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AMERICAN THEATRE WING & XM RADIO'S DOWNSTAGE CENTER CELEBRATES 200TH INTERVIEW
Special Guest will be Legendary Producer/Director Hal Prince
Online Program Archive to Pass 1,000,000th Download
New York and Washington, D.C. - April 22, 2008 - The American Theatre Wing and XM Satellite Radio will celebrate their 200th Downstage Center interview on May 2 with a program featuring the legendary producer/director Hal Prince, airing on XM's On Broadway (XM Channel 28). Prince will survey his impressive career from his early days as a protégé of George Abbott to his work as a groundbreaking producer of such hits as The Pajama Game and Fiddler on the Roof to his landmark work as a director of Cabaret, Company, Follies, Sweeney Todd and The Phantom of the Opera.
The milestone show will air on Friday, May 2 at 6 p.m. The show will repeat on Saturday, May 3 at noon, Sunday, May 4 at 7 p.m., and Wednesday, May 7 at midnight. The program becomes available as streaming audio and podcast from www.americantheatrewing.org beginning Monday afternoon, May 5.
Since its debut in April of 2004, Downstage Center has become America's premier radio program on theatre. Its hour-long interviews spotlight all aspects of the theatre: musical, comedy and drama; commercial and not-for-profit; Broadway, Off-Broadway, national and international. Described on one theatre blog as, "The Charlie Rose Show from an alternate universe where all of the guests are in theatre," Downstage Center goes beyond artists' current projects to discuss their beginnings in the theatre and many of the significant points in their careers.
Downstage Center guests have included actors, writers, composers, directors, producers, designers, artistic directors, critics, and more, ranging from Edward Albee, Jerry Herman, Michael Blakemore, Horton Foote and Graciela Daniele to Michael Cerveris, Alice Ripley, Lea Salonga, Kristin Chenoweth and Nathan Lane. With no repeated guests, the roster of DSC programs includes separate interviews with siblings (Lynn and Vanessa Redgrave), spouses (Chris Sarandon & Joanna Gleason; Kate Burton & Michael Ritchie), acclaimed co-stars (Matthew Broderick and Nathan Lane), actors who have shared the same role (John Lithgow and Jonathan Pryce of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels), two fake kings (Tim Curry and Harry Groener of Spamalot) and two real knights (Sir Tom Stoppard and Sir Alan Ayckbourn). [A full list of guests below.]
In addition to its broadcast audience via XM, Downstage Center's online archive, available from the American Theatre Wing's website and iTunes, is an unprecedented resource for students, researchers and theatre fans, who can access the complete catalogue as streaming audio or podcast for free at any time. The Downstage Center archive will mark it 1,000,000th download shortly after the 200th program airs.
DownstageCenter was created by and is co-hosted by Howard Sherman, executive director of the American Theatre Wing, and John von Soosten, program director of XM 28 On Broadway. Each new Downstage Center is regularly broadcast at 6 p.m. on Fridays, Saturdays at noon, Sundays at 7 p.m. and Wednesdays at 12 a.m. (all times EST; transmission is simultaneous in all US time zones). Following the initial run on XM, each program is made available for free, on-demand, internationally as both streaming audio and podcast on ATW?s Web site, www.americantheatrewing.org.
About The American Theatre Wing
The American Theatre Wing is best known as the creator of the Antoinette Perry "Tony" Awards®, which it presents annually with The Broadway League. The Wing's other activities, dedicated to recognizing excellence and supporting education in theatre, include Working in the Theatre, now in its 29th year of telecasts on CUNY TV in New York and on other national cable outlets; Downstage Center, an hour-long weekly interview program on XM Satellite Radio; Guides to Careers in the Theatre, a video series developed for schools and libraries; a grants and scholarship program to New York City schools and not-for-profit theatre companies, which has awarded more than $2.5 million since its inception; the Theatre Intern Group, a career development program for young professionals; and SpringboardNYC, a two-week college-to-career boot camp for young performers moving to NYC. Visitors to www.americantheatrewing.org can view or download an archive of Working in the Theatre and the career guides and listen to DownstageCenter, all as free, on-demand streaming audio and podcast. Sondra Gilman is Chairman of the Board of the American Theatre Wing; Doug Leeds is President of the Board and Howard Sherman is Executive Director.
About XM Satellite Radio
XM is America's number-one satellite radio company with more than 9 million subscribers. Broadcasting live daily from studios in Washington, D.C., New York City, the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, Toronto and Montreal, XM's lineup includes more than 170 digital channels of choice from coast to coast: the most commercial-free music, premier sports, talk, comedy, children's and entertainment programming; and the most advanced traffic and weather information. For more information about XM hardware, programming and partnerships, please visit www.xmradio.com.
DOWNSTAGE CENTER GUESTS FROM 2004-2008
F. Murray Abraham
Lynn Ahrens
Edward Albee
Gerard Alessandrini
Jane Alexander
Christopher Ashley
Alan Ayckbourn
Michael Ball
Martha Banta
John Barrowman
Roger Bart
Hinton Battle
Gary Beach
Douglas Carter Beane
Joe Benincasa
Dori Berinstein
Ken Billington
Andre Bishop
Michael Blakemore
Lee Blessing
Walter Bobbie
Joanne Bogart
Eric Bogosian
Philip Bosco
Alain Boublil
Matthew Broderick
Blair Brown
Kate Burton
Kerry Butler
Norbert Leo Butz
Simon Callow
Len Cariou
Carolee Carmello
Patrick Cassidy
Michael Cerveris
Kathleen Chalfant
Kevin Chamberlin
Carol Channing
Ted Chapin
Kristin Chenoweth
Dominic Chianese
Victoria Clark
Jill Clayburgh
John P. Connolly
Barbara Cook
Nancy Coyne
Billy Crudup
John Cullum
Alan Cumming
Michael Cumpsty
Tim Curry
Stephanie D'Abruzzo
Graciela Daniele
Jeff Daniels
Kurt Deutsch
Ayesha Dharker
Joe DiPietro
Joe Dowling
John Doyle
Brian Drutman
Christopher Durang
Richard Easton
Eve Ensler
Melissa Errico
Raúl Esparza
Oskar Eustis
Tovah Feldshuh
William Finn
Stephen Flaherty
Dan Fogler
Horton Foote
Sutton Foster
Maria Friedman
Boyd Gaines
Malcolm Gets
Joanna Gleason
Robyn Goodman
Richard Greenberg
Joel Grey
Harry Groener
A.R. Gurney
Margot Harley
Sheldon Harnick
Neil Patrick Harris
Rosemary Harris
Jeffrey Hatcher
Shuler Hensley
Jerry Herman
Tom Hewitt
Drew Hodges
Elena Holy
James Houghton
Doug Hughes
Isaac Hurwitz
David Henry Hwang
Garry Hynes
Amy Irving
Bill Irwin
Charles Isherwood
David Ives
Dana Ivey
Judith Ivey
Kristen Johnston
Cherry Jones
Sarah Jones
Tom Jones
James Earl Jones
Judy Kaye
Michael Kuchwara
Marc Kudisch
Judy Kuhn
Swoosie Kurtz
LaChanze
Michael John LaChiusa
Mark Lamos
Nathan Lane
Stephen Lang
Frank Langella
Angela Lansbury
Martha Lavey
John Lithgow
Craig Lucas
Rebecca Luker
Patti LuPone
Galt McDermot
John Mahoney
Richard Maltby, Jr.
Terrence Mann
Donald Margulies
Kathleen Marshall
Andrea Martin
Bob Martin
Michael Mayer
JeffersonMays
Des McAnuff
Kevin McCollum
John McDaniel
Audra McDonald
Michael McKean
Donna McKechnie
Terrence McNally
Alan Menken
Brian Stokes Mitchell
Jerry Mitchell
Alfred Molina
Debra Monk
Rita Moreno
Donna Murphy
Manu Narayan
Bebe Neuwirth
Cynthia Nixon
Marsha Norman
Jack O'Brien
Kelli O'Hara
Denis O'Hare
Brad Oscar
Michele Pawk
Neil Pepe
Bernadette Peters
David Hyde Pierce
Tonya Pinkins
Martha Plimpton
Jonathan Pryce
Anthony Rapp
Phylicia Rashad
Lynn Redgrave
Vanessa Redgrave
Roger Rees
Alice Ripley
Michael Ritchie
Tony Roberts
David Rockwell
Eric Rockwell
Bill Rosenfield
Daphne Rubin-Vega
Paul Rudnick
Mercedes Ruehl
Michael Rupert
Lea Salonga
Sarah Saltzberg
Ruben Santiago-Hudson
Chris Sarandon
Eric Schaeffer
Claude-Michel Schönberg
Liev Schreiber
Thomas Schumacher
Marian Seldes
John Selya
John Patrick Shanley
Carole Shelley
Bartlett Sher
Richard Sherman
Leigh Silverman
John Simon
Stephen Spinella
Frances Sternhagen
Kris Stewart
George Stiles
Tom Stoppard
Susan Stroman
Charles Strouse
John Tartaglia
Terry Teachout
Arielle Tepper
Richard Thomas
Ashley Tuttle
Leslie Uggams
Jack Viertel
Tom Viola
Paula Vogel
Barbara Walsh
Tony Walton
Zoö Wanamaker
Barry Weissler
Fran Weissler
Mary Louise Wilson
Michael Wilson
Catherine Zuber
as of 4/8/08
198 interviews recorded
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