American Actor Jeremy Pope Discusses Queer, Black Identity and Performance at College Event

Emmy, Grammy, Golden Globe, and Tony-nominated actor Jeremy Pope spoke about identity, his upbringing, and navigating the entertainment industry as a queer Black artist during a talk on Thursday afternoon.

The event — which was co-hosted by the Harvard College Office of BGLTQ Student Life, the Office for the Arts, the Harvard Black Men’s Forum, and Black Arts Collective — was moderated by Jamaal ‘Jama’ N.A. Willis ’25.

Pope, known best for his leading roles in Broadway shows “Choir Boy” and “Ain’t Too Proud,” started the talk by tracing his creative roots to his upbringing in Orlando, Florida. Pope said that his father, who was a pastor and a bodybuilder, shaped his long-lasting interest in performance.

“I remember church feeling like a play, feeling like performance. It was music, it was spiritual, it was what you wore — it was just a very unique space,” Pope said. “My dad, being a bodybuilder, on Saturdays, we would go to bodybuilding competitions where he would go on stage and perform. I think I was just around a lot of performance.”

His father also encouraged Pope’s individuality by supporting his interest in the 90s pop artists Spice Girls and Britney Spears without judgement.

“My parents separated when I was super young, so he was trying to not be the Black father that is absent in the kid’s life. He was trying to do something different and show up,” Pope said.

Following high school, Pope recalled deciding to pursue musical theater at a private art school and said he “hated it at the beginning.”

“They kind of strip you of all the things that are you — your uniqueness, the way that you sing, the way that you talk,” he said. “You’re from Florida, They're like, ‘take that twang out. You need to speak American dialect,’ to get you to a blank canvas, to then build you up to be the actor that they think is going to be successful.”

“I get that, but so much of my experience has been my uniqueness as the thing that I bring to the table,” Pope added.

Because of this experience, Pope said it was difficult “trying to navigate a space of music theater.”

“You weren’t really seeing people of color have lead parts on stage,” he said. “So it was also like, how profitable is this going to actually be? Am I going to just be the one token Black person in the show that’s in the back?”

Pope also reflected on the challenges of being queer in Hollywood, where he said he felt pressured to conceal his sexuality. As a young actor eager to book roles, he said he observed queer actors who kept their sexuality private to appear more “moldable” to casting directors.

While Pope said he sometimes faces biases in role castings, he decided he “didn’t want to lie” about his sexuality.

“I wanted people to see that two things can be true — yes, I am a black queer man, but I can shape shift just the same,” Pope said.