Courtesy Wes Studi
This Saturday, Santa Fe Performing Arts presents the American Foundation for Equal Rights and Broadway Impact’s 8, a new stage play by Academy Award-winning screenwriter Dustin Lance Black. Chronicling the federal trial for California’s proposition 8, the reading features the talent of Joyce DeWitt, Ali MacGraw and Wes Studi of Dances with Wolves and Avatar fame.
Why is this play important to you?
I think it's time that we reassess the institution of marriage and also consider the idea of equality here in the good ol' USA and extend equal rights to all those who are in pursuit of them.
Does its theme strike a personal chord?
I really do believe that equality is something that we as citizens of the US strive for—should strive for—and I also think it's something that's at the heart of what makes up our Constitution. It's about time that some of us think of a marital union as something other than just the procreation of children.
What do you hope audiences take away from it?
For them to see that there are many more aspects to the whole situation other than just gay marriage. It's a much more complicated—and in a way simplistic—thing, to offer equality to all citizens.
