Following the decision by the board of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts to rebrand the institution as “The Donald J. Trump and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts,” several artists announced that they would cancel scheduled engagements at the venue. In response, Richard Grenell, the Center’s president, accused those performers of being “unwilling to perform for everyone—even those they disagree with politically” and threatened to pursue $1 million in damages against jazz musician Chuck Redd, who canceled a performance scheduled for Christmas Eve.
This recent wave of cancellations, which follows an earlier round of artist withdrawals that occurred after President Trump assumed control of the institution and oversaw significant changes to its board, staff, and programming earlier in 2025, raises important questions about whether performers have a contractual right to cancel performances under these circumstances, and if not, what damages a venue such as the Center is entitled to recover.
Following the leadership overhaul, the Center canceled a planned national tour of Finn, a new children’s musical about identity and self-acceptance, which debuted at the venue in late 2024. That decision likely reflected the venue’s own contractual rights and does not necessarily strengthen an artist’s right to cancel a separate engagement at the venue.
An artist faces no contractual exposure if a binding agreement has never been finalized. Where the parties are still negotiating terms—or where key elements such as dates, compensation, or guarantees have not been memorialized in a fully executed contract—either side generally remains free to walk away without legal consequence. In March 2025, when the producers of the Broadway musical Hamilton announced that the show would not proceed with a planned 2026 engagement at the Center because of the leadership changes, the New York Times reported that although the Center had announced in 2024 that Hamilton would return in 2026, “it had not yet put tickets on sale, and no contract had been signed.”
Many artists have claimed that the name change, combined with the Trump administration’s prior actions to remove and replace the Center’s board and staff members, appoint Trump himself as chairman, and prioritize the removal of drag performance and “woke” programming, have fundamentally altered the venue’s nature. For instance, Broadway composer Stephen Schwartz, who announced that he will no longer host a gala event at the Center, told Newsday that “it no longer represents the apolitical place for free artistic expression it was founded to be…There’s no way I would set foot in it now.” Likewise, when Hamilton was canceled, producer Jeffrey Seller wrote on social media that “the recent purge by the Trump Administration of both professional staff and performing arts events at or originally produced by the Kennedy Center flies in the face of everything this national center represents.”
However, under a standard independent contractor agreement between a performance venue and an artist, an artist would not have an automatic right to withdraw simply because of changes to the venue’s name, branding, leadership, or political associations. Force majeure provisions—contractual clauses that excuse or delay performance due to extraordinary events beyond the parties’ control—are generally limited to events that make performance illegal, impossible, or commercially impracticable, such as natural disasters, government shutdowns, labor stoppages, or venue unavailability. These provisions were scrutinized extensively during the COVID-19 pandemic, reinforcing that courts generally apply them narrowly and according to their specific terms.
A court is also unlikely to excuse performance based on a common law defense such as impossibility (where an unforeseen event makes performing the contract objectively impossible), commercial impracticality (where an unforeseen event makes performing the contract extremely difficult), or frustration of purpose (where an unforeseen event substantially destroys a basic, shared assumption underlying the contract).
Given the reported sharp decline in ticket sales for performances at the Center following the leadership changes, an artist whose compensation is tied in whole or in substantial part to ticket revenue could argue that performance has become financially prohibitive and that the economic intent of the contract has been frustrated. However, absent express contractual language conditioning performance on minimum attendance or revenue levels, a decline in ticket sales is unlikely to serve as a sufficient basis to excuse performance.
It is worth noting that performance contracts often protect artists when a venue cancels a performance, as recently seen in the dispute involving the Metropolitan Opera and soprano Anna Netrebko. Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Met canceled Netrebko’s performances in multiple upcoming productions based on concerns about her past associations with Russian President Vladimir Putin and her refusal to denounce Putin. Morals clauses—common in performance agreements—are contractual provisions that permit a venue or producer to terminate an engagement if an artist engages in specified conduct that brings public disrepute or scandal to the institution or production. An arbitrator subsequently ordered the Met to pay Netrebko more than $200,000 in damages for the canceled performances, finding that Netrebko’s associations with Putin “was certainly not moral turpitude or worthy, in and of itself, of actionable misconduct.”
On the other hand, even if an artist lacks a clear contractual right to withdraw from a performance, the artist may not necessarily face significant damages exposure. Performance agreements often include express provisions addressing what damages are available if an artist cancels without cause. In an agreement for a single performance by an artist, the consequence for withdrawal may be limited to the return of a down payment or advance previously paid by the venue along with limited incidental expenses. The agreement may further limit the available damages if the cancellation occurs far in advance of the performance date. If the damages for cancellation are limited in scope, an artist may determine that the reputational risk of proceeding with a performance at a venue outweighs the financial risk arising from cancellation. Similarly, a venue may conclude that pursuing litigation would only serve to amplify controversy, generate negative publicity, and deter future performers.
Careful review of performance agreements is critical to understanding whether and when an engagement may be canceled and what remedies and limitations may apply in the event of a cancellation. While the Center situation may be a rare and unprecedented anomaly, it could encourage artists to consider adding language to performance contracts that would allow them to withdraw due to similar circumstances. If you have questions about the legal issues associated with performance agreements or other agreements in the entertainment industry, please contact the author or your attorney at McCarter & English LLP.