How BLM and COVID Are Wrecking the American Theater

In this clip from this week’s episode, John McWhorter fills in for Glenn and talks with actor Clifton Duncan. Clifton tells John how opting out of COVID vaccination, protesting what he sees as COVID protocol overreach, and speaking out about race have profoundly damaged his career in the entertainment industry. It’s not just Clifton who’s at risk. Theater attendance is way down, and some argue that the influence of BLM-style politics accounts for this newfound unpopularity.

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CLIFTON DUNCAN: I was 17 when I went to college, and that was pretty much the first time where I began to get very positive feedback.

JOHN MCWHORTER: What year are we in when you're 17?

This was 2000. And I started getting cast in shows in my first year of undergrad. I did a play called The Day the Bronx Died, which is a beautiful memory play set in 1968. I'd been a class clown and a goofball, but that was the first time I said, wait a minute, I can do dramatic stuff. And so it's funny to me, saying all of this, that 25 years ago I was being encouraged left and right by my peers and my teachers and mentors who were telling me, “Hey, if you bust your butt, if you work hard, you'll have a very long career. You have a lot of potential.” And they were right about that.

So it's just funny to me to see now that the industry is now self-immolating over this idea that it's a white supremacist industry, and no one has ever impeded me. No one has ever made me feel out of place. No one has ever made me feel not included, until a bunch of mostly white progressives decided that I don't belong in the industry, which I think is ironic.

You have provided a beautiful transition. That's exactly where I wanted to go.

You're welcome, John.

That was good. I have been told for a good couple years now by conservatives and liberals that the theater is immolating itself because it's been taken over by a hard leftist—let's face it—woke sensibility that is driving theater companies around the country to program hectoring, hard-left, woke, sermonizing plays that audiences don't like, and that basically audiences are not coming back to the theater after the pandemic because of this.

That is a damn good story. But I wonder whether you could say, as somebody who's part of the industry, is that actually happening? Or is that just something that the right and we liberals wish would happen because it makes a good story and because it's something going on with the occasional theater rather than most of them? Is there really a big sea change in the industry?

Yeah. I'd say throughout 2023, there were major articles. L. A. Times, Washington Post, New York Times, even right-wing outlets like the Federalist were reporting on this. And they were talking about how 20 to 30 percent of the audience has not returned post-pandemic. This is Peter Marks of the Washington Post, the theater critic in Washington, who was talking about how there are experts predicting that the industry will contract by 50 percent by this year. There are theaters across the country which are either truncating their seasons or closing outright.

On top of that, they're now forming coalitions of theaters now and they're demanding—I have to laugh—but they're demanding more government aid to support the arts.

But is this because of wokeness or because people stopped going to the theater because they stayed home?

They claim that they're recovering from the pandemic. What is difficult about that is that other live performance fields—pro-wrestling, combat sports, professional sports—bounced right back and in some cases are doing better than ever, even with declining ratings, in the case of the NBA and the NFL. Taylor Swift is breaking records right now. You know what I'm saying? Beyoncé is still selling out shows.

My argument is, even in these economic times, they still are spending money on entertainers and entertainment that they want to spend it on. They're still hungry for live performance. They're just not hungry to see the theater. So between what I view as a histrionic pandemic response on top of the social politics, that's been the one-two punch that has really diminished the relevance and vibrancy of the theater in the past few years.

What is the source of the conflict between you and theater, personally? You're saying that people have decided that you're no good. What happened? Because you are good. And what's the friction?

The friction started in 2020. And part of it is pandemic, part of it is politics. The irony is that in 2020, in the first three months, I was totally in what I call the Covidian Cult. I was literally sanitizing my groceries and my mail. So if anyone wants to accuse me of being a denialist, they can't do that, because my roommate literally thought I was crazy because I'd be walking around our apartment in a mask. I called it my little hazmat suit, just maniacally trying to disinfect every handle and knob in our little shoebox apartment.

I never felt that way. So you started there. Okay.

I started there. I started there, and then my mind changed over time. In 2020, all the social unrest happened, and I saw these sweeping changes in the industry that was responding. I was getting messages from these aggrieved white women that I'd worked with in the past who were just like, “I'm so sorry about what's happening.” It's all the George Floyd stuff. “I'm so sorry about what's happening.” And I'm thinking to myself, bitch, this is racist. You're sitting there assuming that your life is better than mine, that I'm suffering and in pain because I'm black.

And that black people are all this one united organism.

Yeah, exactly. This is why I call progressivism socially acceptable white supremacy. Because it presumes that all black people everywhere are living in fear and resentment of white people everywhere who aren't even alive anymore.

But go back to the masking. Because I find it very interesting. And a lot about the pandemic really frustrated me. First you were washing your apples. Then what happened?

I always wash my apples.

I don't.

You don't give them a little rinse in that pristine New York tap water?

I do not. And I did not wash my hands any more during that time than I ever have. I'm a finicky person, but no, I really was not COVID timorous the way many people were. I just thought to myself, that's not something that's going to happen to me. And it essentially hasn't. I thought that a lot of what we were made to do was excessive. However, I also knuckled under to the superficial aspects of it, because you only go around once. And so what happened with you?

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With me, it was just that I began asking questions, which you're not allowed to do in many sects of the left, apparently. And it was ironic, because like I said before—this is a very New York way to start a sentence—I was talking to my therapist about this in January [2020]. I'm in her office, which is in Chinatown, and I got a mask on and I got my gloves and everything. We were both like, there's no way this thing isn't here already. This is New York City. It's an international travel hub. It's here.

So while everyone else was obsessed with Donald Trump's first impeachment and assuring me that “It's just the flu, bruh,” I was stocking up on food and supplies. I still have some nitrile gloves from years ago that I collected from that period. Literally, I spent a night in either late January or early February walking around Lower Manhattan, going into every Rite Aid, CVS, Walgreen's I could find, trying to find masks. They were already sold out. So I had to overpay on Amazon, like 75 bucks for a box of 50.

What made you that afraid? That's interesting. When it happened, I knew instantly. I remember actually telling my ex at the time, it was before you had to put a mask on outside, which frankly got absolutely ridiculous in New York. And as soon as Trump started talking about COVID the way he did, I remember telling my ex, now it's going to be that the way that you show that you're not a Republican is that you wear the mask all the time, because Trump doesn't understand.

And I remember my ex said, “No, you don't have to worry about that.” And she's a healthcare person. And I said, no, wait, in about two weeks, you will not be able to go outside in this neighborhood without the mask without getting dirty looks. And that's exactly what happened.

That's how I felt at the time. I thought, this is a serious disease, but we're being asked to go too far, including with the school closings and how long they were. But you found yourself changing your mind because of what?

For one, I have a friend who is more center than I am. And she sent me an op-ed from a man named John Ioannidis, world-renowned, eminent scientist. And basically it was a Wall Street Journal op-ed that was like, “This might not be as bad as we're making it out to be.” And I remember at the time, John, I was so annoyed. I said, how dare you send me this. But because I respect her, I had the door open up. Maybe there's another possibility.

But then over time, nothing made sense to me. Like our numbers were going down, but the restrictions in some places were either staying in place or increasing. There was an article in April of 2020 in the New York Times where they said the sensational headline that was like, “Death toll surpasses 10,000 after 3,700 deaths are added to the toll.” But they were presumed COVID deaths, meaning they weren't even tested.

So I'm like, okay, at a time where we're trying to figure out and ascertain just how deadly this pathogen is, why are we guessing? We need as accurate information as possible. It was just a matter of, over time, saying this does not make sense. And I think my primary objections began as a bleeding heart artist. I said, we're shutting down everything that it means to be alive just for the sake of living, whatever that really means.

Did you feel that people should be able to do plays in, say, August of 2020, before there was a vaccine. I'm just asking because I was in the middle. I masked while inside, I got vaccines. I hated having to wear the mask outside, because it was clear from a lot of studies that wasn't necessary. The fact that we had to walk around like that for a year-and-a half to show that we were Democrats I thought was absolutely absurd. I shudder thinking of it now, putting that damn thing on for no reason and having my kids have to do it, too. But did you think people should be running around doing Long Day's Journey into Night before there was a vaccine or maybe doing it in masks?

We never should have closed. Because the thing about it—

Wouldn't that have made people sick? This is a genuine question.

Yeah, here's the thing, John. For one, there's never been a successful vaccine for any coronavirus. I knew that going in. There never has been one. Second, the data that was coming out about the disease itself in the CDC, the beleaguered CDC even acknowledged that, for most people, it's going to be mild-to-moderate at worst. Lastly, there were already doctors around the world who were coming up with treatment protocols to treat the damn thing.

Because that was the thing for me. I was like, okay, no one here is talking about lifestyle improvements, especially for black people, like losing weight. We forgot that medicine exists. And again, you mentioned Trump, as soon as he brought up hydrochloroquine that became, we can't talk about that. There's still a debate raging about ivermectin, whether that works or not. But it wasn't just about miracle drugs. It was people who were saying, okay, this is a very complex disease and in order to treat it, get it as early as possible. Here is a combination, a series of drugs you can take. Fluvoxamine, Budesonide, corticosteroids, blood thinners, all kinds of things. Vitamin D, zinc to support the immune system, all kinds of things that you could do to combat this disease. Because you're not going to be able to avoid it. And vaccines on top of that.

But are you saying that you decided not to do the vaccine?

Yeah. I got the disease in December of 2020. And so I was like, why should I have to be inoculated against something that I've already caught, when we have hundreds of studies now at this point that indicate the robustness of [post-infection resistance].

How was it when you got it?

I was out for a few days. I rarely get sick, and so, like a lot of men, I bitch up when I get sick. My sense of taste was dulled for about two or three weeks.

So you had the real thing.

Yeah. And part of it was because I was living in Atlanta. That completely changed my view of things. For one, Andrew Cuomo gave this press conference where I said, I have to leave New York. Because he was like, “If it saves one life. You want to work? Go be an essential worker. Death is worse than a bad economy.”

John, I got scared, because I said this man will justify any action he takes. Because he's living by such a rigid, narrow moral framework right now, he'll do anything. And I'm glad I left, because that's what happened, essentially. But I'm in Atlanta, and while in Central Park in New York, people are walking around double masked on their canoes or whatever, in Atlanta—in Piedmont Park in Midtown Atlanta—my brother threw me a welcome to Atlanta surprise party. We're there, we're sharing joints, there's no one wearing masks, kids are running around, people are playing cards, sharing beers. It was a normal day, John. The gyms were still open. They were mask-optional.

I worked at a nightclub. The bars and nightclubs and strip joints were open. So you can get a lap dance at Magic City, but you couldn't go see a Broadway show. You know what I mean? And so that's when I was like, okay, are you telling me that having titties and fluids on me is less dangerous than maybe some spittle from some actor articulating?

I want to ask, and maybe you don't want to share this, but how has this affected your career? Because obviously these are not the sorts of things one is supposed to say in your line of work, and there is a herd mentality and a sense that someone like you is a heretic with a bad odor and must be chased away or pushed out a window. Is that going on? I hope not, but I'm guessing that it must be.

So my career really began to take off in 2017. Suddenly I'm working with, being shared, fought over by Tony-winning directors, upstaging Tony-winning stars. I'm in workshops and readings. I'm doing TV. Things have finally taken off and all the sacrifices have paid off.

Everything stopped in 2020. And then in 2021, I began getting inquiries through my former management about, “Has your client been or do they plan to get the shot” or whatever. And to my manager's credit, she never pushed me, she never was aggressive about it. Other actors weren't so lucky. But eventually, they held onto the mandates, John. Hollywood just dropped the mandates in May of last year. But even then, they're like, “We're just not going to say it's the reason that we're not hiring you.” The theater took an extra two months to drop their vaccine mandates. And this was over a year after the CDC even acknowledged that there's no point in treating people differently who got the vaccine and who didn't. I called it a cult. It was the Covidian Cult.

When you're in the entertainment industry, it's very relationship-heavy and reputation-heavy. So at a certain level, not everyone but most people are really good and they deserve to be where they are. And it's just, what are your relationships? Who do you know? Who's going to hire you? Do they like you? Are you likeable? Yada yada yada.

No one is ever going to say anything that could be coded as “right-wing,” even if it's something as simple as “humans are a sexually dimorphic species” and “I don't think that white people are the cause of all my problems.” If you say any of these kinds of things, you really run the risk of suffering professional damage. And there's tons of cultural workers across the country who are terrified and don't say anything. And it's not that they're hard-right. There might be some. It might be as simple as understanding economics and not being a Democrat. They will not, especially since Trump. Trump just completely destroyed people's mental faculties. And COVID made it even worse.

And so now you can't say anything. Now I have no management, no representation. I presume I've been blacklisted. I still have some people here and there who reach out to me with certain things. I may be in New York in a couple of weeks on something. But as far as I know, I just don't have a career anymore. I basically am not in the industry. Part of the last few years has been trying to get past the intense amount of bitterness about it. I can't watch anything that was made or produced after 2020, because I see a bunch of people who, in my mind, are complicit. It's a bunch of people who normalized a two-tiered society, and I have a huge problem with that. No one has acknowledged it. No one has said this was the wrong thing to do. And that tells me that if such a thing were to happen again, they would do it all over again.

They would.

Part of my objection to all this stuff in the first place was about precedent. Because we we learn how to treat viruses, we learn how to evolve, and we live with them. And we do lose people. It's very unfortunate. No one wants that. At the same time, though, once you allow the state and the government to exercise this kind of power, you've now given them the green light to do it again anytime that they want.

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