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[0:01] Ruthie Fierberg: I'm Ruthie Fierberg, and this is Why We Theater.

[0:06] Ruthie Fierberg: The Intersection of Theater and Social Justice.

[0:09] Ruthie Fierberg: This podcast digs into today's most thought-provoking and urgent onstage works with the artists who made them and real world experts who advise us on how we can create impactful change in our offstage lives.

[0:22] Ruthie Fierberg: After all, that is Why We Theater.

[0:26] Ruthie Fierberg: Today we are talking about The Prom.

[0:30] Ruthie Fierberg: The musical comedy begins on the fake opening night of Eleanor, the Eleanor Roosevelt musical, starring Dee Dee Allen and Barry Glickman.

[0:40] Ruthie Fierberg: When reviews calling out Dee Dee and Barry's narcissism close the show on opening night, the two decide to rehab their images by becoming celebrity activists.

[0:51] Ruthie Fierberg: With help from fellow Broadway vets Trent and Angie, they stalk Twitter and find the case of an Indiana teenager banned from her prom because she wanted to bring her girlfriend.

[1:02] Ruthie Fierberg: The four actors and their sidekick publicist descend on Edgewater, Indiana to help Emma, though they're not exactly wanted.

[1:12] Ruthie Fierberg: Emma is an out lesbian who lives with her grandma after fallout with her parents.

[1:17] Ruthie Fierberg: And while she's out, she doesn't want to be the poster child for political activism.

[1:22] Ruthie Fierberg: She just wants to dance with her girlfriend, Alyssa, at the prom.

[1:26] Ruthie Fierberg: But Alyssa isn't out.

[1:28] Ruthie Fierberg: In fact, Alyssa's mom is the PTA president leading the charge to ban Emma from attending.

[1:35] Ruthie Fierberg: As flashy and splashy as any musical comedy I have ever seen and loved, The Prom has a greater message about acceptance, the hypocrisies in our culture that block that acceptance, and what it means to be a true ally.

[1:50] Ruthie Fierberg: Though the show closed on Broadway even pre-COVID, producer Ryan Murphy brings a film adaptation to Netflix out December 11th.

[1:58] Ruthie Fierberg: Ahead of that, you can listen to the original cast album, as I often do on Spotify.

[2:04] Ruthie Fierberg: And here today to talk all things The Prom, our co-book writer Bob Martin, co-book writer and lyricist Chad Beguelin, and experts Isaac Archuleta and Jennifer Driver.

[2:20] Ruthie Fierberg: As I've said many a time, I am obsessed with The Prom, and I'm not ashamed of it.

[2:28] Ruthie Fierberg: I am so thrilled to have a reason to go back to this beautiful, beautiful musical comedy.

[2:35] Ruthie Fierberg: And I am so psyched that we have writers Bob Martin and Chad Beguelin here today with us, the Tony nominated duo, who also Bob is a Tony winner in his own right.

[2:48] Ruthie Fierberg: And Chad is a six-time Tony nominee.

[2:51] Ruthie Fierberg: So we are in the presence of Broadway greatness today.

[2:55] Ruthie Fierberg: Welcome, Bob and Chad.

[2:57] Bob Martin: Thank you.

[2:58] Chad Beguelin: Hi.

[2:59] Bob Martin: Nice to be here.

[3:01] Ruthie Fierberg: So I want to rewind to the beginning where the story goes that Jack Viertel, who was the previous artistic director of Encore series at City Center, he's a producer, he's a dramaturg, he's a critic.

[3:15] Ruthie Fierberg: He comes to you, Bob and Chad, with this idea for a musical inspired by real-world events where high schoolers have been banned from going as same-sex couples to their proms.

[3:29] Ruthie Fierberg: And I did some research, and there are too many examples of this.

[3:32] Ruthie Fierberg: You know, there's Buffalo, New York, there was French Settlement in Louisiana, there was Sullivan, Indiana, and on DoSomething.org, there is actually an anecdote from every single one of the 50 states where this has happened.

[3:48] Ruthie Fierberg: So I want to start with what resonated with you when Jack came with this idea that made you say, yeah, let's take the time, let's write this.

[4:02] Chad Beguelin: Um, Chad, correct me if I'm wrong. Did Jack go to Casey first and then Casey brought us in?

[4:07] Bob Martin: Yeah, it was actually Casey who Jack went to first, and then, but he did have the idea of us as a writing team.

[4:14] Chad Beguelin: He thought we were the ones that should do it.

[4:17] Bob Martin: And we had worked with Casey previously on Elf.

[4:19] Chad Beguelin: Yeah, director Casey Nicholaw, of course.

[4:21] Bob Martin: Yes.

[4:22] Chad Beguelin: So, but he, yeah, Casey was the first one to hear the actual idea.

[4:27] Ruthie Fierberg: And when Casey comes to you and says, guys, we're making a big broad musical comedy about this issue of kids not being able to go to their proms because they're queer.

[4:38] Ruthie Fierberg: What's your reaction to that?

[4:41] Bob Martin: Well, that's kind of what attracted us to the idea that there was something quite serious and painful at the center of it, but there but Jack had come up with this absurd premise where a group of very liberal, very naive Broadway performers come down and try and help this girl and maybe try and help their careers at the same time.

[5:05] Bob Martin: So it allowed us to it was it was very clear that we could package the very necessary political message within this ridiculous comic construct.

[5:20] Chad Beguelin: Why we were really excited about it.

[5:22] Bob Martin: I was gonna say, why did it work in your mind that it should be a broad comedy with, you know, this politics and and true pain at the center for, you know, anyone who's experienced this kind of exclusion and hate, you know.

[5:41] Chad Beguelin: I think in the hands of other writers, it would be a very different musical, you know, it could be very somber, it could be, you know, more of the genre of Dear Evan Hansen, it could be more of the genre of an octet, you know, which we've talked about on this podcast.

[5:59] Chad Beguelin: What made sense about comedy and this topic to you?

[6:04] Bob Martin: Well, I think, you know, if he would have come to us and said, you know, it's just about a girl not being able to take her girlfriend to the prom, I think we wouldn't have reacted so positively because it would, in my mind, it could veer off into sort of an after school special.

[6:20] Bob Martin: Um, and so the idea was to get people laughing to, you know, sort of sneak the message in like a Trojan horse kind of thing.

[6:29] Bob Martin: So, you know, for us, it was all about, you know, we're not gonna lecture an audience, we're going to entertain them, we're gonna make them laugh and hopefully cry.

[6:37] Chad Beguelin: And I think it's a much more effective way, at least as far as we go, as far as we are as writers, a more effective way to actually get a point across.

[6:47] Bob Martin: Yeah, I know that Casey says this about his directing philosophy that he loves to disarm people with humor and say, I'm laughing, wait, why am I crying?

[6:59] Chad Beguelin: And to have that duality can be so powerful.

[7:05] Bob Martin: Yeah.

[7:06] Chad Beguelin: Also, I think that if you're more likely to attract people whose minds might be changed if it's a comedy.

[7:13] Chad Beguelin: In other words, people who go to see a drama about this particular subject already have a point of view.

[7:18] Chad Beguelin: Whereas people are just coming to see a, you know, a big singing and dancing musical comedy.

[7:24] Bob Martin: Yeah, might be forced to or tricked into thinking about their I like it, I like it, you know, it's the slipping the broccoli into the macaroni and cheese.

[7:36] Chad Beguelin: Exactly, yes.

[7:38] Bob Martin: When we did our out of town in Atlanta, um this, you know, nobody knew what the musical was about.

[7:44] Bob Martin: And after the show, this sort of older white man came up to our composer Matthew Sklar and he said, I didn't know what this musical was about.

[7:53] Bob Martin: And if you would have told me it was about two lesbians, I never would have come.

[7:56] Bob Martin: But you know what? I'm glad I came and I'm glad those two girls got together in the end.

[8:00] Chad Beguelin: And we were just like, wow.

[8:02] Bob Martin: Yeah, that was great.

[8:03] Chad Beguelin: That's exactly what we wanted to have happen.

[8:05] Ruthie Fierberg: That's amazing.

[8:07] Ruthie Fierberg: Oh, I love that story, and I'm sure that it's not the only one.

[8:11] Ruthie Fierberg: You've said you guys have worked together on other musicals, you've worked together on Elf, you know, Bob, you've done Drowsy Chaperone, Chad, you've done The Wedding Singer, where those are all big musical comedies, but they don't really have a political message at the center.

[8:27] Ruthie Fierberg: They are really, it's like just a humongous joy ride, and I am here for all of it, but I have to imagine that that is a very different writing process.

[8:38] Ruthie Fierberg: When you mix comedy with politics, how does that affect the way in which you're writing what you want to be putting literally in people's mouths?

[8:51] Chad Beguelin: Yeah.

[8:54] Chad Beguelin: It's a tough question to add.

[8:56] Chad Beguelin: I mean, because we were constantly, you know, we as we were working on the show, the show was kind of presenting itself to us.

[9:03] Chad Beguelin: And in Atlanta, it leaned more towards the sort of frothy musical comedy land kind of tale, right?

[9:18] Chad Beguelin: Less less of the realistic depiction of the characters and politics that were at the heart of the story.

[9:25] Chad Beguelin: It still worked, but it didn't work the way it did on Broadway once we made the adjustments.

[9:31] Chad Beguelin: So I mean, I think it's really important to listen to the to the performers and to the show that you're creating to sort of stand to try and get out of the way of the material that you're trying to write.

[9:42] Bob Martin: Um, and that's both the beauty and the challenge of writing a fully original musical.

[9:48] Bob Martin: You know, we use the word original in so many different ways, just you know, if it's written, you know, and if it hadn't been a musical before, we often say it's original, but most of the time there is source material, whether that's a book or a movie, and The Prom, you guys just built this plane in the air, you know, it was from scratch.

[10:12] Bob Martin: And I have to imagine that that really affects the adjustments that you know, you have all the freedom in the world, but you have all the freedom in the world.

[10:23] Chad Beguelin: Yeah, yeah.

[10:24] Chad Beguelin: And I it's funny, the the I think what struck me af especially after Atlanta is sort of what Bob was saying is that you know, you cannot make your villains in a piece like this, quote unquote villains, one-dimensional.

[10:43] Chad Beguelin: You have to understand their point of view.

[10:44] Chad Beguelin: And I think we did a lot of work to try and make, you know, Alyssa's mother, Mrs. Green, a real person with real concerns who actually loves her, loves her daughter, but she's just going about it the wrong way, or at least from our point of view.

[10:58] Chad Beguelin: And we also had to make the people that inhabit Edgewater, Indiana more realistic.

[11:06] Chad Beguelin: You know, we sort of they were a little cartoony in our out of town, and it I think people wouldn't take the show as seriously if we didn't if we hadn't gone back and made them, you know, truly real people, make the town in crisis, you know, and sort of like it says in the show, when people are afraid, they need somebody to blame.

[11:27] Bob Martin: And that's exactly what's going on in so many small towns right now.

[11:31] Chad Beguelin: Um, you know, and we base that town on somewhat on the town I'm from, which is you know, all the factories are closed, it's in the middle of you know, the Midwest, and people are scared, and people when they get scared, they start, you know, finding somebody to to put that on.

[11:46] Chad Beguelin: So I think that you know, is part of the politics of it all.

[11:50] Bob Martin: Um, you know, you you can't be one-sided, which I think we were a little bit in Atlanta.

[11:55] Bob Martin: You have to give both sides, you know, a real breathing voice.

[12:00] Chad Beguelin: Yeah, and that's not to say that you can't have a point of view.

[12:02] Chad Beguelin: I mean, you have to have a point of view about your material, you have to, you know, come down on one side of it, but you have to treat both arguments with respect in order to sort of break down the contrary argument.

[12:14] Bob Martin: Right.

[12:14] Bob Martin: I mean, I learned that in AP English in my junior year.

[12:19] Bob Martin: It was like the best way to win an argument is to seed the things that you agree with and make an, you know, make an emotional connection and say, I hear you on these things.

[12:32] Bob Martin: And then here's how I, you know, contrast.

[12:37] Chad Beguelin: And I think it's really effective.

[12:39] Chad Beguelin: I also think that this just speaks to the value of for those who don't know out there, the process of a Broadway show is like you don't really open cold on Broadway.

[12:50] Chad Beguelin: This is why an out-of-town tryout is so important.

[12:53] Ruthie Fierberg: And the fact that you did it in Atlanta in the South, while it is, you know, sort of a democratic leaning city in terms of the South, that that had to have affected what you what kind of feedback you were getting that you then incorporated to go to Broadway.

[13:10] Chad Beguelin: There was one incident that where this woman came up to me after a show and she was really upset and and she sort of had her eyes lowered, and she's she just said that um I am Mrs. Green, right?

[13:28] Chad Beguelin: And I did what that character did.

[13:32] Chad Beguelin: And she it was clear that she was full of shame about it.

[13:35] Chad Beguelin: Yeah.

[13:36] Chad Beguelin: And but she she turned to me and she she she said, This is a really important show.

[13:40] Chad Beguelin: This has to get out there.

[13:42] Chad Beguelin: And then she took me into the lobby and introduced me to her daughter and her daughter's wife and their child.

[13:49] Chad Beguelin: And it was really moving. It was like, wow, that's the she went through that journey and she came out the other side. She managed to see, you know, become a little bit enlightened as the Mrs. Green does in our own show, like to a certain extent. That's incredible. There's a hint of the possibility that she will have a relationship with her daughter. Right. So it was really beautiful to see that, and it was really incredibly moving to see her carrying that burden of that pain with her. I mean, it's funny, right? Because it's a musical comedy. But again, I mean, this is the power of theater. And we are going to get into more of the power of theater and more of the questions that came up for me as I was watching the show and how that applies to real life.

But before we do that, I really want to talk about these two groups and these kind of two tones that you've been alluding to, where the Edgewater Indiana folks are really more grounded. It feels almost like a play. And then you have the four big Broadway stars and their publicists who are just so bold and so bombastic. And you know, the self-proclaimed we are the liberal Democrats from Broadway, which is one of my favorite lines in the whole show. How do you go about showing the blind spots on both sides? Because I thought you did that very well as a liberal Democrat from Broadway, of saying, like, oh yeah, we kind of make a lot of assumptions about quote small town USA.

[15:30] Bob Martin: Well, you it's funny. The moment where I feel like you are hopefully the audience understands what we're doing, is actually in the reprise of the opening number. You know, Barry says, we're gonna teach them to be more PC, and then they've become horrible in the lyrics. So it's right. So it's, I hope that's when the audience gets what we're doing. We're saying, no, no, no, we don't think these guys are saviors. We know they are completely clueless, and they're gonna go down there and make a whole, you know, big mess of everything. So for me, that at least as far as the Broadway actors go, that's hopefully when people see, oh no, we're not on their side either.

[16:12] Chad Beguelin: And I'm actually wondering too, in this moment, and you know, thinking back on your cast, like, was there something to be said about the fact that those people from Broadway were all white and coming into a town where you know we saw a lot of color and the principal was black, and yet the ideals are so stark in contrast.

[16:40] Bob Martin: Yeah, the politics was changing. The politics of America was changing while we were writing the show. And there was a real call to activism that happened after the election in 2016, and so that became a big satirical component of the show. This feeling that you need to do something, and then the mistake of doing it without educating yourself as to the nature of the situation and without recognizing your own privilege. Right. So that is one of the messages of the show. They come down there, they're wealthy for the most part, especially Didi. They're completely ignorant of the lifestyle of the people they're dealing with. The one thing is they're more liberal with respect to gender and to a certain extent, race. But yeah, they're white and they're privileged and they're ignorant.

[17:37] Chad Beguelin: Yeah, when clearly understanding that many times. Coming to rescue an LGBTQ teen.

[17:45] Bob Martin: Yeah. I've been far too angry to Google what those letters mean.

[17:50] Chad Beguelin: Exactly. I mean, it's so phenomenal. You know, as going on this line of thought, The Prom obviously centers around this young lesbian couple, Emma, who is out, Alyssa, who is not. Now, I believe not only in the product of theater. I don't believe in just looking at what we see on stage as an audience. I so fully believe in the process and the value in the process of making it. And I want to get to a world where black women have the opportunity that they deserve to tell the stories of black women, where queer folk have the opportunity to tell their own stories. And once we get there, I want to continue this space where we tell each other's stories and we learn through telling each other's stories if we do it right, what it is as close as we can get to walking in another person's shoes.

And you're both, I'm looking at you right now, you're both white men. Chad I'm really white. Bob is really white. Bob, you are straight. Chad, you are gay, and yet you are writing for a lot of teenage characters in this show, and certainly these two young lesbian women. How did you each get into the mindset of your lead characters in the story?

[19:32] Chad Beguelin: Well, you know, basically we divided it up. I did all the young cute teens, and Bob did all the aging narcissists. So it was really simple. No, especially, you know, as far as Emma and Alyssa go, I, you know, I as I said grew up in a very small town. It was a very different time, and nobody was out. And I know what it's like to walk through the hallways and be called a fag, and you know, to have things hurt, you know, shout at me and just to keep your eyes down and don't engage. And so, you know, a song like Just Breathe was very easy for me to write because that's what I did, you know. There were certain hallways where I was like, you just go somewhere else in your mind and ignore it, you know.

As far as you know, the middle age thing, you know, we talked to the actresses a lot because they were much closer in age, and I actually talked to my nieces and nephews a lot, and which was hilarious because they would just crack up when I would say, Well, is anybody saying this anymore? And they would just be like, Oh, Uncle Chad, no, no, no, no, no. So, you know, we tried to keep checking in with that age group to make sure we weren't using, you know, completely, you know, 1950 slang. But relying on, you know, a lead actress like Caitlin Kinnunen who earned a Tony nomination for that role and really shaping it around her, that sounds like a good plan to me.

[21:09] Bob Martin: Yeah, I mean, and they were all game to just, you know, we were very open to like, is you know, does this sound like, you know, a middle-aged guy, or does it sound like a high school student? Yeah, we and you know, these things are created collectively to a certain degree. You know, theater is. That's why I love theater. You're in a room full of people, you're getting feedback from the actors and the crew throughout production. So it isn't as narrow a perspective as one might have writing a novel or something about a particular subject. Yeah, I mean, I felt that I was lucky to be put in a position where I could enable this story to be told, given, you know, I have a position of privilege and access to resources and money and the ability to write.

I have empathy as well as a human being. I wouldn't be a writer, an artist or an actor if I didn't empathize with the situations that people are going through. You know, it's about listening, it's about educating yourself and treating the subjects and the characters you're creating with dignity. I mean, even one of our producers, Lisa Morris, came up and she contributed the really important moment in the story because of her experience coming out to her mother.

[22:36] Chad Beguelin: Wow. So it's a little bit of the process of writing, especially when you're dealing with something that is not your specific experience, is almost journalistic, right? You're interviewing people, you're educating yourself. So yeah, I mean, this everything that's happened in the last year has really made me think about who I am and what I'm doing clearly. And yeah, I mean, I still believe that a writer should be allowed to write anything. They should have that someone's perspective on a particular issue is valuable as well as someone's someone who may have directly experienced something, their insight is obviously valuable, but perspective is valuable as well. Yeah. But I do feel to a certain extent more than ever, and I've said this to you, Ruthie, that it's kind of time for me to shut up a little bit and listen a little more. And I've been attempting to do that in the last year. This year has been such a bad year, but at the same time it's been an enlightening life experience, yeah, really enlightening year.

[23:47] Ruthie Fierberg: I mean, I also have to imagine that the conversation deepens and shifts with the casting of the movie because with Ariana DeBose, you know, playing Alyssa and Kerry Washington as part of the production, you're doing even more listening because now you have a queer woman of color at the center of the story, not just, you know, young, queer white women. And so that compounds factors as well. You mentioned and I'm kind of gonna tie this in that you mentioned that from Atlanta to Broadway, headlines were changing, you're responding to the moment. How did things directly, you know, in the climate of that time show up in the Broadway show? And how are headlines in the moment of this time going to show up in what we see in December, if at all?

[24:49] Chad Beguelin: Well, I'll just mention that Alyssa's speech, Chad.

[24:54] Bob Martin: That's I was gonna say, you know, that during you when we wrote when we first wrote Alyssa's moment where she came out to her mother, that was during the Obama administration. Yep. When everything looked wonderful. Things were looking up, as they say. Yeah, yeah, everything was looking up. It was everybody was moving towards a brighter future, and it was really a question of being on the right side of history. And that was kind of the point of her statement. And then things got really dark really fast. And that all altered. We couldn't, we couldn't say the same word, we couldn't have her say the same words anymore. We took, you know, everything in American culture took a giant step backwards.

And so it, you know, we altered that moment. It became more a personalized, it became the idea that that you know the change was long overdue and has to be fought for, and that it's personal courage that really makes change happen. And then Barry's interjection about you will lose her, you will lose your daughter, getting to the actual ramifications of this type of thinking, you know. We that his speech used to be much longer. Every Thanksgiving you will have a loan, every Christmas you will have a loan, you will not have your daughter. It was quite brutal. Wow. Because that's the truth. And the these days, truth is not something that's expressed very clearly. So, you know, we yes, it absolutely developed as we listened as much as possible to you know what was going on in the world around us.

I mean, in terms of what Ryan has done with the film, he's it's a different audience on the day that the film will premiere on Netflix, which is December 11th, by the way, it'll be seen by more people than saw the entire Broadway run.

[27:03] Chad Beguelin: Right. It'll be seen by people all over the world. Yeah. And he removed a certain degree of sort of specificity about Republican Democrat politics in order to make it interesting, more global. Yeah, yeah. His whole thing is he wants a queer kid in Russia to see this, and he wants his life to be saved by it. Which, like for us was like Ryan, go do it, man. We're so thrilled with that.

[27:35] Chad Beguelin: Like this, the power of having that platform for our show and our message is amazing to us.

[27:44] Bob Martin: We're so grateful.

[27:45] Chad Beguelin: No, it's incredible.

[27:47] Bob Martin: And um every single one of the characters that you created from the Dee Dee Allen's and the Barry Glickman and their absurdity, and Trent and Angie, and um all the way to all of those inhabitants of Indiana.

[28:06] Chad Beguelin: I mean, Principal Hawkins and Mrs. Green, everyone is you fall in love with everyone, you really understand everyone, even if you don't agree with them.

[28:18] Bob Martin: Mrs. Green, especially, I need to shout out to Courtney Collins because she was absolutely incredible in this very difficult role.

[28:27] Chad Beguelin: And quite frankly, Mrs. Green is the reason we're here in this discussion.

[28:32] Bob Martin: It was her line that I said, this is where we need more people to talk about this because when spoiler alert, and we're not gonna have too many spoilers in this because there is such a wide audience coming to Netflix.

[28:46] Chad Beguelin: So we're gonna keep a lot of things under wraps, don't worry.

[28:50] Bob Martin: But this I feel is a fairly predictable spoiler that Alyssa does come out to her mother.

[28:57] Chad Beguelin: Um, and when she does, Mrs. Green says, I just don't want you to have a hard life.

[29:05] Bob Martin: And that was the line that that producer Lisa Morris contributed to the show. It's from her own experience coming out to her mother.

[29:11] Chad Beguelin: And so then we know that this is the mentality of so many parents out there that it is well-meaning.

[29:19] Bob Martin: But my reaction sitting in that house was look who is making it hard.

[29:26] Chad Beguelin: Yeah.

[29:26] Bob Martin: Look who is the one making it hard.

[29:29] Chad Beguelin: No one else in this town did that.

[29:31] Bob Martin: You did that.

[29:32] Chad Beguelin: I want us to contemplate that for a second.

[29:35] Bob Martin: And after a quick pause, we're going to introduce our experts.

[29:41] Ruthie Fierberg: Please welcome our experts, Isaac Archuleta and Jennifer Driver.

[29:46] Ruthie Fierberg: Isaac is a mental health professional with a master's in clinical mental health counseling, specializing in affirmative counseling to LGBTQ youth and their families.

[29:57] Ruthie Fierberg: He is the founder and CEO of I Am Clinic in Denver and preparing to open in New York City.

[30:03] Ruthie Fierberg: And the former executive director at the Gay Christian Network.

[30:08] Ruthie Fierberg: He is also the host of the podcast Queer Relationships. Welcome, Isaac.

[30:14] Isaac Archuleta: Thank you.

[30:15] Isaac Archuleta: Thanks for having me.

[30:16] Ruthie Fierberg: Absolutely.

[30:18] Ruthie Fierberg: Jennifer Driver is an award-winning reproductive health, rights and justice policy and advocacy leader and the founder of Take Root Strategies.

[30:28] Ruthie Fierberg: She was inspired to begin her work in these areas during her upbringing in Alabama and Georgia before she moved to Washington, DC.

[30:36] Ruthie Fierberg: She has worked in training and education for the Georgia Campaign for Adolescent Power and Potential and the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy.

[30:46] Ruthie Fierberg: She has also worked for the organization Welcoming America, which is a nonprofit focused on immigrant communities.

[30:53] Ruthie Fierberg: She most recently served as the state policy director and vice president of policy and strategic partnerships at the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States.

[31:05] Ruthie Fierberg: Welcome, Jennifer.

[31:07] Jennifer Driver: Thank you.

[31:08] Jennifer Driver: Thank you for having me.

[31:09] Jennifer Driver: I'm so excited.

[31:11] Ruthie Fierberg: So I want to start off with talking about Mrs. Green and this idea of I just don't want you to have a hard life.

[31:22] Ruthie Fierberg: I want to protect you, that this comes from love. What's your reaction to that?

[31:26] Ruthie Fierberg: Maybe Isaac, if you want to start.

[31:32] Isaac Archuleta: Absolutely. You know, I think that that is something we hear in the counseling office very often.

[31:38] Isaac Archuleta: And I do echo with some of your sentiments.

[31:41] Isaac Archuleta: You know, a lot of um Christian parents, we work with a lot of um Christian parents here at I Am Clinic, and they come in saying things like, we just don't want our child to suffer out there, we want them to stay safe, and yet they are um in very subtle ways encouraging the child to feel different, encouraging the child to feel less than.

[32:08] Isaac Archuleta: And I do think that um my honest reaction is is kind of one of um this very eager um anger to say, how do we educate parents to believe in their role, their powerful role to teach their kiddos how loved they are?

[32:29] Isaac Archuleta: I often tell my my gay clients, you know, it was it was our parents' job to convince us that we are lovable, and sometimes we walk out of childhood not believing the full depth of our lovability, if you will, and I think that it is a parent's job to say, one, it doesn't matter who you are or how you blossom.

[32:50] Isaac Archuleta: I didn't know what kind of seed you were when I planted you, but to watch you grow, I didn't know if you were gonna be a daisy or a rose, and it wasn't my job to shape you, it was my job to protect you as you blossomed.

[33:02] Isaac Archuleta: And I don't think parents fully understand that they are incredibly powerful because they're helping rewrite the internal script that a kid is going to use to identify in the world.

[33:14] Ruthie Fierberg: I love that analogy of the flower. That's beautiful.

[33:17] Ruthie Fierberg: Jennifer, what's your reaction?

[33:21] Jennifer Driver: Yeah, I mean, I think I think that I just don't want you to have a hard life, has been kind of the basis for a lot of um one of both a protective factor, but also kind of a discriminatory factor, right?

[33:32] Jennifer Driver: Because the way that I present myself in the world is um what's going to make it difficult for me to kind of navigate my space.

[33:41] Jennifer Driver: Um there's also an intersectionality focus to it, right?

[33:44] Jennifer Driver: So um not only I I just don't want you to have a hard life, the first thing that comes up for me is just being a black woman and like this idea of being as going to have a hard life as being a um black woman and then compounded um with a queer identity um and kind of what that that says.

[34:01] Jennifer Driver: So I'm gonna have a hard life um, regardless because I am a black woman, but also um, what are the systems around me that's contributing to that?

[34:11] Jennifer Driver: And so if we have discriminatory policies, if we have um kind of this um vocal pushback against LGBTQ, and in my case, where I work with um really focusing on young people, um, that's what's creating this hard life for them, not the fact that that they are um who they are.

[34:32] Chad Beguelin: Yeah, absolutely.

[34:33] Jennifer Driver: I mean, you know, there are other lines that Alyssa's mom says that also I think even backtracking to before a child or a person is clear on their identity, um before a child comes out and needs that love, there are a lot of questions, right?

[34:57] Jennifer Driver: And what Mrs. Green says is this isn't who you really are.

[35:02] Jennifer Driver: You're confused, you're young.

[35:05] Jennifer Driver: And for someone who is young and is feeling confused, that gaslighting undermines the process of understanding one owns identity.

[35:18] Ruthie Fierberg: So, how do we help people at any age, but especially youth navigate their own identity specifically when it comes to sexual orientation?

[35:31] Isaac Archuleta: Absolutely, sure.

[35:34] Isaac Archuleta: You know, one of my favorite little quotes is the primary function of sexual orientation is not to tell me whose body I will enjoy.

[35:34] Isaac Archuleta: The primary function of sexual orientation is to guide me towards the person who will teach me love at the most deep layer.

[35:51] Isaac Archuleta: And I think as we're educating people, specifically young queer kiddos who need to trust their body as they're developing their identity, it's not this, it's not only this identity that says my eyes are oriented to look at this gender and be attracted, but also to trust the desire that says I feel most seen, I feel most loved, I feel most safe, I feel most understood by this particular person, no matter the gender.

[36:20] Isaac Archuleta: And I can trust my body to guide me towards that person.

[36:25] Isaac Archuleta: I think if we were to talk about sexual orientation at its roots, where it's emotional intimacy first, we wouldn't have to come out as sexual beings, but more as emotional intimate beings.

[36:45] Isaac Archuleta: Ways level the playing field that there's not a better sexual orientation than another when every orientation is guiding us towards love.

[36:54] Isaac Archuleta: And I I don't think that many um parents understand that functioning, which is shocking to me because they're being guided by their own orientation.

[37:03] Chad Beguelin: Right.

[37:03] Isaac Archuleta: And I I find that very fascinating.

[37:07] Isaac Archuleta: Uh, you know, I do think the other thing is uh research now.

[37:11] Isaac Archuleta: We have a lot of beautiful research, especially starting around 2016, that um is proof that we are actually born with a sexual orientation and a gender identity before birth.

[37:26] Isaac Archuleta: It is prefabricated, it is made, I don't want to say fabricated, it is um it is created by two androgen bathing of a fetus during week six, and we twiled in the uterus, and then we come out and we don't know what's gonna happen until hormones kick in during puberty.

[37:43] Isaac Archuleta: But the foundation, the coding is already laid in place.

[37:47] Isaac Archuleta: And again, this idea of I have no idea what my child will blossom into, but the foundation is already laid, and it's my job to watch and nurture that blossoming.

[37:58] Ruthie Fierberg: And I think if parents could understand that, they could help the child trust what's happening in their own body.

[38:05] Ruthie Fierberg: So the coding is there.

[38:08] Ruthie Fierberg: How do we help kind of peel back the layers for a person to, you know, because I have the privilege of being straight, and that culture kind of told me that that was the norm, right?

[38:25] Ruthie Fierberg: So I never had a moment where I thought, oh, I'm not with the norm, but I imagine that other that queer people today, and you know, Chad and you were talking about feeling this way that like you were very othered and you felt different, and you just needed to breathe walking down the hallway.

[38:47] Ruthie Fierberg: What are the healthy questions that we should have all children asking themselves?

[38:55] Ruthie Fierberg: What are the healthy questions that maybe sex educators should be teaching youth to ask themselves to help uncover the truth of that coding?

[39:06] Jennifer Driver: Yeah, so I mean, I guess I would back up a little bit, right?

[39:10] Jennifer Driver: So I think a lot of it is how um we teach a lot of aspects of of things as we grow along, right?

[39:17] Jennifer Driver: So um you knew that you were part of the norm because the norm is what is projected in school systems, the norm is what is projected in society.

[39:26] Jennifer Driver: And so there was never that really that questioning.

[39:29] Jennifer Driver: We then started to move when we um started to look at like LGBTQ young people coming um and how we were going to interact um for lack of a better word with LGBTQ young people in spaces.

[39:41] Jennifer Driver: We started to have the words like tolerance, right?

[39:43] Jennifer Driver: And so we were trying to teach tolerance, and someone was, you know, they would say, Oh, we're gonna tolerate you.

[39:48] Jennifer Driver: If someone had said I tolerate you as a black person, I would probably knock them out, right?

[39:53] Jennifer Driver: Like I would be so frustrated.

[39:54] Jennifer Driver: And so then we move from tolerance to um inclusivity, right?

[39:59] Jennifer Driver: And so we were trying to figure out how do we include um LGBTQ young people as part of our conversations.

[40:04] Jennifer Driver: We started talking um in schools around um gender neutral um names, right?

[40:09] Jennifer Driver: So Sam and um I know I I find those um this whole lesson about gender neutral names when you're doing instructions so frustrating that I can never come up with two gender neutral names.

[40:20] Jennifer Driver: But two.

[40:20] Jennifer Driver: I have many gender neutral names in my life.

[40:23] Jennifer Driver: My parents are Randy and Elliot.

[40:25] Jennifer Driver: I will leave you to decide who is who.

[40:28] Jennifer Driver: Yeah, so we were we were doing that.

[40:30] Jennifer Driver: And we thought that, oh yes, by teaching gender neutral names, that we have we have done our job, like we we are being inclusive, and this is what was going to um help young LGBTQ young people thrive within schools and in communities.

[40:44] Jennifer Driver: And then we said, well, hold on, that's actually not enough.

[40:47] Jennifer Driver: We actually need to be affirming, right?

[40:49] Jennifer Driver: So we need this proactive approach that it wasn't just this one off conversation about LGBTQ identities and sexual orientation, but we needed to, this needed to be ingrained in every single thought process.

[41:03] Jennifer Driver: When you're in preschool, that all of this kind of um socialization, that we weren't putting forth this kind of heteronormative cisgender approach to how young people are supposed to act.

[41:14] Jennifer Driver: Um, and so when we think about sex education, we think about what the power of sex ed can be, um, is rethinking and retraining ourselves and getting rid of those heteronormative kind of those norms and really um moving beyond of what should um our society really look like and how do we do that.

[41:36] Jennifer Driver: On that note, for those of you listeners who heard our episode, our two-part episode about usual girls, we got into a lot about sex education and at what age do you teach consent and you know what does five-year-old teaching of consent look like, and what does ten-year-old teaching of consent look like and how that progresses, etc. And that we talked about that in sex education, even in the best of situations, which I consider myself to have come through one of the best sex education situations we probably have in America, not best on a global existential scale, but of what we have now, where I learned all about pregnancy. I learned about the reproductive system from videos and pictures and discussions.

I learned about STIs, I learned about contraception, and there was no talk about sexual identity. There is no talk, and all of the sex education and reproductive systems I got was in a heteronormative space of, you know, this is how babies are made, and also you boys and you girls are gonna wanna have sex and you know, don't do that. And if you do do that, wear a condom. There was no talk of what homosexual sex looks like and how that can be healthy. So, like what should we be teaching kids about the spectrum of sexuality and gender? How do we start that? From what age do we start that? The national standards come out and they start at um at kindergarten, but there is a whole body of work that says that you actually start in preschool and and and younger.

Um because I think as Isaac said, we come out knowing that we are sexual beings, right? Um and so in theory, we start having conversations around about sex education um late in life, middle school, um, high school. Um, and then if you're lucky, um, you get it some type of something in in in kindergarten and and up if you get comprehensive sex education. And if you're really lucky, you live in one of the 16 of 50 states that require it to be medically accurate, because the only 16 states actually require medically accurate sex education. So I don't even know what her other states are doing. Um but um so there's that. There are also a whole lot of states that actually prevent you, like want you to talk about um sexual orientation and gender identity in a negative light.

So that the only time that you're actually talking about sex among LGBTQ or lesbian, gay and queer young people, is that in the shape of an STI or HIV, right? And so that this idea that I have to have a mutual monogamous relationship, quote, from a lot of state standards. And when I talk about LGBTQ young people, it must only be in the form of the risk that are there and HIV and um and STIs. And so like what do we do? We change laws and policies, right? We change um we change what's happening at the district level. We're changing what's um the curricula that's being presented in um in schools. We provide massive amounts of trainings and actually have experts come in and and lead these conversations um or working with teachers so that they're in the best position to actually deliver this information.

You know, Ruthie and you and I had spoken about it. It's it's not just kind of your state, but it could be classroom by classroom for where your sex education can um can vary. So if you have a really homophobic teacher who's gone through all the training in the world, can still be protecting um projecting those values um as they're delivering their their sex education. You know, I'm a policy person, so I'm always going to be looking at the policy aspects of where um things need to happen. Um, and so there's there needs to happen a lot at the local level, but then again, a lot at the federal level, right? So there is still a federal push for abstinence only until marriage. And anytime you hear that, the red flag should be coming off as oh, these are going to be discriminatory policies against LGBTQ young people. Because when they're talking about it, it's between two heterosexuals, this gender um married. Right. And that that is the assumption with that, and that those assumptions are dangerous.

[46:11] Chad Beguelin: I'm wondering in in creating safe spaces, whether that is creating a safe home for exploration and for eventually full expression when we create schools, when we create uh communal spaces. Like Chad, what for you as a child, where, if anywhere, did you feel safe? Uh well, uh, it was obviously theater. Um, you know, I uh I remember uh my father taking me to the local community theater and the curtain went up on Oliver and I was like, what is this? Um and it uh I was lucky enough to have a community theater and schools that that put on shows and it definitely felt like a very safe place. And it's it's you know, for for me it was, you know, when you were in choir, when you were in drama club, when you were in rehearsals, uh nobody was going to come at you.

Um and I think that also says a lot about the kind of educators that go into the arts because they're you know, back to what Isaac was saying. I had a lot of theaters that were trying to protect the bloom. Um, and uh, you know, that was a real lifesaver for me because there were people that were saying, no, no, no, you're you're great just the way you are, you know. Um so for me, those were the safe spaces, and I think it's traditionally uh sort of true because you have sort of most times you have educators that are very empathetic to anyone that is feeling as if they're an other, you know, or an outsider. Right. Well, it's a it's a field of emotion, of sensitivity, of taking other people's experiences on as your own, if you can.

Um I love that line in the show of well, of course it's subpar, you don't have a drama program is you know, something along the lines. And I do, I mean, as as funny as it is, it's funny because it's true that we think so much about the hard skills that we're teaching kids in schools and even you know, these facts, and I'm not gonna say, you know, I'm here advocating for accurate and comprehensive sex education, but as important as those things are, it's just as important to have the soft skills that we learn through the arts of connecting with each other, whether or not you have dreams of being Patti LuPone.

[48:48] Isaac Archuleta: Exactly. Or Bob Martin or Chad Beguelin. Isaac, what for you when you are working not only with um a child or an adolescent, but when you're working with families, what are you advocating to parents who do want to be helpful, who do want to make change? What are you saying to them are the strategies that they can take to make a safe space in their home when I also always want to acknowledge that, you know, parents are also a product of their culture, right? Like they grew up with their norms of their generation and you know, hope that their kids get married and have grandkids, and now suddenly it does affect their life. Their life is turning out differently than they thought. And how do you help them adjust to that and create the safe space that their kids need?

One of the first things is to really help parents check the stigma that they have around the queer community. Before they even were thinking about children, what types of notions or characteristics were they kind of uh slapping onto the queer community? Because I think it's important to understand the context from which the parents are having kiddos. The other thing that I always always encourage parents to do is learn the story of their child. How did you know you were different? What makes you feel different? Um how does it feel to be safe here? Um, when did you first know? Really important questions that validate the blossoming of the child's identity, whether it's gender identity or sexual orientation.

Because I want to help parents empathize with the reality of their child to say, if this is your internal reality, how do I create safety inside of this nest for that to be normal, but also for that to have uh for it to be sacred, that we get to protect this beautiful thing that's happening inside of you. The other thing that I really encourage parents is this might sound odd at first, but I encourage parents to have a boundary. And what I mean by that is not to boundary themselves off from their child, but to have a boundary that says, I am your protective parent. And so whatever you need to tell me, I'm putting up a boundary so that my emotions don't convince you that this is scaring me, that it's um hard for me, that it's a disappointment.

Because as a child, we're supposed to learn that we're not in charge of our parents' emotional reality. And so if a little kid says, you know, mom, I'm trans, and the mom says, Oh my god, we need to go to therapy, that child is no longer safe to be vulnerable. And so the boundary really helps the parents stay safe for the for their child's vulnerability so that they can actually guide their child through development as opposed to kind of leaving the child feeling sequestered, like they have to reinvent the wheel.

[52:00] Ruthie Fierberg: That's so beautiful. I I think that that's just an important thing, regardless of LGBTQ issues or identity or whatever, to help children learn that you can have your emotions and I will be fine as the parent. You are not responsible for my fear, for my anxiety, for you know, that's what we say in therapy. That's quote my stuff, right? Your stuff, my stuff. Um, Jennifer, you mentioned that like we want to work on a macro level of policy, but if a teacher refuses to teach something, or if a teacher teaches something with judgment, or if a teacher just passes out a pamphlet because they're required to, but doesn't review said pamphlet, you know, these interactions and the strength of them happen on an individual basis. What are the best ways to train educators and to create safe spaces specifically in schools?

[53:06] Jennifer Driver: Yeah, the one thing I will also say though is even on the flip side though, right? So if the teacher hands out said pamphlet, there's also those really great teachers who are um, as Chad mentioned, are affirming within their school system, right? And so they may be the first person that you're that that young person sees that's like, oh, this is a reflection of me, you know. And so it's like being. I'm glad you brought that up because that was, yep, that was my other question, is the flip side of what does a welcoming teacher look like because a child may not feel comfortable at home and may go looking elsewhere. So yes, answer both sides of the question. So to be able to see yourself reflected, not only either in the curricula that you see, but also the people around you.

I mean, I think we can all, at least for me, I remember the first time that I had a queer teacher or a lesbian teacher. I don't know how she identified, but um, you know, I remember my first teach that teacher. I remember the first time I had a I I grew up in Alabama um in Hoover, Alabama. So I was my sister and I were the only black students all the way until um high school, really. Wow. Um, and so I remember the first time I saw had a black teacher and then I have a black queer teacher, like blew my mind, right? And so to be able to see that person reflected in you and like to have that connection with someone is really powerful. Um, so that's one I just wanted to make sure that I was like, Yeah, and that actually relates to we did an episode on Pipeline where we talked about our education system and how important it is not for not just for your student body to be diverse and representative of the swath of America, but for your educators and your administrators to also be diverse and that we have to repopulate with black and brown teachers, with queer teachers and all of all of the people who had lost their jobs when integration in schools, you know, happened decades ago. So yeah, hearing how powerful that was for you is very important for people to realize. So yes, because you know, young people spend the majority of their day in school.

[55:13] Isaac Archuleta: Um, well, pre-COVID we did. Um, that's what was happening. So around training, so there are some really strong folks who are doing training for teachers and um health educators. Um, you know, and we talked about kind of the pre-2016 um era where there was a lot of funding that was going to schools to be able to offer this training um that was really supportive and moving this along fast forward to where we are 2020, and a lot of those that funding that was available and that those programs that were um offering these these trainings have been removed. Um the funding that was allocated to support uh teachers and school administrators um no longer exist or has been changed to something that has been very discriminatory.

Um, so you don't actually have that supportive um nature um on the ground. What I will say is that there are more efforts now to do kind of online trainings to have um sex educators coming into the classrooms to teach. There are community health educators that are getting trained to um if you're um not able to get this these really great programs in schools you can go to these community settings because um a lot of students go from school to like a community based learning and then go home.

[56:36] Isaac Archuleta: There also needs to be more training starting at a younger age I think um for teachers right so we've we teach teachers to do sex education in like 11th and 12th grade but never do we are we teaching like elementary school teachers about sex education partly because when we think about sex, we are thinking about the act of sex and not all of the other life those those skills that you were talking about those soft skills that happen before you even get to the sexual nature and um and later in life. Absolutely and there are really I was looking for resources there are fantastic resources on the Trevor Project website from glossaries to tool kits and you know we are not only about to elect a president we have to remember there are so many elections happening around the country for mayors and school boards and all of those things are what impact our communities on the most micro level.

You know it's the school board that sets the district policy that approves curricula that chooses textbook that chooses videos, that then chooses a superintendent and staff where you know they're enforcing those policies. And then again, they're hiring the teachers who are going to do this healthfully or not, and hopefully healthfully.

[58:03] Isaac Archuleta: Um I also just think that there's something to be said, you know, Bob, you were saying, just talking about general climate and how that changed and how that impacted the way in which Alyssa, you know, came out, and how in an administration such as the Obama administration where marriage equality was passed and things felt better for the LGBTQ plus community, that Alyssa felt like she could say things are getting better. But then in the world we live right now where marriage equality is being questioned, that impacts the day-to-day mental health of every queer person and every person who loves a queer person in this country. And I think there's a really powerful statistic that I just want to share that in terms of family, lesbian, gay, and bisexual youth who come from highly rejecting families are 8.4 times more likely to have attempted suicide as their lesbian, gay, and bisexual peers who report zero or little family rejection.

And so then imagine I do not have a statistic for this, but then also imagine on a macro scale, if your country is telling you that you are rejected, what the risks are for depression, what the risks are for suicide, that this is a really it's a dangerous problem that has, you know, we when we hear policy, it suddenly becomes abstract. But it's like, no, the policy has impact on the day-to-day feelings and self-worth of people who we should be cherishing.

[59:53] Isaac Archuleta: Actually, I want to talk a little bit about the practice of of coming out. Um and the moment of potential rejection or acceptance by people you love. Um should we still be coming out? Should coming out still be a thing? Is it important? If so, why? Um, because you know, I have I have many queer friends. I have some who sat me down and said, you know, I like girls and boys, I like boys, I like and I sat there thinking, this is nonsense. I never I never sat you down and said, I like boys, so why do you have to do this? At the same time, of course, I want to validate if that's important to them. And then I have some friends who are queer and just went about their lives, never had a sit down with anyone.

Do you know, they do what they do. Um, and I feel like we also have a whole thing about celebrity coming out culture of well, they never came out, and how dare they not stand for the queer community, or they took forever to come out. So talk to me a little bit, Isaac, about coming out. Is it a healthy practice? Is it is it important? It is something we should retire. What's going on?

[1:01:14] Isaac Archuleta: You know, I uh yeah, I definitely I love this question. I I'm thinking about kind of my my story here. Um, you know, uh I grew up in a Latinx community, very, very religious. And um both of my parents are pastors, and I remember just from the age nine till about twenty six, I prayed every day that God would change my sexual orientation. And as puberty kind of, you know, created this engine called sexuality in my body, and I began feeling my body even betray me. I started fasting two meals every day in high school as a way of petitioning God to change my sexual orientation because it was a matter to me of life or death. Will I live comfortably or will I perish and and kind of go to this fiery place of doom?

And in this context, you know, as a nine-year-old, as a 15-year-old, as a 26-year-old, I still questioned if I come out, will I be allowed in my mom and dad's home? Will I be allowed to go to their church? Will they want to communicate with me? And so the coming out process for me was if I needed to go through that because I needed to know that I would still be safe and that I would still be loved.

[1:02:37] Isaac Archuleta: You know, I love how you said it, Chad. You know, it was a different time when I'm 37 and um that was a different era. Now I watch the 12 year old client come into the office and they say, I didn't come out, I just started dating, you know, so and so. And I dream, I I just I reflect on my own life and think, my goodness, what self acceptance could have felt like. I would have saved years of depression, years of anxiety. There was one day where I got into my mom and dad's bed and I said, please don't let me leave because if I do, I might hurt myself. And confronting that that level of self-hatred and that level of shame. And I think the coming out process for many kids is a it's a major question of am I still good enough?

And to have a loved one say, absolutely, thank you for telling me. I not only accept you or tolerate this, but I want to celebrate this as well. I think for some kids from some backgrounds, that is an important little ceremony to go through. And as shame deconstructs and homophobia dissolves, as slow as it may be to see other queer youth not needing to come out, they just live out. I think that's such a wonderful gift too.

[1:04:01] Chad Beguelin: Yeah.

[1:04:01] Chad Beguelin: And so I think it really depends on the context. What are you feeling? What are your reactions?

[1:04:09] Bob Martin: Yeah, I mean, I I would have to agree. I think I you know, the first part of me my initial was response was I think it does depend on the on the the context and on the person. Um I'm not sure I can tell someone, you know, yes, you need to come out or no, you you know, you know, just live authentically. I I I think it it's their experience. Um I am ironic Nisi Nash was on TV on Good Morning America yesterday. You know, she just recently got married, and um the question about what you know, did she come out? And she was like, I I never had to come out, I'm not coming out, I was never in anywhere, you know. I just love who I love. Um, and so for me, I that kind of resonated. Um, you know, I'm I'm very different. I didn't necessarily have this coming out. Um, I'm just here.

[1:04:56] Bob Martin: And um, able, and so even that in itself is a privilege, right? That I am afforded this ability that I don't necessarily felt like I never felt like I had to come out anywhere. I just show up. And um and so in that sense, it's it's a privilege to be able to just do that. And so I honor anyone's um kind of feelings. Was yes, I need, I need, I really need that connection and that ability to say, hey, I'm here. Um I still gonna be loved by you? Or you know, those folks who are just you know, maybe on kind of like me, you're just there.

[1:05:36] Chad Beguelin: Yeah. Chad, was coming out an event for you? Was it was it a big deal for you? Was it something that you just kind of slid into?

[1:05:48] Chad Beguelin: Uh it was bizarre. I mean, I uh went to uh NYU and uh finally, you know, realized uh that I couldn't lie to myself anymore. And I started dating a guy, and I told my dad, and his response was, well, everybody experiments in college, so I just, you know, don't tell your mother. Right. You're young, you're confused. Right. And then he told my mother. And so she called me up crying. Um, and uh, you know, my and my brother, I remember uh heard and he called or he told my mother, well, he'll never know the love of a good woman. Um that was his response. They have no memory of this. My brother's like, I would never say anything like that. And I'm, you know, it's just, it was very funny because it was, you know, eventually accepted.

There was never any sort of like you're going to burn in hell talk, uh, or you need to change. But it was so um, but it was so dismissive. It was so like, oh, this is just college and people do things and you'll grow out of it. So it was very heavy on that, you know, the old phase uh uh excuse.

[1:06:58] Isaac Archuleta: Um that makes me wonder, Isaac, what is, you know, we can theorize about in the best case scenario, what you should be saying uh to someone who comes out to you to affirm and what it would feel like to be celebrated as you said. But how do you recommend people who come out and receive a negative reaction cope with that?

[1:07:24] Isaac Archuleta: Sure. I definitely think that community, the chosen family, other loved ones who are supportive, to really kind of um, you know, have those trustworthy, safe people ready so that they're they're kind of in position, if you will, for the coming out, so that they're ready to take your text or your phone call or go on the walk. Um, so that we can get the mirroring that you know, we can create all these facades and and be really accepted for them, the closeted life. But to have someone say, Hey, I see the undecorated version of you and I love it. And to have those people in position for us if we go through a coming out, you know, if you know that a parent or a loved one or a teacher, whomever it might be, might be dismissive, have someone waiting, um, so that you can really be supported.

I think the other thing too, and I I I love doing this work, but it's to trust your own story, you know, as that little Latinx little boy who is feminine and and loved playing with the girls, and and then watching you know, my body kind of respond to the the blonde kid in theater who was taking a shirt off in the dressing room to get into costume and thinking, Oh my goodness, to say that is my reality, and there's something beautiful about that, even if this person can't appreciate my version of love, it's still love, and I might be able to teach them something about love, and I have to kind of sit in my own with my own pillar of confidence and self-acceptance holding me up, even if people can't see that.

[1:09:08] Bob Martin: Yeah, but I feel like that's kind of a badge we earn as we watch our own lives expand and we've become mature because it's not something we know at 12 years old, right? So Bob, I'm wondering as someone outside of the queer community, if anyone has come out to you and if you didn't know how the best way to react is, or if you have questions for the experts in the room about like things you wish you knew at that moment, or to know if a moment like that comes along in the future.

[1:09:43] Bob Martin: Well, I'm you know, again, I'm far older than anyone on this Zoom call. I also grew up in Canada, so it was slightly different. Um, but um yeah, I it for me as as Chad said, it was the theater that made there was such a spectrum of people in the theater. Then I and I was an actor from a very young age, it started when I was like 10 or 12. Um so I was always surrounded by people um who were who felt empowered to express themselves and were very proud of who they were uh on every level. Um so there was not I don't remember anything uh about any trouble accepting someone of a particular, you know, gender the utopia of Canada once again wonderful, wonderful place up here. And so our border will be open again. I look forward to the day. I look forward to the day.

[1:10:42] Jennifer Driver: Yeah, there was just I remember so the whole idea of coming out. I had a lot of my formative, so I live in DC, but I also spent a lot of my um kind of a youth to adulthood in Atlanta. So two of like um that could be two of the most flamboyant cities that you can actually kind of live in. And so one of the things that I um knew is that I didn't want to be the poster child um for LGBTQ rights. And so I I remember in a work ex um environment, I I generally don't go in and you know flash that I'm queer at when I start a new job, but I remember when the folks at my job found out and I got like every freaking rainbow, like pride flag or every single thing. And I like it was always that you were then called on to be the representative of LGBTQ rights, and I knew for me that that wasn't where I wanted to sit.

Um that's Emma's story. Emma says I don't want to be the poster child. The poster child for this. And I always say that my my book, if I ever write a book, it would be hashtag bad queer because I I never felt like I would fit, you know, have that the right experiences and so much. So when we moved to DC and the neighbors, we are the only um we're one of the few black um people in this neighborhood, and everyone was bringing us something. They were like, Oh, we're we're really accepting, we're really loving. And like I get it, but like also I need you to see something other than my queerness.

[1:12:10] Jennifer Driver: That perfectly brings me to the trio of songs within the show that deal with acceptance in very different ways. And when I stepped back, I saw in my point of view that they work in conjunction. Um the acceptance song, which is when the liberal democrats of Broadway uh write this very naive tune, held it a NASCAR rally, they're very well intentioned, and you know, it's very silly in the best way, and they think it's genius because obviously, you know, bumblebees fly, and you know, whales have blowholes and humans can be gay. And then we have later on, we have Love Thy Neighbor, which goes directly to the community, directly confronting the spaces and the ideals and the religion and um some biblical hypocrisy, and then we finally get to Unruly Heart, where Emma is not becoming the poster child, but reaching out to her own queer community within YouTube. Bob and Chad, was it calculated that those three songs work that way? Did it was it a happy accident? Talk to me about writing those.

[1:13:34] Chad Beguelin: I don't I don't think it was calculated. I think um we wanted to make sure that they actually didn't, you know, rub up against each other and and sort of be the same moment again and again and again. Um the acceptance song uh went through a lot of changes. Uh originally the uh the lyrics were much more harsh. And uh so we had to soften that up a bit, uh, which happened a lot with the Broadway characters. We had to I had to change their lyrics because they were just too harsh. Um but uh Love Thy Neighbor is my favorite uh moment in the show because it's something that uh I get uh to discussions with people all the time with uh you know, this sort of cherry picking the Bible idea. Yep. Um and I grew up uh very active in the Presbyterian church.

And um just as a side note, you know, talking about finding safe spaces, you know, most people don't think of uh church being a safe space for uh, you know, anybody that's different. But uh I actually was very lucky to have a pastor there that I did the same thing that Isaac did. I was always praying for God to kill that part of me. And I finally told him, I said, you know, there's part of me that I I keep praying to God to take away. And he said, God made every single part of you. And that was so powerful for me. So you sort of never know where you're gonna find those uh safe spaces. Uh yeah.

[1:15:05] Chad Beguelin: But uh, but one thing that infuriates me is when people bring up the old testament and you know, say well, that song is very explicit, right? It reminds me, it reminds me of the West Wing monologue, the famous monologue. Look it up for those of you who don't know. It's my favorite moment of television ever, where you know, President Barlin says, you know, should I be stoning my chief of staff for working on the Sabbath? Do I uh, you know, nail my head of communications to the cross for playing football and touching the skin of a pig? Like which which laws apply and which ones are literal and which ones aren't. And so putting that in a contemporary context of, you know, this teenager who goes, well, my stepdad says, and oh, well, divorce is totally against the Bible.

So why are you okay with your parents being divorced and remarried, but you're not okay with homosexuality? What was the kind of response that you were getting specifically to that song? Because I'm really curious to know if that did illuminate the paradox there, or if people like kind of shut down, or if you even know how people were reacting.

[1:16:20] Bob Martin: Well, Bob, weren't you next to someone when uh that song came on and she was like, Oh, this is good. This is good. I don't know if it was Bob or Matt, but uh somebody was next to a woman in the audience, and when that song came on, she was going, Oh, this is good. This is good. Like, I mean, who knows uh what you know uh different reactions are, but it uh you know, it for me it it just uh it's it's saying it's so close to what I believe. And then um, and I guess with Unruly Heart, uh, that was, you know, her uh Emma's you know character is very, you know, going back to that poster child. I don't want to, you know, be on TV and do some freak show thing. I just want to I want to write a song and I want to sing it.

I want it to touch other people, like she says, who love somebody in a way that people can't understand. Um so I yeah, I guess we we didn't calculate to make them uh the three of them sort of work in concert, but uh it was sort of just you know trying to serve the moment. Uh Love Thy Neighbor has become uh the most controversial thing in the show in terms of touring. And there are markets where we, you know, they're saying we will love we love the show, but we don't want to do that song. And we're like, no, we're gonna do the show.

[1:17:34] Chad Beguelin: I was gonna say, do you so you say this song is in no way? Yeah, no, you can't do the show. It's cut this off. It's such an essential part of the story. We couldn't possibly not do that. I mean, it would be ridiculous to, you know, do a song about prejudice and blinkered thinking and you know, uh harmful, you know, as you talk about norms, about what that actually means and how norms are constructed in society and religious, you know, dogmatic thought is a huge part of the mechanism that constructs these norms. So we couldn't possibly ignore it. I was trying to find uh, you know, things that happen every day, uh, and nobody has a problem with because nobody's going back and leafing through, you know, Leviticus to say, hey, hey, what about this?

Um, you know, it's like I often wonder why we have held on to that verse about homosexuality as a culture, I mean, not as the individual people in this room, but like, why have we given up on so many things as you point out in the song? And yet homosexuality is the thing that everyone holds on to in that Bible.

[1:18:44] Chad Beguelin: Yeah, I mean, I I think it's, you know, it's somewhere where they can take their prejudice and go, look, here, this is the hand uh you know, written by God, and he says no, but we'll ignore the big 10 commandments and break them. No, that's fine. Um, uh, it's it's just I think it's a way to sort of back up hate and back up your uh opinion that people should be punished for being different. Um I mean, that's my guess. Uh the experts probably know better than I do, but I was gonna say Jennifer and Isaac, I see you both leaning forward. Jennifer, you want to go first?

[1:19:18] Jennifer Driver: Yeah, no, I love, I mean, I I agree with that. I think that there is some part of it that wears as a justification for um your um your hate for lack of a better, you know, to call it what's already there. It's an another way to kind of other a group, right? To um I'm and this group and know you're doing something wrong. You know, as a society, we like to kind of point out like the faults of other people, but not really kind of look at ours. And so um, there's a supremacy nature of kind of how we navigate our society. And then I think Chad said something earlier that um I actually wrote down, and it says when people are um when people are afraid they need someone to blame. And I think that there is a fear of um change and something different from kind of your own upbringing and the way that you know life to be. Um, and so there's a a fear in that, and so you you blame and you point.

[1:20:10] Isaac Archuleta: I have so many thoughts.

[1:20:13] Isaac Archuleta: Lay them on us.

[1:20:15] Isaac Archuleta: I have a master's degree from a seminary, oddly enough. And um in the consulting work that I did, helping churches transition from non-affirming to affirming, this and with my work at the Gay Christian Network, this cherry picking is often a concept and a kind of a uh challenge that we face often. You know, you know. I think that um I I will say that I think religion is the root of homophobia, and I don't think homophobia is the anti-gay hate crime that happens, although those are absolutely horrible. And I think the the actual smallest, most um root of homophobia is the willingness to tell somebody else that they're too different and unacceptable, and if we're communicating that in any layer, we're participating in homophobia.

We cherry pick from the Bible, I think, and kind of to answer your question, every civilization in society has had a scapegoat. We're trained to feel more powerful, we're trained to feel better morally correct if we can point out the flaws of someone else. And I think religion is so interesting that we have verses like God is love, and yet we can't appreciate the full spectrum of love as it is expressed through humanity. You know, I think if if we're going with this idea of God is love, is there a sinful version of love and a righteous version? If God is love, we can't have that. And so I think religion has a lot to reconcile with the paradox that's found in in scriptures, and I think that when we're cherry picking, it's almost this codependent relationship with God that says God needs me to protect God because if I don't stand up for this, God will somehow be afflicted or wounded, and so I need to be this protective force, and I think that's kind of silly, and so this cherry picking is a way, I think, to not only defend God, which doesn't need to happen, but it's also a way of maintaining the tribe.

You know, I heard somewhere, I don't know how historically accurate this is, but if there's a tribe of a hundred people, if it gets a little more than that, it's too big and there's chaos. If it gets too small, they can't protect themselves.

[1:22:47] Isaac Archuleta: And so this tribe of a hundred people needs just that right amount. And if one person goes beyond the fray, beyond the limits, then the tribe is threatened. And so it's we protect the tribe and we protect what we believe because we know we believe what we believe because we believe it and we never challenge that. Right. And I think the cherry picking is a great way to keep those, you know, those walls up so the tribe can stay safe. Right, and to keep people in line. It's interesting, you know. Obviously, Christianity is not the only religion that does this, you know. Um, this is an issue in Judaism, this is an issue in Islam. This is, I am less versed in, you know, Sikhism or Hinduism or Buddhism, but I imagine that there are manifestations of this just cross-culturally and cross-religiously.

And um in Judaism, you know, we just finish the high holidays and we have a prayer malkenu, which translates to our father, our king. And it's interesting that you said that moment of it's as if we have to protect God from hurting, you know, from wounding God, from our feelings doing anything to God. It brings me back to what you said at the very beginning of a parent creating a boundary, saying, My feelings are my feelings, so we shouldn't have to worry about our effect on our parents, or if we believe in God on our God as our father, our king. Um, I think that that's actually a very, you know, that's God's stuff, as it were.

[1:24:28] Isaac Archuleta: Um of course, you know, Isaac, you actually wrote in a beautiful piece after the Pulse Nightclub shooting. Um I want to quote the blossoming of homophobia is violence. That violence is not homophobia, it is the outcome of homophobia because it is quote, the root system is the cultural religious mindset that's comfortable branding an entire group of people as relationally inferior, spiritually immature, as well as socially and sexually deviant. End quote. And it's that belief system that is the thing that leads to canceling proms that leads to hate, that leads to bullying, that leads to all of these mental effects of depression and suicide and homelessness at higher rates in LGBTQ plus folk as compared to their heterosexual counterparts.

And so as we close out, I just want to ask to the room what is the first step to challenging implicit bias? You know, what policies should we be instituting in our families or in our workplaces? Does every place need to have a gay straight alliance just as, you know, just the same way we have HR? Should those things be taken into account? And I want everyone in the room to answer as to what their hope is. Love thy neighbor as you love yourself. And we have to start with loving ourselves. And what I mean here is understanding our inherent value. If I not only understand my inherent value as a cognition, but experience it as a knowing, then it's easier for me to see the inherent value of everybody else around me.

And I think that if we could get to a place where we say I am no better than or no less than my neighbor, I'm able to empathize with their story, their struggles, I'm less judgmental, I'm more compassionate. And that would be a beautiful day.

[1:27:00] Isaac Archuleta: You know, I think that one other thought, this idea of relational equity. It's not to say equality in my mind says, hey, come into my house and sit at my table and eat our food, but relational equity says this recipe isn't quite yet done unless you add your spices to it. And to say we need everybody's spices in order to perfect this recipe. That is a relational equity in my mind that stems from inherent value that says we all have beauty to contribute, and I don't think we can do that if we don't love ourselves.

[1:27:39] Ruthie Fierberg: I think that's beautiful. Beautiful. Bob, what about for you? What do you hope and what do you hope that people even take away this second time around or some of them for their first time around when they see the show through the Netflix adaptation?

[1:27:57] Bob Martin: I do think that for me it's about allowing yourself to create the world you want your children to live in. Um when I did my first Broadway show Drausy Chaperon that's really that that's although it's considered a comedy it was really a tragedy because it was about a closeted man who would not accept who he was and as a result didn't interact with other people and escaped into the world of musical theater in order to cope. Right. It was extremely sad. Prom is sort of the other side of that story because Emma does accept who she is she's proud of it. And we know on the Broadway stage we had limited resources in this because it was a piece of theater so we didn't have a lot of time to present her prom which was really an idealized worldview where everyone was accepted and celebrated and happy.

In Ryan's film he's able to put, you know, a lot of Netflix money into really presenting that moment for Emma amazing glorious it's beautiful and it's and and I just think you know that that's that's the individual responsibility to create the best world possible for our children. Um, you know, so as artists, we can at least present it. Say, look, it can happen. And wouldn't this be wonderful? Build that prom. Build that inclusive, beautiful prom.

[1:29:35] Chad Beguelin: Chad, what about for you? When I was in high school a million years ago, HBO came to town and we finally had HBO, and we were all so excited. And the only gay characters I could find were in the movie Rope or in Death Trap. So everybody that was gay was a murderer. So I was like, oh, I gotta date guys and kill people. I just don't have that kind of time. Um so you know, I look at a movie like Love Simon, which is a very sweet gay love story, and I think how my world would have been different if that would have been available to me. And so that's my hope is that you know these stories keep getting told and told in a way where you know the gay guys don't have to be the villain and kill people.

And where you have two really different stories of Emma who has come out and dealt with ramifications, but is you know getting closer and closer to accepting herself and Alyssa, who is really struggling in this household that won't accept her and wants to come out, but doesn't have the liberty to do that. I think showing both sides of that experience is so powerful.

[1:30:56] Jennifer Driver: Jennifer, what about for you? What would what's your ideal first step for people and communities to take?

[1:31:04] Jennifer Driver: Yeah, so our country doesn't do a really good job of owning that there is a problem, right? And um, and acknowledging the problem and actually addressing things at the root. Um, we do need to start um getting to some of those structural things to make to make changes that are going to be impactful. Um I I don't, I think we we there, I'm I'm very happy that this is coming out on Netflix, right? Because I I don't know why, but like no longer can we say that this isn't an issue or this isn't a problem or like in a turn or um an you know away from a problem. And um for that I'm really I am really grateful. I also think that we have to start asking, um, kind of what is it that I'm willing to give up so that um someone else can be centered, someone else can be heard, someone else can be um so that we can address an issue.

And I don't mean give up in a sense that you're losing something or something is being taken away from you. Um, but how do you center the most impacted um so that long changes can happen, right? So as someone who has um privilege to not have to um come out, I don't have to be at the center of every conversation for LGBTQ. But I know that there are trans folks of color who are deeply impacted who don't often get to change um share their stories um or don't actually get to talk about the trauma and then the needs of trans communities. And so in that sense, I can back away. I can step back and center someone so that there will be an actual change happening and that there's some awareness that's going to happen among a community that is often overlooked.

[1:32:48] Jennifer Driver: Um, when I think about like what do I want? I want us to acknowledge that there is a problem, start thinking about what are the root changes that need to happen, and then also think about how do I give up something so that communities are actually going to thrive. And knowing that by me giving up or stepping back does takes absolutely nothing away from me, but it does heal or um create a more um cohesive community. Yeah.

[1:33:16] Ruthie Fierberg: What is one or two of the structural changes at the root you would like to see? Is it the sex education we were talking about in the beginning? Is it something different?

[1:33:25] Jennifer Driver: Like that's I mean, that's that's one, right? So that's could be a change of how we change things in school systems. A structural change will be um looking at kind of these courts, um, what's happening at the courts, both um um judicial nominations and at the Supreme Court. A structural change, um even in like your own family is like when you're coming to these Thanksgiving conversations and you're letting some of those things slide because you know, I don't want to make um anyone uncomfortable or I want to be nice and I still want this. No, calling it out. It's not, it's no longer okay. It's never actually been okay, but it's no longer okay to let these things slide. And we have we've built this culture that I need to be nice and respectable, um, so that you know, to keep the peace.

And people are literally dying because we're not speaking up. The other structural changes need to be um gutting systems that weren't built to support those that it's trying to protect. Um if the system was not built for you, it is not protecting you. And so you gutting those systems and really rebuilding it. I think all of those are really important for us to take forward.

[1:34:38] Ruthie Fierberg: As always, there will be resources in the episode description and on the web page to go to everything from the Amaze video series on sex education to the Trevor Project and their Lifeguard Initiative. If you are in need of support, the Trevor Project Hotline or ways to find a mental health professional, as well as ways to advocate and create safe spaces. We're gonna have uh Jennifer's community action toolkit will be available to you and many, many more resources. So thank you all so much for listening. Thank you all for being here. Bob, Chad, Isaac, and Jennifer. This has been extraordinary. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thanks.

[1:35:58] Ruthie Fierberg: Why We Theater is a product of the Broadway Podcast Network. It's edited and mixed by Derek Gunther. If you like the show, subscribe at bpn.fm slash WWT or Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don't forget to leave a review and tell your friends. Our theme music is by Benjamin Velez. Why We Theater is recorded in part on the traditional lands of the Wapinger and Lenape peoples. I acknowledge this land was unjustly taken from them and pay my respect to elders both past and present. Special thanks to Dory Berenstein, Alan Seals, Lee Silverman, Patrick Taylor, Tony Montaneri, Wesley Birdsall, Elena Mayer, and Suzanne Chipkin. For more resources for change, info about our guests, and more, visit us at WhyWeTheater.com.