Actors' Equity Association: On June 30, Equity’s diversity and inclusion department hosted “Let’s Talk Hair,” a discussion of the context of the April resolution passed by council to include hair texture as a protected characteristic in union contracts.
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Hair seems like such an insignificant thing to many people, but that is because their natural hair isn’t considered bad or unprofessional. I think the theatre industry enjoys preaching often about diversity, but they still greatly hold onto that classic white-centric professional look. People with textured hair are constantly told to hide it away like it is something to be ashamed of. But in the case of wigs and such, I think again they are trying to hide away cultural hair. They want to be racially diverse but not accept all aspects of it. So if someone is black with curly hair, it's ok that they are black, but their hair still has to be within the tolerability of white people. In addition, if Actor’s Equity is worried about wig stylists not knowing how to deal with cultural hair maybe focus on your designing and backstage team being just as diverse as the onstage one.
My biggest takeaway from this article is that moving into my career, especially if I pursue stage management, I need to actively work to make the backstage space comfortable for everyone. This means asking what people need and creating a safe place to voice concerns. This is especially important when many workers are afraid of being seen as “difficult” to work with when they challenge the systematic issues within theatre. No one should be put at a disadvantage in this industry, it is already hard enough as it is. Increasing diversity of the people on and off the stage is a huge aspect of how to fix these systematic problems. We grow as artists when we share our different experiences, diversity in theatre will never hurt anyone. I am hopeful for the future of theatre though we still have a long way to go. Conversations like this one will always be necessary but as we become more aware they will become less taboo.
As this article mentions, “the show must go on” is no longer an excuse for the wrongful treatment of members in a union show as it pertains to hair. Now, since the pandemic, we have seen a lot of reasons for “the show to go on” turn irrelevant since cold symptoms could mean you have contracted coronavirus and getting injured can lower your body’s ability to fight coronavirus if you get infected while injured, so why should hair be any different? If we keep letting “the show go on”, there will be no one who wants to do the next show that is about to “go on”. There was one show I saw on Broadway where all the characters whose hair was made up, were wearing wigs. My first thought when I saw this show was, that must be expensive. Each one of these cast members had multiple wigs custom made for them whether it was because their hairstyle changes throughout the course of the show or because they were an understudy or a swing. This was a new idea for me because I always thought having to curl and put massive amounts of hairspray in your hair was just part of “show biz”, but the show won’t go on if actors don’t trust “the biz”.
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