Broadway Star and Graphic Novelist Boost Vermont LGBTQ Charity

A Broadway star and a famous graphic novelist teamed up to raise funds for a Vermont charity supporting LGBTQ causes.

Beth Malone received a 2015 Tony nomination for her leading role in the acclaimed musical “Fun Home.”

Beth Malone performs “Telephone Wire” from the acclaimed musical “Fun Home,” at a fundraiser for The Samara Fund.

The show is based on the life of Vermont resident Alison Bechdel, who wrote and illustrated her autobiographical story of coming out as a lesbian, while her father was secretly gay.

The performer and the author appeared together Friday night at the BCA Center in Burlington, at the twenty-fifth anniversary celebration of The Samara Fund.

The Samara Fund awards college scholarships as well as grants to organizations that benefit LGBTQ Vermonters statewide, in areas such as health care, housing, the arts, elder services, anti-bullying work, and HIV prevention.

“We try to target those grants and scholarships to what we believe is making our community thrive, and healthy, and active, and entertaining,” said Richard Wizansky, the chair of the advisory committee for The Samara Fund.

“It’s for the LGBTQ community, but, I feel like what Samara does also makes Vermont—the whole Vermont community—a stronger, better place,” Bechdel told necn. “That’s why they’re so awesome.”

The Samara Fund is housed under the Vermont Community Foundation, and says it has granted more than $600,000 in scholarships and grants to LGBTQ causes in the state over the past quarter-century.

Click here for more information on the Samara Fund.

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