Benefit Reading of What the Constitution Means to Me Set for Cooper Union's Great Hall
(© Joan Marcus)
The original Broadway cast of Heidi Schreck's What the Constitution Means to Me will do a reading of the play at the Cooper Union's historic Great Hall on June 9. All proceeds from the evening will go to the National Network of Abortion Funds.
What the Constitution Means to Me debuted on Broadway in 2019, earning Tony nominations for Best Play and Best Leading Actress in a Play (Schreck). The play was also a 2019 Pulitzer Prize Finalist for Drama, and debuted on the Amazon Prime streaming service in October 2020.
What the Constitution Means to Me is described as follows: "Fifteen-year-old Heidi Schreck earned her college tuition money by winning Constitutional debate competitions across the United States. In her boundary-breaking new play, the Obie Award winner resurrects her teenage self in order to trace the profound relationship between four generations of women in her own family and the founding document that dictated their rights and citizenship."
Directed by Oliver Butler, the Broadway cast of What the Constitution Means to Me featured Schreck, Mike Iveson, and New York City high school students Rosdely Ciprian and Thursday Williams, all in their Broadway debuts.
The Great Hall of the Cooper Union, located in the Foundation Building on East 7th Street, opened in 1858 and has served as New York City's epicenter of public debate and political discourse. Eight US Presidents have spoken from the hall's famed "Lincoln Lectern," beginning with President Lincoln himself, and the hall has provided a platform for historic movements and organizations including the NAACP, the women's suffrage movement, and the American Red Cross.
