Help us raise $1,000 between now and August 10th by inviting your friends to join our Community Circle on BloomSpot! If we hit 200 members by August 10th, BloomSpot will donate $1,000 to our cause. If each of us invite a few friends to join, we’ll be there in no time!

BloomSpot is a website that provides exclusive discounts at local restaurants, bars, spas, hotels and more. We recently started a Circle on BloomSpot to provide members an easy and fun way to support us online. Once you join our Circle, any item you purchase will generate a donation back to our cause.

Please spread the word to your friends by sending this link –  www.bloomspot.com/circles/the-drama-league –  anyone can join and every invite counts! Thanks for your support!

Join Executive Director Gabriel Shanks and new friends for our theatre discussion group. This month we’ll be talking about the hits of last season…that will soon be NEXT season’s hits. How will Broadway transfers of The Scottsboro Boys, Brief Encounter, Yank!, and Time Stands Still change what we see onstage?

Monday, July 26, 5pm | FREE
Drama League Offices| 520 8th Avenue, Suite 320

RSVP by calling 212-244-9494 x5

Congratulations to our new Drama League Fall Fellow, Lila Neugebauer, for her 2010 New York Innovative Theatre Award nomination for Best Director for her production of Samuel and Alasdair: A Personal History of the Robot War, at The Mad Ones. Click here for a list of nominations!

The emo-rock musical Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, which played at the Public Theater this spring, will begin performances on Broadway starting September 21 at the Bernard Jacobs Theatre.

Congratulations to Drama League alum Alex Timbers, who authored the book and will direct the production again for the Broadway run. Click here for more information!

Last chance to catch John Guare’s Olivier Award-winning play Six Degrees of Separation, at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. The production is directed by Drama League alum, Anne Kauffman and runs through July 25. Click here for more information!

The Classic Stage Company’s 2010-2011 season will begin with Sarah Ruhl’s Orlando, directed by Drama League alum, Rebecca Taichman. Performances begin September 8, 2010. Click here for more information!

Alan Jay Lerner-Burton Lane reincarnation-themed musical On a Clear Day You Can See Forever will be presented at Off-Broadway’s Vineyard Theatre in January 2011. The production will be directed by Drama League alum and Tony Award-winning director Michael Mayer following a concert presentation at Vassar College this month starring Tony nominee Brian d’Arcy James (Time Stands Still, Next To Normal, Shrek The Musical), Tony winner Anika Noni Rose (Caroline, or Change), David Turner (The Invention of Love), Kerry O’Malley (Irving Berlin’s White Christmas, Billy Elliot), Colin Hanlon (Rent), and Sarah Stiles (Avenue Q,)

The Public Theater’s concert production of Paul Simon’s The Capeman will be presented August 14-16 at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park. The concert will be directed by Drama League alum, Diane Paulus. Click Here for more information!

Roundabout Theatre Company will present The Language Archive (September 24-December 19, 2010) at the Laura Pels Theatre, directed by Drama League alum Mark Brokaw. Roundabout will also present Tigers Be Still in their Black Box Theatre as part of the Roundabout Underground series. The production will be directed by Drama League alum, Sam Gold. Click here for more information!

Drama League alum Sam Gold will also direct two more productions this season! Lincoln Center Theater’s The Coward will play at The Duke on 42nd Street starting November 8, 2010. Click here for more information! And, Kin, a new play by Bathsheba Dora will begin performances this winter at Playwrights Horizons. Click here for more information!

The La Jolla Playhouse’s new production of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream begins July 20 under the direction of Drama League Alum, Christopher Ashley. The cast includes Tony Award nominee and Obie Award winner Charlayne Woodard (The Night Watcher, Ain’t Misbehavin’) as Hippolyta/Titania, Obie winner and Tony nominee J. Smith Cameron (The Starry Messenger, As Bees in Honey Drown) as Helena, and Obie winner Martin Moran (Spamalot, Titanic) as Puck.

Click here for more information!

At the recent White House Music Series Event Saluting Broadway, President Barack Obama remarked…

“Musicals carry us to a different time and place, but in the end, they also teach us a little bit of something about ourselves. It’s one of the few genres of music that can inspire the same passion in an eight-year-old that it can an 80-year-old –- and make them both want to get up and dance. It transcends musical tastes, from opera and classical to rock and hip-hop. And whether we want to admit it or not, we all have the lyrics to a few Broadway songs stuck in our heads. (Laughter.)

In many ways, the story of Broadway is also intertwined with the story if America. Some of the greatest singers and songwriters Broadway has ever known came to this country on a boat with nothing more than an idea in their head and a song in their heart. And they succeeded the same way that so many immigrants have succeeded -– through talent and hard work and sheer determination.

Over the years, musicals have also been at the forefront of our social consciousness, challenging stereotypes, shaping our opinions about race and religion, death and disease, power and politics.

But perhaps the most American part of this truly American art form is its optimism. Broadway music calls us to see the best in ourselves and in the world around us -– to believe that no matter how hopeless things may seem, the nice guy can still get the girl, the hero can still triumph over evil, and a brighter day can be waiting just around the bend.”

To view the entire speech on the official White House website, click here!

The Drama League is happy to announce the appointment of Dustin Bryant as its new Audience Project Manager. An experienced theatre professional, Dustin recently relocated to New York City from San Diego, where he worked for San Diego Repertory Theatre, serving for many years as the Marketing and Development Manager. A seasoned professional with experience in audience development, he received his degree at the University of Little Rock in Arkansas.

Mr. Bryant can be reached at 212-244-9494 ext. 25, or at dbryant@dramaleague.org. He is available to help Drama League Members with membership questions, needs or requests. Welcome Dustin!

The Drama League has a Community Circle on BloomSpot, a new website offering daily specials for quality restaurants, hotels, spas, etc across the country! Join our Circle, and BloomSpot will contribute a percentage of sales for EVERY purchase you make on the site to The Drama League.

Additionally, as a free thank-you from BloomSpot, for each person who signs up to become a member of The Drama League Circle on BloomSpot between now and July 4 (Sunday), BloomSpot will donate $5 to The Drama League.

It’s FREE and easy to sign up!

Just click here…

http://www.bloomspot.com/circles/the-drama-league

and enter your email address and BloomSpot will donate $5 for each person who joins between today and Sunday at midnight! And…once we raise our first $100, BloomSpot will match and contribute an additional $100 to The Drama League!

Please spread the word to your friends by copying the link – anyone can join!
Thank you for your support!

Congratulations to Drama League Alum, Laura Kepley, who has just been selected as the Associate Artistic Director of The Cleveland Play House! Click here to read more!