessment raised. We were aiming to share that plan by now, but as we moved through this process, we quickly realized that we needed much more time to carefully craft a plan we could all own, commit to, and endeavor towards together.
We have made great progress with our first draft plan, which is now being thoughtfully discussed and vetted across staff groups, departments, and our Board. Our hope is that in the first quarter of 2021, we will be able to share our ideas and commitments with the broader community.
As we were building those plans, we immediately recognized there were some opportunities and ways in which we could begin our cultural transformation work. We are proud to report that:
The Public Theater culture reflected in the equity assessment findings and in what we’ve heard from our BIPOC colleagues was built over time, and it will take time to undo it. But we do believe that the work we’ve been doing over the past few months can begin to transform this organization and make the culture of The Public one that our community is proud of and one that truly reflects our mission and our values. We remain committed to making sure we achieve our goals of becoming an anti-racist organization. Despite these difficult times, we are proud to report that our team has continued to show up, participate, and bring depth of experience and knowledge to The Public’s cultural transformation work. We look forward to sharing more with you in the new year.
Patrick Willingham
Executive Director
We are living through difficult times. The pandemic and the resulting economic fallout are causing enormous pain, loss and stress for so many of us, and the burden falls with particular severity on Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. In the midst of this, a call for racial justice and reckoning has arisen, in our country and across the world, that challenges us to reflect on and reform all of our practices, from the governmental level to the most individual.
The American theater community has been deeply damaged by the pandemic. Unemployment among our freelancers and staff members is catastrophically high, and the institutions which produce work and hire theater workers are under punishing pressure, as well. In this moment, we must mobilize and fight to ensure the survival of the field, and of the individuals who make up the theater.
But we have a unique opportunity, as well: inspired by a world-wide mass movement, educated by thinkers and activists pushing us to a deeper understanding of systemic racism and our role in it, we have a chance to not just come back, but to come back better-- more just, more anti-racist, more equitable. In the wake of George Floyd's tragic murder, and that of countless other Black men and women, it is time to understand the powerful and destructive role that anti-Blackness plays in American life, and in our field. This is the moment to make the invisible forces of systemic racism visible, and to center anti-racism in our practice. It is vital for all of us in the American Theater to accept this challenge. History is demanding it of us.
At The Public, we are examining our systems, habits, structures, and behavior, and what we have found so far requires change. We have not been courageous or consistent enough in challenging the structures that support inequity and white supremacy, and we have allowed too many problems to fester without taking bold enough action to resolve them. We have to change.
We are involved in an in-depth, organization-wide assessment of our practices and ways of working. This assessment involves our entire staff and Board, and is facilitated by outside experts. We anticipate releasing a comprehensive plan in November. Until then, we would like to share some of the changes we are making in our work.
This is an interim report, and there remains much more work to do. As we said above, by November we anticipate being able to roll out our comprehensive plan for transformation. The Public must become more anti-racist, more democratic, more equitable. Our mission, our history and our hopes all demand this from us.