I know I had my equivalents in Adrian Lester and Lenny James when I was at drama school. I remember David Harewood doing 'Othello' at the National and Adrian Lester having done Cheek by Jowl's famous 'As You Like It and Company' at the Donmar. Not necessarily performances I saw but just the fact they happened was massively encouraging.
All the perplexities confusion and distress in America arise not from defects in their Constitution or Confederation not from want of honor or virtue so much as from the downright ignorance of the nature of coin credit and circulation.