Michelle Williams appeared on Good Morning America yesterday and spoke about her current role in the Broadway show, Death Becomes Her. During her conversation with Robin Roberts, she reflected on the highs and lows of her Broadway career, which began more than 20 years ago when she replaced Toni Braxton in Aida. Since then, she’s had roles in The Color Purple, she starred as Roxie Hart in Chicago, What My Husband Doesn’t Know, and did a national tour of the musical Fela!
Despite her success on stage, and her recent return to Broadway making her eligible for a Tony Award when nomination time comes around, Michelle revealed that there was a point in time she wasn’t sure she’d even have a future on stage. During her ongoing battle with mental health issues, she felt like there wouldn’t be more opportunities for her to pursue work on Broadway.
"I had to leave because of my mental health. I thought that door was closed for me to return on Broadway. I thought I’d blew it. I thought I’d be seen as a liability. 'Can she maintain?' And six years later I get a phone call, minding my business, saying, 'We want you to come to New York.'”
In 2018, when Michelle was on Broadway for Once on This Island, her doctor ordered her to quit the production after just two weeks due to ongoing depression. At the time, she was in the process of calling off her engagement to Chad Johnson (not Ochocinco). And despite seeking treatment at a facility earlier in the year and feeling ready, it was all too much.
"I wasn't as well as I probably should have been, and it just got to the point where I had to check out of the show. I didn't want to do it.”
Michelle described feeling like she had endured “two blows” in one year – the first was needing to check into a treatment facility, the second was having to leave the show. But after getting the phone call inviting her back on stage, starring in eight shows each week and meeting Isabella Rosselini two weeks ago backstage, she feels differently.
“When you think that you did wrong and something happened, you can get another chance," she told Robin.
The journey Michelle described being on in the interview had a happy ending. She had an amazing career with Destiny’s Child, despite speaking out in the past about knowing she wasn’t a fan favourite or the most recognizable from the group in the past. And after experiencing that success, she went on to forge a career on Broadway which we all know is no easy feat. And while there are a lot more Black women sharing similar success stories about everything working out in the end, like Doechii, who incorporated this narrative into her Grammy acceptance speech over the weekend, it by no means implies that the journey itself is easy, particularly because for her and so many others, the initial fears of being seen as a ‘liability’ are widespread among Black women.
Each year, the Women in the Workplace study, which is the largest study on the state of women in corporate America, is conducted by the Lean In and McKinsey Company. And each year, the report reveals that women’s experiences vary. But the 2021 report, specifically, included some data driven narratives that suggest Black women face disproportionately high barriers in their workplaces. From being heavily impacted by bias in the hiring and promotion process to experiencing microagressions and being more likely to be subjected to disrespectful and “othering” comments and behaviour, workplaces can be a hard place for Black women to survive, let alone thrive.
There is an inherent threat that comes from Black women being their authentic selves in their place of work. Whether that place of work is an office, a school or a theatre stage, it’s not uncommon for Black women in different industries to feel like they have to perform, code switch, and restrict letting who they are at their core shine through over fears of how it will be perceived by our colleagues, our customers and the higher ups.
What was interesting about the 2021 study was that it incorporated trauma-based reporting:
“Black women are far more likely than other employees to be coping with the impact of racism and racial trauma. More than 60 percent of Black women have been personally affected by racial trauma in the past year,” the study read.
This isn’t to say that the reason behind Michelle’s depression was racial trauma, but truthfully, it can be difficult to gauge the exact impact that racial trauma has on us in our daily lives, particularly during the year that was 2021.
But perhaps the most interesting finding came from Black women’s disposition to the company as a result of measly inclusion efforts, which are dwindling at a more rapid pace than ever now.
The study found that Black women’s pessimism from their company’s commitment to inclusion stems from the fact that they face bias on a regular basis in the office, and that they are twice as likely as other women to speak up about their company not following through on inclusion efforts. Despite all this, they are more likely than any other group of employees, including men of colour and women of other races and ethnicities, to devote a noticeable amount of time on inclusion work, which is outside of their official job responsibilities – and largely unpaid. Black women are also more likely to speak out against bias and discrimination at work and more likely to experience retaliation for speaking up.
So it’s no wonder that a lot of Black women face burnout, but continue to press on over fears of how they’ll be perceived if they step away. Michelle is saying that she overestimated her wellness, was forced to step away, and her immediate thought was that her future and fate on Broadway had been sealed and that she would be seen as a liability. That is so incredibly sad that not even a doctor’s order could protect her from feeling that way.
While Michelle’s journey certainly sounds amazing, particularly at this stage, where she’s back on Broadway and eligible for a Tony – if she wasn’t Michelle Williams, would she have been able to land the roles she did on Broadway? Or would she have faced the same bias in the hiring process that so many other Black women do?
In Doechii’s acceptance speech, she addressed Black women directly, saying:
“I know that there is some Black girl out there, so many Black women out there, that are watching me right now, and I want to tell you, you can do it. Anything is possible. Anything is possible. Don’t allow anybody to project any stereotypes on you, to tell you that you can’t be here, that you’re too dark, or that you’re not smart enough, or that you’re too dramatic, or you’re too loud.”
But the reality is, that’s exactly the message that so many of us hear in our workplaces, whether directly or indirectly, through microaggressions, the shutting down of our ideas and contributions, or, as the study suggested, not getting the job or being promoted once in it.
So while women like Michelle Williams and Doechii have given us great inspiration in just how far we can make it, particularly in creative spaces like music and Broadway, there are a lot of us still waiting to see wider changes in other industries where we’re still fighting to feel comfortable being ourselves. Because we’ve seen the amazing things that happen when Black women just be themselves.