May 19, 2009

The New Gig

Dear readers, today is my last day as Editorial Content Manager for Theatre Development Fund, where I've spent nearly three happy years writing about New York theater and about the ways TDF serves it. It's been a great, generous, collegial place to work, but tomorrow I begin my new job as Associate Editor at American Theatre magazine, a publication I've written for a few times over the years. With all due thanks to TDF, the American Theatre gig is precisely the sort of career journalism opportunity I moved to New York for in the summer of 2005.

Looking back over my work at TDF, there's a lot I recall fondly, not least the opening of the red steps and the new TKTS booth...

My main job, in addition to covering TDF's pathbreaking service and outreach programs, was to talk to artists about their stage work and write features about them. Nice work if you can get it. My first interview was with producer Tom Hulce before the opening of Spring Awakening, and my last was with Condola Rashad of Ruined--not a bad pair of bookends, I'd say. In between I've relished speaking to such legendary figures as Paul Taylor, Edward Albee, and Charles Strouse, as well as...

playwrights Theresa Rebeck, Sarah Ruhl, Douglas Carter Beane, Danny Hoch, Adam Bock, J.T. Rogers, David Henry Hwang, Vern Thiessen, Darrell Dennis, Rinne Groff, Lenelle Moises, Jeff Bowen,
Rajiv Joseph, Steven Levenson, Ronan Noone, Lee Blessing, Mike Birbiglia, David Greenspan, Donald Margulies, Itamar Moses, and Dick Scanlan;

composers William Finn, Heidi Rodewald, Mark Mulcahy, Tom Kitt, and Michael Friedman;

directors Bob Falls, Steven Cosson, Neil Pepe, Leigh Silverman, Pippin Parker, David Cromer, Trip Cullman, John Collins, Henry Wishcamper, Douglas C. Wager, Daniel Aukin, Ciaran O'Reilly, Nicholas Martin, and Colman Domingo;

designers Anna Louizos, Martin Pakledinaz, and William Ivey Long;

producers Thomas Schumacher and Jeffrey Richards, and Richards' colleague, press agent Irene Gandy;

and actors Denis O'Hare, John Glover, Pablo Schreiber, Michael Cerveris, Charlotte D'Amboise, Harriet Harris, Marian Seldes, Capathia Jenkins, Karen Ziemba, Allison Fraser, Kate Mulgrew, Xanthe Elbrick, George Andrews, Carole Shelley, Cheryl Freeman, Gerald McRaney, Debra Monk, Kathleen Chalfant, Jonathan Hadary, Shuler Hensley, Chuck Mee, Sarah Stiles, Norbert Leo Butz, Arnie Burton, Jimmi Simpson, Laurie Metcalf, Lily Rabe, S. Epatha Merkerson, Michael McKean, Ciaran Hinds, Austin Pendleton, Javier Munoz, Marylouise Burke, Jane Alexander, Joanna Gleason, Danny Burstein, Boyd Gaines, Julie White, Gideon Banner, Mary Beth Hurt, Rondi Reed, Tom Wopat, Jeremy Lawrence, Amy Warren, de'Adre Aziza, Christopher Evan Welch, Jim True-Frost, Anna Camp, Daniel Jenkins and Robert Stanton, Clay Aiken, Donna Lynne Champlin, Ivan Hernandez, Christopher Sieber, Paul Sparks, David Wilson Barnes, Richard Kind, Aaron Monaghan, Gregory Jbara, Zach Grenier, and Tovah Feldshuh.

Onward and upward!

3 comments:

Jessica said...

Congrats Rob! Sounds awesome!

David Cote said...

Belated but nonetheless enthusiastic congratulations sir. Now start saving American theater.

Kerry said...

Lovely! I hope I get a chance to work with you soon!