by Freeda Cathcart
NYC – Sunday, June 14, the stars came out to benefit the First Amendment Committee in the Town Hall concert hall. The event was live streamed to thousands of watch parties across the country on the anniversary of the first No Kings protests.
Jane Fonda’s father, Henry Fonda, was one of the founders of the First Amendment Committee that stood up to McCarthyism in the 1940’s. Jane Fonda revived The Committee For The First Amendment to “defend our constitutional rights.” In her letter announcing the reformation of the committee she said “The federal government is once again engaged in a coordinated campaign to silence critics in the government, the media, the judiciary, academia, and the entertainment industry.”
Before the concert began, the audience was taught how to participate as the background singers for when Patti Smith sang “People Have The Power”. It looked like a sold out event and the attendees looked excited and joyful to be there.
Jane Fonda opened the concert with an inspiring speech about the moment our country is in and why it’s imperative to protect the journalists and artists who are being attacked by the regime. Since the First Amendment Committee had been relaunched many legends have joined it including Aaron Sorkin, Barbra Streisand, Glenn Close, JJ Abrams, John Legend, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Julianne Moore, Kerry Washington, Laraine Newman, Jim Beaver, Larry David, Lily Tomlin, Natalie Portman, Nikki Glaser, Patti LuPone, Pedro Pascal, Quinta Brunson, Rob Reiner, Rosie O’Donnell, Sean Penn, Spike Lee, Ted Danson, Mary Steenburgen, Viola Davis, Wanda Sykes, Winona Ryder, Whoopi Goldberg, Billie Eilish, Ben Stiller, Janelle Monae, and Fran Drescher.
The evening intertwined empowering and fun music with sobering and inspiring stories from organizers. Bette Midler came out with her energetic rendition of “All You Fascists Bound To Lose” and the audience joined boisterously in the chorus.
Robert DiNero gave an inspiring speech about the importance of protecting our right to free speech. It ended with a loud call and response with Dinero repeating some of the nonsense being peddled by the White House and then leading the crowd to respond with STFU, except they yelled the actual words “Shut The F*** Up!”
There were touching presentations to remember that people have lost their lives exercising their First Amendment rights including Alex Pretti and Renee Good. Julia Roberts recited a poem written by Amanda Gorman in honor of Renée Good. The Singing Resistance from Minnesota beamed into the concert with their determined and beautiful song “Hold On”.
There were children who traveled from Texas with stories and pictures from their friends who had been held in the concentration camps. Their words and pictures were haunting. It seemed surreal that such horrors are actually happening in our country.
Lily Gladstone reminded us that our country has committed atrocities before and taught us about the importance of the resilience of the bison to her tribe. Our country almost destroyed all the bison in order to obliterate her tribe but they had survived and now were on the path to thrive.
Natashe Allen sang “It’s Been a Long Time Coming”. Then the Founder of Black Voters Matter, La Tasha Brown, came out singing “Ain’t Nobody Going to Turn Me Around” and spoke about all the on the ground organizing that Black Voters Matter has been doing in the South to register and turn out voters.
The theme of unity resonated throughout the evening. LGBT activists reminded people how important it is to stand up for everyone’s rights. They spoke about how trans people are being killed and that the news isn’t even covering their deaths. Rufus Wainwright came out in sparkly ruby red shoes and sang “Over The Rainbow”.
The show ended with a powerful rendition of Shaina Taub’s “Keep Marching” song from the SUFFS Tony award winning musical. Jane Fonda reminded people that The Town Hall was built by the suffragists for voter education and called on the audience both in the theater and across the country to rise up and take these four actions:
Join the Freedom Summer movement. Go to https://blackpowerwarroom.com/freedom-summer/
Get involved to protect the vote. Go to https://protectthevote.net/?source=riseup
Help staff the polls and get paid. Go to https://www.powerthepolls.org/1acommittee
Sign the petition to stop the merger between Paramount and Warner Bros. Go to https://www.commoncause.org/actions/stop-the-paramount-warner-bros-merger/
