Megan The Stallion wowed the industry with her return to Moulin Rouge, becoming the first female performer to play the role of Harold Zidler at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre. Her contribution left many curious about what roles other black music artists have taken up in the theater world.
Theater, like many other American entertainment industries have no shortage of contributions from the black population, from Myles Frost, Fantasia Barrino, Usher, Deborah Cox, Ashanti, Michael R. Jackson, and more. However, outside of Megan, there are only a handful of new black music artists participating in that industry.
The reasons for this lack of representation are similar to all the other historical problems with other entertainment industries. The theater industry has been notorious for inequality in its productions, limited funding, and being predominantly white. Additionally, the barrier to entry for minority students is quite high due to opportunities to break in or learn about the theater industry being very limited compared to their white counterparts.
For younger generations, the theater industry has had a hard time advertising towards them, largely because of how opposed the industry has been to adopting social media marketing compared to other industries. This has unfortunately led many black and other minority populations to see the theater space as not worth entering. Thankfully, it doesn’t have to stay this way. There have been many efforts to encourage minority voices within the theater industry. Megan The Stallion’s latest performance acts as a great stepping stone to get newer eyes interested in learning more. However, the work is far from over, much still needs to be changed within the theater industry leadership.
