Wilson Cruz becomes new GLSEN board chair
These days, when actor, producer and activist Wilson Cruz isn’t walking a picket line with the Screen Actors Guild and supporting the striking members of the Writers Guild, he’s busy getting up to speed as the new chair of the board at GLSEN, the organization that is also known as the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network. “It’s really a turning point for the organization,” Cruz told the Los Angeles Blade in a recent phone interview.
For the first time in GLSEN’s 33-year history, its board chairs and executive director represent BIPOC, nonbinary and trans people. “And it’s a great time to set a new course for this organization, because if there’s ever been a need for a GLSEN, it is in this moment when education and queer kids and the relationships to their education is so fraught.” Variety first broke the news on July 26, but as it turns out, the award-winning actor best known for “Star Trek: Discovery” and“My So-Called Life”and for his advocacy spilled the beans to the Blade way back on June 8.
That evening, Cruz joined his “Star Trek” co-stars Anthony Rapp and Blu del Barrio for a Q&A with fans, following a performance of Rapp’s extraordinary one-man off-Broadway musical, “Without You.” The Blade asked each of the stars on stage that night at the New Worlds Stages theater in Manhattan what their plans were for Pride Month, and Cruz let it slip that he was about to embark on this new adventure with GLSEN. “Just between you and the 30 people who are in here, I’m taking over as the chair of the board of GLSEN,” Cruz revealed to wild applause.
Rapp asked his “Star Trek” “space boo” about the group’s current name, which Cruz confirmed will soon be known only by its acronym. “It’s basically an organization that works
