Actors’ Equity Association is committed to working collaboratively with the industry to create a landscape that is just, inclusive, and anti-racist.
To that end, we’ve partnered with grassroots organizations and consultants who specialize in understanding and uplifting people of marginalized people with strategies that are tailored to the unique circumstances of a theatre workplace. Some of these organizations have asked their work with Equity remain confidential. As such, below is a non-exhaustive list of several of the organizations with whom we have worked in 2020 and 2021. Among them, at least six organizations are led by people of color, seven are led by women, one is led by a trans person and one is led by a person with disabilities.
The union has ongoing relationships with consultants who work with the union regularly on specific dimensions of diversity. Each of these consultants are not only experts in their respective dimensions, but have lived experiences in them, as well as being in the theatre industry at large and in theatrical communities with those who share their marginalized identity. They each hold two-hour workshops for members of Equity twice a year, updated each time.
While we cannot share our core responsibilities to the members as a union, like contract bargaining and grievance investigation, we welcome collaborations for member engagement events, public industry talks and long term member education programming. You can read write ups about the events in the Diversity & Inclusion Blog and you can find videos of the events behind the member portal.
Ongoing member education collabs:
Claudia Alick @ Calling Up Justice: Focusing on issues of disability and theatre.
Kaja Dunn @ Kaja Dunn Radical Equity Consulting: Focusing on issues of race and theatre.
Josie Kearns @ Josephine Kearns Consulting: Focusing on issues relating to gender and theatre.
Chelsea Pace & Laura Rikard @ Theatrical Intimacy Education: When a protected characteristic is leveraged for storytelling on stage, that is theatrical intimacy. It’s more than sex. Theatrical intimacy education is an ongoing collaborator because they frame intimacy in a way that acknowledges all primary dimension of diversity in a safe, transparent and respectful way.
Industry Think Tanks:
Line Drawn
Recent collaborations for member events:
B. Fli Productions
BOLD
If there is a group you think Actors’ Equity should team up with - or an org that would like to include a representative from Equity in an event or conference line-up - we invite you to email diversity@actorsequity.org. In particular, Equity is still looking for consultants to educate the union about age discrimination and religious discrimination in the theatre. We welcome the opportunity to explore new relationships, and the diversity department staff will be glad to help.
