Kate Shindle, who served as president of the Actors’ Equity Association for nine years, is stepping down after a tenure marked by the coronavirus pandemic, which for a time shut down all members of the union.
Shindle, 47, said she expects to remain active in the labor movement but is eager to get back to acting. The Equity chair, which leads a union that represents more than 51,000 theater actors and stage managers across the country, is an unpaid, volunteer position. Because of the time required to deal with the crises facing union members, Shindle has done so little acting work that she didn’t even qualify for her own union’s health insurance coverage.
Her departure comes amid significant fluctuation in the theater industry. Charlotte St. Martin recently left her position as president of the Broadway League, the industry association most often on the other side of the negotiating table with Equity, and the heads of many nonprofit theaters are also leaving their positions.
“It feels like it’s time,” Shindle said. “We have achieved a lot. And I think fluctuation is good for companies. I’ve never been someone who wanted to stay until the members kicked me out.”
Shindle, a former Miss America, will complete her third and final term on May 23. These are edited excerpts from an interview.
Justice has implemented very strict rules during the pandemic, which have resulted in service restrictions across the country. Looking back, how do you think about the role of Equity in the theater situation in those years?
For most of these turning points, a few things were at the forefront of my mind. First, how little we knew at the start of Covid that we now take for granted – for example, how it was transmitted. Second, if you designed an industry to be completely wiped out for a period of time by a highly contagious pandemic, I can’t imagine you could design an industry better suited to that than live performances.
There came a point where everyone wanted to go back to work – including me, for that matter – but we really had to come to terms with the fact that we could potentially reopen an industry that was pretty safe for 22-year-old dancers who would probably survive Covid if they were would be infected with it, but was this the industry we wanted to reopen that was only safe for some of our members? What about seniors? What about those in our industry who are disproportionately and permanently immunocompromised due to the AIDS epidemic? We needed to reopen an industry where we had sufficient safety measures in place so that people could do their jobs without risking their lives.
Union organizing and activism appear to be on the rise. How did this affect equity?
The art industry does not exist in a vacuum. The things that workers around the world are waking up to permeate our industry too. The murder of George Floyd and the resurgence of Black Lives Matter have really mobilized the majority of our members. How can we reopen an industry where discrimination, harassment, racism, bullying and all related behaviors are equated with other reasons we would tell an employer that there will be no Equity members at their trade show tonight, so be it because, they fix that? ?
How do you assess the situation in the industry?
We are still in recovery mode. I was so excited at the end of last season, which for my money was pretty much the best Broadway season I can remember. It feels like a time where we as an industry are trying to tell stories that traditionally don’t get a platform. But there may be further developments to be made in things like marketing.
Something that isn’t talked about much, but that never gets out of my mind: I don’t think we can overlook the fact that there is a lot of politically motivated fear-mongering about cities, especially cities with Democratic mayors, and maybe some of it The reason some of the audience hasn’t returned as fully as we hope is because we have to do something about it.
The pandemic has changed the idea that “the show must go on.” We’re seeing more artists calling in sick. What do you think about it?
I think it’s really important. I have sat across from employers who have pointed out that the number of people seeking mental health care or reporting it is higher than before, and in my opinion this is now probably more in line with what the rest of the world accepts sensibly. When I started, we were still talking about the stories of an artist who ran off stage, vomited into a bucket, and then came back and continued his show. I don’t think this is a reason to celebrate anymore.
What challenges does your successor face?
Wages will continue to be a key issue. “Will there be a strike?” will be asked more and more frequently in the next few years because people are full of enthusiasm. There is a fight on many fronts, but at the heart of it is that it is a moral imperative for people who choose to produce theater to build their structures on living wages for the artists who work for them.
One of the last things you had to deal with was the war between Israel and Hamas. The National Council of Equity has decided not to comment?
We were deployed for both a statement in support of Israel and a statement in support of the ceasefire. I actually wrote a draft for our council to consider if they voted to make a declaration, but we never got around to it – the question “Do we make a declaration?” was not adopted.
We try to take positions that are appropriate for us and do not make us foreign policy experts, which most of us are not. I know members are increasingly wanting to join unions that reflect their values - this isn’t entirely new, but it seems to be growing. Personally, I think it’s pretty clear that it’s imperative that there is some kind of ceasefire as soon as possible. But the way we handled that, with members whose opinions were completely opposite – I think we handled that as best as we could.
What’s next for you?
I audition all the time. All I ever wanted was to be an actor, and it really feels like it’s time to focus on my own career again. I miss singing more than anything. I want to be in a rehearsal room getting new pages.
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2024-04-04 19:00:10
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