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Playwright Jon Robin Baitz Discusses the National Endowment of the Arts.

Jon Robin Baitz is a playwright who was awarded a $15,000 grant from the National Endowment of the Arts (NEA). While he has accepted the money, he has turned around and donated the exact amount to the two institutions that were recently turned down by the NEA's acting Chairwoman, Anne-Imelda Radice. He wrote a scathing letter to the endowment informing them of his two $7,500 donations to MIT and Vigrinia Commonwealth, saying, "I simply will not be complicit with faux-moralist sharpies of the Right, nor with psycho-sexual hysterics in the cultural sacking of this country." Baitz currently has two of his plays running Off-Broadway in New York: "The End of the Day" and "The Substance of Fire."

07:43

Other segments from the episode on June 2, 1992

Fresh Air with Terry Gross, June 2, 1992: Interview with Terry McMillan; Commentary on music from Seattle; Interview with Jon Robin Baitz; Interview with Jill Collins; Review of the film "A Midnight…

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