Rosie O’Donnell and a motley troupe of Broadway actors past and present bussed down from New York City for a protest “show” in front of the White House on Monday (Broadway’s traditional day off) and the New York Times decided the silliness was worthy of the lead National section story slot on Wednesday
Reporter-intern Alexandria Yoon-Hendricks’ “A Free Broadway Show Starring Putin, Trump and Jean Valjean” ignored O’Donnell’s unrepentant Trutherism and took her seriously as an anti-Trump voice, though the two had been personally feuding years before Trump’s presidential campaign.
Three large photos featured Trump-insulting signs in the same musical mode, including one of T-R-E-A-S-O-N spelled out with marquee-style lettering. But there was no questioning of the protest’s reasoning or hysterical tone.
Wearing shirts that read “Now Showing: Truth” and with accordions in tow, the comedian Rosie O’Donnell and a cast of Broadway actors and musicians bused from New York to Washington on Monday for a musical protest just outside the White House.
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The cast members -- who hailed from current and past runs of “Wicked,” “The Lion King,” “Hamilton,” “The Phantom of the Opera” and other shows -- belted out songs meant to evoke a political edge or offer a tinge of hope for the hundreds of protesters who are disillusioned by Mr. Trump (who was in New Jersey during the performance)....
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It is the diversity of Broadway, both in the subjects it tackles and the people who bring that vision to the stage, that makes creative protests such as Monday’s a clear extension of the community’s larger mission, said Ellie Neal, a 15-year-old from Fairfax, Va. She held a sign reading “Don Jr. was in the room where it happened,” a reference to both a song from “Hamilton” and a meeting Donald Trump Jr. attended with a Kremlin-connected lawyer before the election.
More political wisdom from children followed:
Sitting on the shoulders of her father holding a glittery sign that said “Tomorrow there’ll be more of us,” one of the youngest was Ellie Moritz, 7, who said she was excited to see “some of the people I want to be like when I grow up.” Her father, Brian Moritz, happened to be in town for a conference from Fairport, N.Y.
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Though some protesters mentioned Russian election interference as a top concern, Monday’s speakers focused more on what they see as the social implications of, and the social responsibility to combat, Mr. Trump’s presidency. Jim Obergefell, the plaintiff in the landmark Supreme Court case that guaranteed the right to same-sex marriage, said that “one person or a group of people really can change the world.”
Those words seemed particularly appropriate. Just minutes before, when a crying boy was lost in the sea of people, the crowd sprang into action to quickly find his father.
That segued, naturally, to a condemnation of the family separations on the Mexican border.
Last month, the same intern-reporter wrote a full-page press release posing as a news story on a teenage crusade against climate change.
