We were thrilled to have our Open Doors program recently featured on WABC-TV Eyewitness News. Take a look!

Last night, as part of the New York Times‘ ongoing Times Talk series, Frank Rich interviewed Stephen Sondheim about his life and career. Rich, who is a mentor in TDF’s Open Doors program, has a long friendship with Sondheim, and their chat was warm and inviting.

You can find highlights of their conversation here.

On October 23, Victoria Bailey, TDF’s Executive Director, gave the keynote speech at the National Alliance for Musical Theatre’s (NAMT) fall conference. Under the title “Outrageous Fortune — the Musical!”, the conference investigated the state of new play and musical development in the United States. Below, we are please to present the full text of Bailey’s address.

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So why Outrageous Fortune? Why did Theatre Development Fund, an organization that if you know us at all, you for our TKTS booths,and maybe our
membership program, why did TDF commission Outrageous Fortune?

The idea came from a founder, our first Board President, John Booth. TDF was started in 1968 in response to a concern on the part of some folks at the Twentieth Century Fund that it
was getting more and more difficult for Broadway to sustain serious plays, plays that were meritorious. TDF was started to help stimulate the production of those plays. We did it with our ticketing programs, which have gone on to bring millions of people to theatre who wouldn’t otherwise have gone. We did it with our subsidy program, and we did it with the TKTS booths.

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The musical In The Heights is set in the Latino community of New York’s Washington Heights neighborhood, and when heart disease affects one of its characters, it’s more than just a plot twist: It’s a reflection of a major American health crisis.

According to the American Heart Association, heart disease and stroke claim twenty-seven percent of the Hispanic and Latino Americans who die each year. For a show like In The Heights, which strives to honestly embody a contemporary Latino experience, it would almost be inconceivable to leave heart disease out of the story.

But what happens when the story has been told? Beyond representing this health crisis on stage—which is no small thing, of course—can a group of theatre artists do anything to address it ?

They certainly can. Last week, cast members from In the Heights, as well as cast members from the current Broadway revival of West Side Story, gathered on stage at the Richard Rodgers Theatre (where In the Heights performs) to be trained by American Heart Association representatives in a technique called “Hands-Only CPR.” That’s a type of CPR that only involves chest compressions, not mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, and it’s valuable because it can quickly be learned, quickly taught during an emergency, and provide vital support to someone suffering from cardiac arrest.

In other words, this event made it clear that with just a little training, any of us can help someone who is having a heart attack.

Fortunately for me, the AHA invited journalists to participate alongside the actors in the training session. I was happy to join in, since I haven’t been trained in CPR since eighth-grade health class. (I also brought along Sarah Aziz, coordinator of TDF’s accessibility programs.)

Right there alongside actors like Olga Merediz (Tony-nominated for her role as Abuela Claudia in In the Heights) and George Akram (who is starring as Bernardo in West Side Story), Sarah and I went to work on our plastic CPR dummies, learning the best way to position our hands over a victim (fingers interlocking, elbows straight) and the best speed for applying chest compressions (roughly 100 beats per minute.)

Honestly, I hope I never have to use the skill I picked up at this event, but I’m happy to have it. And I’m happy to be able to spread a few messages: Be aware of your heart health; be aware of how heart disease affects the Latino and Hispanic communities in America; and be aware that it doesn’t take much time to make a difference.

To learn more about Hands-Only CPR, go here.

(Top photo, TDF staff members Sarah Aziz and Mark Blankenship on stage at the Richard Rodgers; middle photo, Olga Merediz gets CPR training)