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I like to keep up with culture, so I watched the Tonys last night. For five years or so before the pandemic, I live-drew them on-location, which was really fun. Theater people are a hoot, from my experience. The Tonys are not necessarily a great barometer of national trends or taste, but, like the Oscars, who wins or doesn’t win tells us something about us.
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The nominees for Best Play included one called “Liberation.” I was aware of the production, and was planning to see it because it’s about the Suffrage Movement and women’s lives. Happy to hear it was nominated, I expected it to lose.
It won.
This is good news because it is the first win by an American playwright, Bess Wohl, since 1989 when Wendy Wasserstein won for best “The Heidi Chronicles.” But I see it as a continued sign of the push back from women and male allies in the fight for women’s rights and equality. The political ethos for women is bad, and Trump’s attitude towards women gives so many permission to be misogynistic. We’ve seen it before, but things are getting better, bit by bit. r
Speaking of how he treats women, yesterday things were not going his way, so Trump walked out on an inteview with Kristin Welker, who was doing a great job pushing back on his claims about rigged elections in 2020 and now in California. In the interview, you can see that Trump is incredibly stressed, acting more angry than normal. Welker repeatedly tells Trump, “that’s not true, how can you say that?” “What proof do you have?” Trump says,
“What proof? I just have to look.”
Here is a portion of the interview.
Take note of the body language. Leaning into his anger, he is red in the face, unhinged because Welker she is not playing along with his “script,” and was challenging him. He calls her “either stupid or crooked.”
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Right before he walks out, Trump says, “Let’s call it quits. Thank you darling. Have a good time.” Welker was so strong and showed great courage, I applaud her. As we know, in recent months Trump has verbally gone after female reporters consistently, calling them names and attempting to belittle them.
By the way, the elections in California are going just fine, not rigged and while it is a long process, it’s not late.
Another significant interview was in the news over the weekend. Scott Pelley sat down with the NY Times’ Lulu Garcia-Navarro—another powerful female journalist— and spoke about the significance of his firing from “60 Minutes” last week.
“There was a thumb on the scale for the president’s version of events,” Scott Pelley told The Interview after he was fired last week from CBS. He also said, “We can save this. It’s possible to land this plane.”
That’s it for today. But before you go, here is another drawing I did on my phone while I waited to go into the Tonys in 2017. That year, it was held at the Beacon Theater. I love drawing on my phone with my finger.
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Thanks for being here, all. I hope you have a good Monday!!