2025 Native Performing Arts Grantees: Anthony Hudson & Brandi Berry Benson

We’re delighted to go behind the scenes with two of our 2025 Native Performing Arts grantees, Anthony Hudson and Brandi Berry Benson. We explore the moments that shaped them, how community fuels their work, and the perspectives they’re challenging today. Spoiler: next-door neighbors matter.

Anthony Hudson: Responding Through Laughter, Legacy, and Drag

Anthony Hudson (Confederated Tribes of Grande Ronde, enrolled; Confederated Tribes of Siletz, descendant) is a Portland-based writer, artist, satirist, performer, playwright, and self-proclaimed drag clown. When asked to put an easy label on his work, Anthony just runs away.  We say, “Please don’t go!”

Whether through essay, video, theatre, or drag, Anthony’s compass holds true:  “What makes me laugh more than anything? What am I selfishly drawn to?”

A “responder,” Anthony draws material from everywhere.  Early influences range from trickster tales, stand-up comedy, and film to dad jokes, the clown who lived next door, and every “Native guy with a microphone.”  Anthony thanks parents who identified him as a young storyteller, his father’s educational PowerPoints on ICWA (infused, amazingly, with humor), and a surprise sanctuary–high school drama.  When Anthony came out, his father offered him the term “Two-Spirit,” even scouting out scholarly research on two-spirit identity across Turtle Island, to place in his son’s hands.

At Pacific Northwest College of Art, Anthony’s professors noticed makeup on his face (and on an exam).  When they invited him to perform drag in class, he did, leading to long-standing collaborations, response, and eventually international acclaim.

Is it all laughs?  Nope.  Navigating the art world as a Native artist means contending with gatekeeping and narrow expectations. “There’s pressure to be ‘the good Indian,’” he says. Today, Anthony self-produces most of his work.

Burnout is another reality. Touring is exhausting. “You have to start fresh every time.”  Anthony is scaling back,  committing to his home communities. “I’m a clown for my people.”

This is where First Peoples Fund comes in. “They’re not transactional,” Anthony says. The support from FPF has allowed him to pause, recover, and dream. “It’s been nothing but acceptance, support, and flexibility.”

Looking ahead, Anthony is celebrating the 10th anniversary of Queer Horror, developing his new show Ask Dr. Carla, and documenting performances for wider sharing. He’s also working on not one, but two new plays.

About Carla Rossi, Anthony’s drag persona:  “She lies a lot,” he says. A white-faced Karen, Carla is a trickster.  She always gets it backwards, and by mistake, it helps everyone. “I’m interested in taking things apart and putting them back together the wrong way.”  

Drag clown?  Anthony coined the term himself: “Culture doesn’t have the right words for me.”

His legacy? “Pretty simple,” says Anthony Hudson.  “I want the weirdos like me to feel less alone.”

Brandi Berry Benson: Strings, Storytelling, and Chickasaw Futures

Brandi Berry Benson (Chickasaw) is a Chicago-based violinist, fiddler, composer, educator, and researcher.  Like a musical composition, her story is full of recurring themes and refrains.

Brandi fell in love with the sound of the violin the first time she heard it.  Who was playing?  The girl next door.  Brandi began to play at nine, when she officially became a citizen of the Chickasaw Nation— always under the eye of the photograph of her ancestor Pa I Sha, displayed in her family’s living room.

As an undergrad at the University of North Texas, Brandi played everything from classical to country.  Bluegrass won her over with its lively and inclusive energy.  Another highlight was the performance of her first composition, Where the Creek Meets the River.

Performing is Brandi’s passion, and she was fully immersed in it—until the pandemic hit. With gigs suddenly canceled, her other passion–composition– came to life.   Brandi’s first album of original compositions, Silver Linings, features Chickasaw Suite, a piece that seeded her deeper engagement with cultural and familial research.

One thing led to another: a Google search, a Zoom call, mentorship, all towards collaboration with the Chickasaw Nation. Nudged on by her great-grandfather’s “old way” dedication to genealogy, she’s walking in his footsteps.  Brandi recognized more footsteps when she encountered a 19th-century photograph of young Chickasaw women holding violins—taken at the Chickasaw-run Bloomfield Academy, where her ancestors married.  In 2023, she premiered The Story of Pa I Sha, a musical narrative inspired by oral history and songs.

While most arts grants limit support to projects, Brandi appreciates that FPF supports the full arc of an artist’s journey.  FPF’s support is helping her visit the Chickasaw Nation more often and invest in visibility and marketing. “We have to get our voices out there,” she says. “More people need to benefit.”

Legacy is on Brandi’s mind.  Chickasaw way, she notes, “if you have even one drop of Chickasaw blood, you’re 100%.”  For her, this understanding represents freedom through artistic expression and responsibility.

Brandi’s music flows through three currents: baroque, bluegrass, and Chickasaw/Choctaw traditions. She’s working on Chickasaw Caprices, a series honoring influential Chickasaw figures, and researching Native influence on early American music as a faculty affiliate at Northwestern’s Center for Native and Indigenous Research.

“We always hear how Native peoples were influenced by European contact,” she says, “but there should be way more talk about the Native influence.”

Can music shift the story?  “Music literally ‘resonates’ with people.”  That resonance, Brandi hopes, can change the narrative, and she means  “Big picture.”