Feminist Art

Theater in the Time of Trump: Feminist Storytelling Against the Backdrop of Authoritarianism

The Trump administration’s assault on the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts continues, with another tranche of staff fired last Friday—employees in its government relations, marketing and social media departments. A prevailing question remains: What does the future of national public theater hold? Will the show(s) go on?

News of the latest job cuts overlapped with the one-year anniversary of opening night of the Broadway show Suffs. Its anniversary got me thinking about the vital role of feminist storytelling against the backdrop of authoritarianism. We know that in a robust democracy, live performance is not merely “nice to have” or an outlet for escape. The ideas to which we are exposed in the theater mean exponentially more: They are a measurement of our collective pulse, a gauge of our collective potential and a glimpse into how much farther forward we might propel (or fall).

With all that in mind, I headed off to Broadway to check out the shows I suspected might smack of such sensibility. With Tony nominations just one week away, here are recommendations for the hottest shows for which pro-democracy viewers can root.

Have You No Decency?

“Have you no sense of decency, sir?” The iconic query—best known for the public takedown of U.S. Sen. Joseph McCarthy and his fearmongering campaign and persecution of Americans with supposed ties to communism and other “transgressions”—is making a comeback.

With renewed relevance and urgency, U.S. Rep. Bill Keating invoked the line a few weeks ago as a rebuke of fellow House member U.S. Rep. Keith Self whose boorish behavior at a committee hearing included deliberately, cruelly misgendering Congressional colleague U.S. Rep. Sarah McBride.

But the appeal took on technicolor form last weekend, thanks to the vision and handiwork of award-winning graphic designer Bonnie Siegler. Her Hands Off! protest signage is serious, next-level art: capturing the political moment and long litany of transgressions by Donald Trump, Elon Musk and so many of their cronies and capitulators.

Women’s History Month Is a Time for Optimism

Dispatches from Week 2 of Women’s History Month:

It’s Week 2 of Women’s History Month, and just knowing the federal government might well ban those three words in sequence—along with “gender,” “female,” “feminism” and about 250 others—you can bet I’m feeling extra rebellious as I write this column.

I am back from celebrating International Women’s Day (March 8) at South by Southwest. Among the festival keynotes, Chelsea Clinton urged that optimism is fundamentally a moral and political choice. Remaining optimistic, she remarked, is like “saying we do not have to accept the status quo. … We do accept that we may not be able to do everything all at once, but we can always do something.”

Women’s History Month is a solemn reminder that our reaction—and our commitment to action—also requires that we hold tight to the optimism our foremothers possessed.

Screaming for Change: Documentary Turning Women’s Fury Into Power Hits AMC+

In OUTCRY: Alchemists of Rage, Clare Major’s powerful direction and classical-violinist-turned-punk-singer Paris Hurley’s (of Object as Subject, an LA-based art punk band) high-octane music frame this riveting 30-minute documentary on Whitney Bradshaw’s ongoing social practice project, OUTCRY.

The short film follows the photographer from her home in Chicago to D.C. for a reproductive freedom march, then to Denver for an OUTCRY exhibition, and on to Dayton, Ohio, for a scream session just prior to voting on Issue 1, which enshrined abortion rights into the Ohio Constitution.

This film is available to stream from March 14 to April 12 in the AMC + “Future of Film: Athena Rising Stars” collection. 

Feminist Musicals ‘Teeth’ and ‘Suffs’ Steel Us for the Next Four Years

As feminist resistance faces a critical crossroads, Suffs and Teeth present two diverging paths: marching forward or tearing it all down.

It is the feminist movement’s challenge moving into a time that will most certainly require vigilance and resistance to consider how to reconcile these two paths forward. Will we keep marching? Or will we lick our teeth? 

The Most-Read Stories of 2024

Every day of 2024, Ms. writers and editors set out to create content that empowered, informed and infuriated readers. We sought out the truth, sounded alarms, asked tough questions, mourned feminist losses (and feminists we lost), looked to gender justice advocates abroad, and handed the microphone over to experts. Dear reader: As we enter a new year and a new era of the movement, we promise you more of this.

Explore the 30 most popular articles published this year on MsMagazine.com—the articles feminists most clicked, shared, studied, bookmarked and passed out at marches.

‘Mercutio Loves Romeo Loves Juliet Loves’ Brings Joy Into Its ‘Queer Kinda’ Adaptation at NYC Theater

Boomerang Theatre Company’s premiere production of Mercutio Loves Romeo Loves Juliet Loves by Gina Femia is keenly, tenderly aware of the pain of high school theater and being a teenage girl.

Directed by Scott Ebersold, the play is “a new queer kinda adaptation of Romeo and Juliet,” according to Boomerang’s online program, marking the first-ever production of Femia’s new play.

Mercutio Loves Romeo Loves Juliet Loves is running at The Jeffrey and Paula Gural Theatre at ART/New York until Nov. 24, 2024.

The ‘Woman in Charge’: Diane von Furstenberg’s Lifelong Commitment to Empowering Women, Fashion and Philanthropy

Though her fame as a designer came through the success of her iconic wrap dress, Diane von Furstenberg has said, “I don’t think I had a vocation for fashion; I had a vocation to be a woman in charge.”

Towards the end of the exhibit—on display at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles until Aug. 31, 2025—a QR code directs visitors to sign up for her more recent innovation: the “InCharge platform,” which serves as “a place to rally, where we use our connections to help all women be the women they want to be.” Its aim urges women to make “first a commitment to ourselves” by “owning who we are” and then to use the platform to “connect, expand, inspire, and advocate.” It is her latest project in a lifetime of advocacy meant to strengthen women.