It鈥檚 been an unfortunately eventful year for the New York-based National Queer Theater. In March, they were a plaintiff in an ACLU lawsuit against the National Endowment for the Arts, because the federal agency had begun requiring grantees certify that they are not 鈥減romoting gender ideology.鈥� Then in May, NQT was told that their $20,000 NEA grant had been revoked, with the agency saying that it was pulling back funding of numerous theatres in order to focus on art that reflects "the nation's rich artistic heritage and creativity as prioritized by the President.鈥�
When asked how he鈥檚 feeling, founder and Artistic Director Adam Odsess-Rubin is not sad. Instead, he is fired up: 鈥淲e're upset by the attacks on the arts in the United States. We're upset by attacks on the queer and trans community, not only revoking funding, but limiting future opportunities for queer and trans artists,鈥� he says passionately. 鈥淲e are rallying our community and our resources and our queer joy and our art to spread inspiration and organize our community in spite of the government's actions.鈥�
And the way that NQT is organizing this Pride Month is through continuing, in the face of great adversity, to make art. That $20,000 NEA grant had been to fund NQT鈥檚 Criminal Queerness Festival, a presentation of plays from international artists, who hail from countries where being queer is criminalized. The NEA had funded the festival for the past two years, which makes the agency pulling back this year particularly shocking. But Odsess-Rubin was not defeated.
Immediately after they received that letter from the NEA, NQT launched a GoFundMe, which has to date raised over $12,000. That plus additional foundation support has meant NQT has recovered the missing $20k and has been able to put on the Criminal Queerness Festival, which runs until June 28 at HERE Arts Center. The festival features playwrights from Uganda, Indonesia, and Cuba鈥攚ith each play being given five fully-produced performances.
Odsess-Rubin first started the Criminal Queerness Festival in 2019, as a response to the first Trump Administration, 鈥漬ot only to show the violence and censorship of LGBT communities in other countries, but to warn my fellow Americans, my fellow queer Americans, that this can happen here, and it's happening here.鈥� Six years later, Odsess-Rubin鈥檚 instincts have sadly proven correct, as trans rights are being rolled back across the country, drag shows have been banned at the Kennedy Center, and government funding is taken away from any organization that promotes diversity or queer stories.
Instead of being a word of caution, the festival is now a showcase of survival. Says Odsess-Rubin: 鈥淲hat I'm taking away from these plays is that queer artists from around the world are giving us a road map for how to survive and how to resist under fascism and authoritarianism. And we are building global queer solidarity through these plays, by gathering the theatre together to not only see and empathize with stories of queer people from around the world, but to then organize and discuss and interrogate what this means for us in the U.S. right now.鈥�
One of the plays being presented at Criminal Queerness is Tomorrow Never Came by Jedidiah Mugarura, a writer originally from Uganda鈥攚hich has one of the harshest anti-gay laws in the world, with prison sentences ranging from a decade to a lifetime to anyone who is gay. Tomorrow Never Came follows a decorated soldier who is torn between his wife and his lover, who is a man.
Mugarura currently lives in Toronto, but in 2023, he took a big risk by presenting Tomorrow Never Came in Uganda鈥攁t great danger to himself, considering that many artists in Uganda choose to self-censor rather than test the country's Anti-Homosexuality Act.
鈥淚 had to do it with a small group of friends, a very close-knit community, and we did a closed reading in which we trusted the people who were there,鈥� describes Mugarura, who smiles fondly when describing that reading in Uganda. In the basement of a local cultural center, he noticed the center鈥檚 security guards were enraptured by the play. 鈥淚 was watching the play and watching them, and they wanted to know more. They weren't violent. They were bringing in more chairs for the audience members who didn't have a place to sit. And they wanted to know. And I believe that's the power of theatre because at the end of the day, what the government is doing, it is suppressing knowledge. Ugandans are not naturally or organically homophobic, it's made up. They just want to know; they want to see art and to see what possibilities exist in the world.鈥�
Through continuing to make art, these artists hope to continue to shine a beacon in the current darkness. For NQT, the lawsuit against the NEA has been somewhat successful; artists no longer have to check a box saying they are not 鈥減romoting gender ideology." Though Odsess-Rubin admits the lawsuit doesn鈥檛 prevent the NEA from secretly withholding funding from queer artists.
At the same time, he says, 鈥溾婭 hope our actions, joining this lawsuit and creating works like Criminal Queerness Festival and Staging Pride, our queer youth theatre program, I hope this sets an example for other theatres. Whether they're bigger than us or smaller than us, we can use our platforms and use our resources to fight back against these repressive policies鈥e are creators of American culture, and we need to hold on to our freedom of speech and our freedom of expression, because that's what makes America great.鈥�
When asked how he stays hopeful, Mugarura has an apt answer for a theatre artist. 鈥淐ommunity is what keeps me feeling hopeful,鈥� he says, before adding, resolutely, 鈥淭his is the time we have to do our work. This is the time to show up. This is the time when the writers get writing, the producers get producing, the funders bring in the money. Everything seems to be falling apart, but this is the time.鈥�
