Meet Emerging Producer Halle Morse: Building Broadway Back Better

Halle Morse

 

How did you become involved with Broadway For Biden?

I started volunteering with Women for Biden in May, just after graduating business school. They are an incredible group of women professionals focused on digital media and marketing, and I helped them to launch their TikTok. From there, I started asking friends of mine from the Broadway community to contribute content for their social media. The stories from throughout the community were so compelling, I felt they deserved their own organization. And so I created Broadway for Biden, to be a home for the Broadway community this election season.

From the onset, I knew this needed to be a grassroots initiative. As theatre-makers, we are natural organizers. I wanted to create fun, engaging, and meaningful events— phone banks, town halls, performance-based fundraisers— as well as content. My co-founders Jeff Metzler and Dimitri Moise helped to form our marketing and field teams. Partnering with producers Julie Boardman and Nolan Doran, we've been able to build a concert akin to what Broadway has created in the past for candidates like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton - but with a grassroots approach. While the organization has grown to encompass some 50 volunteers, all of whom are industry professionals, we continue to prioritize inclusiveness and intersectionality in everything we do. Our industry has been ravaged by the effects of Covid-19. We hope our weekly events serve as mini-reunions, as well as reminders of powerful the work of artists can be, especially when we work together.

Why was it important to you to support the Biden Harris campaign?

Because voting is not enough! Yes, vote. Exercise your civic duty. And please, this year, do it as early as you can!!!! But beyond that, there is so much more we can do. 

Like many of us, I woke up to the 2016 elections results feeling broken and devastated, but also guilty that I hadn't done enough. Four years later, Donald Trump’s attacks on the arts, both in his Twitter feed and in his proposed legislation, have been an attack on our culture and on our economy. The arts make up 7.5% of New York’s economy, and employ over 5 million Americans nationwide, yet federal arts spending is just .003% of the yearly budget. The arts deserve so much better. With a Biden-Harris administration, I do believe we will be able to build Broadway back better!

What can people expect to experience by viewing the concert?

Broadway for Biden's upcoming fundraiser, In Our America: A Concert for the Soul of the Nation, will amplify a Broadway that is future-looking, accessible, and deeply inclusive. We want to Broadway to Build Back Better— just like Joe Biden wants for America.

The concert will feature top talent from the theater community performing to raise funds for the Biden Victory Fund, and We have an entire Broadway team onboard to make this show a reality: the incomparable Liesl Tommy (Respect film, Tony-nominated for Eclipsed) is at the helm as our director, Jason Michael Webb (Tony Award winner, Choir Boy) music directs, and Lorin Latarro (Waitress), Tony winner Christopher Gatelli (Newsies), Ray Mercer (The Lion King), and Abbey O’Brien (assoc. choreographer of Jagged Little Pill) are choreographing.

Tune in to see talent like Jennifer Hudson, Samuel L Jackson and his wife LaTanya, Darren Criss, Glenn Close, Chita Rivera, Norm Lewis, Renee Elise Goldsberry, Chuck Cooper, Karen Olivo, Phillipa Soo, Steven Pasquale, Laura Benanti, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Rita Moreno, BD Wong, and writers including Lynn Nottage, Tony Kushner, Paula Vogel,  Robert O’Hara, David Henry Hwang, Aurin Squire, Heidi Schreck, and more!

The one-night only event will stream through our partners NowThis and MoveOn. Be sure to RSVP here: http://inouramerica.broadwayforbiden.com/event

We are just a few short weeks before Election Day. How can people support Broadway for Biden beyond the fundraising concert?

1)    Join our National Arts Workers' Roll Call Video Project, #Arts4America. This is our most recently launched initiative. We want to hear from arts workers all over the country - actors, musicians, dancers, sound designers, directors, box office workers, producers, administrators - you name it! Just visit Arts4America.com and submit your video. Do it ASAP, as we hope to include some videos in our flagship concert airing Oct 21!

2)    PHONE BANK! It's the #1 thing you can do this election season. Monday night "Call Time!" is our bread and butter. Every single Monday 7-9pm, we make calls into crucial swing states. We work hard to provide a positive, meaningful experience for our guests. All you have to do is join us and make calls. I promise, it's super fun and easy!

3)    We have events happening almost every day of the week: Town Halls, fitness classes, watch parties, rallies, and performances! Visit BroadwayForBiden.com to learn more and SIGN UP!

4)    If you are able to donate, we would greatly appreciate you making a donation through the link on our website. The money goes directly to the Biden Victory Fund, but our account will be credited. We want to show how much of an impact we can make as a community.