- - ‘Wicked’ composer says he won’t appear at Kennedy Center after name change

Michael Williams, CNNJanuary 3, 2026 at 3:50 AM

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Stephen Schwartz attends the "Wicked: Part One" European Premiere in London on November 18, 2024. - Tim P. Whitby/Getty Images

“Wicked” composer Stephen Schwartz says he will not appear at the Kennedy Center after its board voted to attach President Donald Trump’s name to the venue — becoming the latest artist to push back against the president’s takeover of Washington’s most iconic performing arts center.

The Oscar and Grammy-award winning composer said in a statement, “The Kennedy Center was founded to be an apolitical home for artists of all nationalities and all ideologies. It is no longer apolitical, and appearing there has become an ideological statement. As long as that remains the case, I will not appear there.”

The center’s website had listed Schwartz as appearing in a gala with the Washington National Opera in May, and included a link to buy tickets to the performance, but it was removed from the website Friday afternoon.

In spite of the website listing the upcoming appearance by Schwartz, Richard Grenell, the president of the center’s board, denied that he had ever been signed to appear.

“He was never signed and I’ve never had a single conversation on him since arriving,” Grenell said in a post on X, calling reports of Schwartz’s cancelation “totally bogus.”

“He himself said last February he hadn’t heard anything on it,” Grenell said.

A spokesman for Schwartz said the composer and a person associated with the Washington National Opera had been in communication about his “possible participation” in a May gala, and they had last spoken in February 2025.

“Having not heard anything further after that point, he assumed—incorrectly, as it turns out—that the event was no longer moving forward,” the spokesman, Michael Cole, said in an email to CNN. Cole added that Schwartz had only learned Thursday night that the event was still scheduled.

The Kennedy Center opened in 1971, designated by Congress as a living memorial to the assassinated President John F. Kennedy. Schwartz attended the center’s opening.

But a stream of artists have canceled their appearances since Trump purged the center’s existing board and installed a slate of loyalists to oversee the center last year. Since then, the center has cut staff and reevaluated its programming.

More artists canceled after the new board voted last month to rename the center “The Donald J. Trump and The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.”

The New York City-based dance company Doug Varone and Dancers is among those who cancelled their upcoming performances. The company’s director, Doug Varone, appearing on CNN’s “Erin Burnett OutFront” on Friday said the decision to cancel was unanimous — despite the financial hit from lost revenue.

“Everyone in our organization from our board to our dancers to our staff all supported this decision,” he said. “I can’t imagine any artist wanting to step through those doors right now with his name on that building.”

The decision by artists to bow out of scheduled appearances prompted threats of legal action from the Kennedy Center against some of the artists.

The move to add Trump’s name to the center quickly raised legal concerns as to whether the board had the legal authority to rename the arts institution. But it’s unclear whether anybody looking to challenge the renaming would have legal standing to do so, experts previously told CNN.

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