Theatre, the Post Office, and Democracy

The following is a lightly edited, abridged version of a keynote address given at the National Theatre Conference on 16 January 2026.

Even as our country comes undone, as the very foundation seems to be unraveling, as any semblance of agreements—the kind we grew up with that bind a civil society together—appears quaint, a thing of the past, I ask myself what matters. I still find myself saying, “the theatre.” We must continue to do our work.

What is our work? As theatremakers, as artists, scholars, leaders of organizations, universities, theatres, rehearsal rooms, and unions, what is our work?

It’s live. I think. I hope. But I don’t think we know yet. There are a lot of ideas about what is happening and what the future of our work will be. Is the future immersive, devised, multimedia, transmedia? Deeply local, necessarily global? As if those things were new.

There are also many theories about why we struggle. Funding. Funding. Screens. Funding. Screens. We are all tied to screens.

I would like to talk about our relationship with one another, our accountability, our need to harness our collective strength. And I would like to begin with the post office.

I have two kids. One lives in Ohio, and one lives in Manchester, England. I write them letters. Amazingly, occasionally they write me back. I love mail.

I write things down on a piece of paper. I address the envelope. There’s something about the act of writing when the hand takes a pen and moves it across a piece of paper. Granted, it’s a little nostalgic, but nostalgia is okay. Writing gives me a sense of connection as I think of what to say, scribble out what I just wrote, and try again. I am live—present in time and space. I understand this act deepens the connection between the parietal and frontal lobes of the brain, improving conceptual understanding and memory, among other things, when the hand takes a pen and presses it against the paper.

I don’t have an outgoing mail system at my apartment that I’ve ever been able to figure out, so I walk to the mailbox around the corner. But more often I go to the post office around the other corner.

Sometimes the post office is very crowded and there’s a very long line of people patiently waiting, or impatiently waiting. Sometimes they’re talking to one another. Sometimes someone slows the line by asking the postal worker how their day is going. Often that person is me. Neighbors see each other and often stay in conversation long after their business is complete, sometimes assisting with customs forms. The post office in a small town might be housed at the drugstore, general store, or bodega. It’s no coincidence that Abraham Lincoln was a postmaster at a general store in New Salem, Illinois. Honest Abe, can you imagine? Post offices are gathering places.

A speaker at a recent event in San Francisco inspired me to go deeper into the history of the Post Office. The United States Postal Service was advocated for by the publisher of the Pennsylvania Chronicle who drew up a plan to ensure his newspaper would be delivered for free. It appears to have taken the Second Continental Congress a year to vote to establish the Post Office; some say they had to get through the Battles of Lexington and Concord first. On 26 July 1775, Benjamin Franklin became our first postmaster general. The legislation explicitly noted the facilitation of the freedom of the press, free speech, privacy for all, and an infrastructure to support the growth and prosperity of a nation.

The postal service was made permanent by George Washington in 1792 with the signing of the Postal Service Act. This Act was drafted to prevent the crown from censoring or suppressing political opponents. As such, the Postal Service Act was considered foundational to democracy—connecting citizens, supporting privacy and free speech for all, and promoting an informed citizenry.

It is essential to our national security and our economy (grandmas still send birthday checks). The post office is critical to functions like mail-in voting and the delivery of important documents. The post office operates without regard to location: 41,552 zip codes, 169 million addresses in the United States. Everyone has access to and pays the same for a first-class stamp, be it Betty White, August Wilson, Goodnight Moon, or the American flag. 

In 1970, after 187 years of delivering the mail, the most sweeping changes to the Postal Act were initiated by President Nixon through the Postal Reorganization Act. Since then, out of the line of my vision, the postal service has increasingly become politicized. In 2006 President Bush signed into law the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act (PAEA), which followed in Nixon’s footstep by putting ten-year price cap on most services while requiring 100 percent funding of future benefits liabilities—continuing the requirement that the agency be self-funded. Let’s try that math. In 2022 President Biden went some way toward repealing those measures through the Postal Service Reform Act. Too little too late. The future of the postal service is in question.

The current postmaster general is David Steiner, former CEO of Waste Management and board member of FedEx. He continues President Trump’s efforts—begun by the postmaster general in Trump’s first term, campaign donor Louis DeJoy—to undo the core tenets of the Postal Service Act. On 24 December 2025, the United States Postal Service published revisions to the Domestic Mail Manual (DMM). The newly adopted Section 608.11 of the DMM sets about to clarify that the date displayed on a postmark represents the “date of the first automated processing operation,” rather than the date when the mail was dropped off.

In sixteen states and the District of Columbia, mailed ballots can be counted if they are received by a deadline set after Election Day—but only if they are postmarked on or before Election Day. One in three Americans in the 2024 elections voted by mail. 

For so many reasons, I want us to turn to the post office. We can do everything online, but does it touch you? Do you think the endless petitions to save the National Endowment for the Arts have meaning? Are the emails read? What about a bag of mail? What if we all started writing letters to Congress and postal workers were carrying those grey duffle bags full of mail into the offices of elected officials? 

At Stage Directors and Choreographers Society (SDC) we publish a magazine, SDC Journal. We mail it. From time to time, someone suggests we move to a digital format (we do have digital but not as a replacement for print version). Most often it is with a call to consider the environment. I am going to step into space I have no expertise in—but I have a question. Are we saving the planet by using our screens to communicate with one another? The environmental and human cost of mining for minerals, non-renewable nickel, iron, titanium, cobalt—rare earth elements, conflict minerals—seems high. Water cools artificial intelligence (AI) data centers. I don’t think these are saving the planet.

The mail touches you. Paper has different textures, envelopes, stamps. It’s tactile.

I have come to believe there is a connection between the act of writing a letter, as a live person-to-person act, the post office as a vehicle through which that letter is delivered, theatre, and protecting democracy. 

I believe there is a connection between writing a letter and going to the theatre.

I believe there is a parallel—theatre and letter writing.

I believe the theatre and the post office share a foe: a screen.

I believe the theatre is connected to democracy is connected to the post office.

I believe we should be afraid but not paralyzed.

The crisis we’re experiencing, the unrelenting stress we have lived with for decades, weighs heavy on so many. An industry whose infrastructure and spirit—like under-maintained roads and tunnels—is fraying. If we are honest, it has been for a very long time.

No matter how often we tell ourselves, or tell others, that we are at the forefront of change, the incremental moves to include are too small. Too few doors stay open for too few moments. The racial reckoning that followed the death of George Floyd, and so many others before him, came down hard on the American theatre. The striking inequities in our field became undeniable to all. The tears in our structure and our spirit lie before us. 

What matters to me is to find a way to uncover the underlying issues, to try to create shared language that might influence and inform cultural policy that would, in turn, make it possible for transformation and for sustainability.

What matters is being part of a community that thrives because of a vast and complex ecosystem, not despite it. We must ensure that those who follow us can build a life, professional and personal, in an ecosystem where the connection to live theatre fills the full measure, breadth, and depth of our communities.

What matters, if we agree that theatre is, and always has been, foundational to democracy, is how we help each other hold our voices. 

Theatre is inextricably bound to our most sacred spaces, to places of inquiry and of learning, libraries, museums, symphonies, schools, parks, public spaces… and post offices. Our theatre holds many forms, aesthetics, and meanings—and it can hold many more. Missions and ambitions are as varied as those of us in this room. There is no singular measure of success.

It is hard for me to resist thoughts of Zelda Fichandler. There was one thing she had to say to me too many times. I would begin to tell her of my trials and tribulations, she would stop me and say, “Laura, it has always been hard, and it always will be hard.” For most of my career I felt comfort in her words. Today I am less sure. Is this a “hard” Zelda would recognize?

Today we struggle to hold our course in the madness against this backdrop of chaos. We are facing internal and external threats, and there are opportunities that come from within and from outside our known circumstances.

We know that this is not working—not just for some, but for most. Even those who are fortunate to have found equilibrium do not escape the experiences and struggles of their colleagues and the impact of the crisis on the web of artists and craftspeople who travel from one theatre to the next. Are we seeing a critical mass of recognition? Can we lift our heads? Mustn’t we lift our heads?

We are seeing a transfer of influence in our field, and we have to do all we can to make certain this transfer holds. We must work quickly, in earnest to ensure that those stepping into leadership do not inherit a mess. A life in the theatre has too long been the exclusive purview of a select few. Not just a field dominated by a single demographic but a craft whose expression has been too often limited to a single cultural perspective. Artists of color and artists with disabilities are no longer willing to accept a career that would mean primarily working on smaller stages, for lower wages, on projects limited to their own race or ethnicity or culture. Positions of leadership in management and production are changing across the field. In many cases, those who have not been included have stepped onto a seriously weakened foundation—a mess.

Positions of leadership in management and production are changing across the field. In many cases, those who have not been included have stepped onto a seriously weakened foundation—a mess.

So if there is a critical mass of recognition that there is, in fact, a big problem, let us solve it. Alas, there is less consensus on what the problem or series of problems is. Many subsets of the field are proposing solutions to the problem, and some are in competition with others—possibly unhelpful competition. The longer we go without a holistic approach, the more we may experience short-term triage rather than transformation and the more confusing it will be for key decision-makers to act. In government quarters there are committed supporters, and they are willing to use their influence, but they are unclear about what will have a lasting impact. Short-term is clearer: cash. Long-term—not so clear.

The National Theatre Conference brings together a multitude of threads that are winding their way around the country and in and out of our communities. How might the threads in this room be woven together to frame an articulation of the underlying issues. Are our problems our problems, or are they symptoms of something deeper in our culture or country? Or both?

Not being alone. An Informed citizenry. The post office.

As humans, we are responsible to others, those with us now and those who will follow. Our responsibility can only be fulfilled if we are informed. Theatre is uniquely positioned to build and maintain an informed citizenry. The theatre, when available to all, when central to our lives, tells us stories that open us up, deepening our understanding of each other and our empathy for one another. Our curiosity and our outrage fuel us, and a sense of possibility compels us to engage in civic discourse. We become better neighbors and friends, better strangers.

To see ourselves and to see others. Nothing can take the place of seeing (except, maybe, a letter). And nowhere can we see like we can see in the theatre.

If you will allow me, I would like to share a couple of brief passages.

George C. Wolfe:

We are going through an incredibly complicated time in this country, but for all of us here in this room, and people who are watching…at one point the theatre gave all of us a piece of ourselves that we did not know that we had. And as we go through this complicated time, it is very important that we approach the world, not with fear, not with trepidation, but with the knowledge that the work we do celebrates and explores the powerful, fragile dynamic that is the human heart.

Anne Bogart:

And isn’t this the point of what we do in the theatre? We connect with one another to acknowledge our common plight, share warmth and inspiration, and then go forth together. If we can step back from issues of career, projects, and ambitions for just a moment and widen our perspective, it is possible to perceive our profound and meaningful quantum entanglement with others. We do not construct ourselves by ourselves. Our character grows through the influence and interactions with others. We are not an island.

Shouldn’t we go to the post office?

Shouldn’t we go to the theatre?

Shouldn’t we save democracy?