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Downstage Center
Go in-depth with the leading artists and professionals working on stage today when you go Downstage Center. Downstage Center is the American Theatre Wing's acclaimed weekly theatrical interview program that spotlights the creative talents on Broadway, Off-Broadway, across the country and around the world, with in-depth conversations that simply can't be found anywhere else. Now in its fifth year, Downstage Center, produced in association with CUNY Graduate School of Journalism, has been featured by the Associated Press and Slate.com as the place to go for theatrical talk. New editions will be available every Monday from this website, where you can listen online, download the programs or subscribe to the podcast.

Laura Benanti
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With:
Laura Benanti

Broadway's newest Gypsy Rose Lee, Laura Benanti, talks about playing the title role in Gypsy both last summer at City Center and again this year on Broadway, including her thoughts on formidable author and director Arthur Laurents, as well as a few facts about the real Gypsy and Rose that didn't make it into the musical. Benanti also discusses her vocal training under the tutelage of her mother (who unlike Rose expressly forbid young Laura from turning pro in her youth); her big break understudying Rebecca Luker in The Sound of Music -- and playing a romantic role opposite someone 45 years her senior; how she handled her first professional disappointment, at the fate of the musical Time and Again; the serious injury -- and nasty rumors -- that plagued her during the revival of Into the Woods and nearly derailed her performance in Nine; and what it was like, after playing many period roles, for this Jersey girl to play a girl from New Jersey in The Wedding Singer.

Original air date - May 30, 2008
Running Time - 53:15



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