Isa Cruz

Writer, director and actor John Cameron Mitchell visited campus Monday and Tuesday for a series of events, including a “Hedwig and the Angry Inch” screening and playwriting workshop. Mitchell first came to the College 15 years ago, and the Cinema Studies and Theater and Dance departments, among others, were happy to have him back. Mitchell spoke about various topics, ranging from his background as the child of a military general, the process of creating “Hedwig,” cancel culture and the importance of storytelling and community.

Professor of Theater and Chair of Theater and Dance Department Davis R. Robinson explained the significance of having someone like Mitchell on campus, especially as a model for students in times when the importance of artists speaking up is growing ever higher.

“John really came to light as an artist and a theater-maker during the AIDS crisis, and his friends were dying,” Robinson said. “I think carrying that generation’s idea of, ‘How do you fight back against forces that could be killing you,’ [is important], and it crosses into politics and healthcare as well as using the arts and using collective energy to be able to create positive change.”

The works that Mitchell created also carried striking messages. Phoebe Marin ’26, who is part of the Bowdoin Film Society, spoke to the importance of the message of “Hedwig and the Angry Inch,” especially for marginalized identities.

“Hedwig is a character who is unapologetic about her identity and doesn’t hide who she is. And I think that’s a really important message for young people growing up, young queer people, especially,” Marin said. “I do think it is really important to kind of see representation like that in the media.… ‘Hedwig’ is ultimately about being proud of your identity and negotiations of identity, and I think that’s really important.”

Professor of Cinema Studies Tricia Welsch, who organized the visit with Robinson, emphasized the current relevance of the show’s themes of acceptance and forgiveness.

“The characters behave badly. But then they behave well, and they learn from what they’ve done. I think there is a really profound message of accepting people writ large, forgiving them for their mistakes, and that’s an important message for us to be able to be more together than separate right now—not to let our small differences divide us and to work together to heal our larger issues,” Welsch said.

Welsch noted that having the creators of such works come to campus to talk to students was especially crucial.

“I think it’s really important for us to bring working artists to the campus and have them talk about their lives as well as their work. There is no substitute for seeing that,” Welsch said.

In addition to talks, students had other opportunities to learn from Mitchell. Two workshops—one on playwriting and one on musical theater—provided hands-on opportunities for students to get feedback from Mitchell.

“He worked on some of [the students’] songs, so they actually got some sort of hands-on coaching,” Robinson said. “They really had a great one-on-one, and we really could see the change from when they first did the song, to him working with them, to then changing how they were approaching it gave them all different techniques too.… That really was a great little masterclass.”

Mitchell also spoke to the post-Covid-19 generation who had grown up with social media. While he emphasized having more roles for marginalized individuals onstage, he also highlighted the importance of empathy and warned against “cancel culture” in storytelling.

“If we follow [the idea that] there is only your story to tell, there are only autobiographies,” Mitchell said. “Even if it’s imaginary, it’s not you, it’s your identity. It becomes more important than empathy … and then guess what happens? [People of separate identities] don’t collaborate anymore.… It comes from a good source, a good intention, which is that there are not enough different stories being told.”

Zoe Pringle ’27, who attended the workshop, had mixed feelings about this message.

“There was certainly a lot of criticism about that in a way that can be productive to induce empathy but can also be restrictive when you have somebody who’s not really connecting with that [younger] population,” Pringle said. “There were some points of contention there, but the general spirit of what he was saying about living your life and finding your own punk and your own voice was good.”

Among the messages Mitchell highlighted was also the strength that comes from a community of like-minded people, which Robinson encouraged students to find at Bowdoin.

“What was really important in emphasizing, along with the idea of empathy, is [to] find your people. Find people to collaborate with,” Robinson said. “They are the people you’re going to make work with for life. They are the people you’re going to touch base with and check in with when you go to another part of the country. It’s really important to find your people while you’re here and hang on to them once you get out, to ease that glide into the professional world with some other people.”