Producer David Binder Honored by PS 122 on May 2

On Monday, May 2nd, 2005, Performance Space 122 will honor ground-breaking theater producer David Binder at Live Onstage!, a benefit performance and celebration. The event will be held at Webster Hall (125 East 11th Street, NYC) and will be hosted by performers Lisa Kron and Marga Gomez. Tony Award-winning actress Phylicia Rashad will present the award to her former Raisin in the Sun producer.

In the theater industry today, not one producer has been as successful as David Binder in identifying and creating box office gold with productions that were too risky for other producers to even consider. David developed and produced John Cameron Mitchell and Stephen Trask's rowdy, loud, and ultimately sweet rock 'n' roll musical Hedwig and the Angry Inch. At De La Guarda, a group of flying Argentines literally lifted a young, international crowd off its feet for six and a half years. And last year, A Raisin in the Sun not only broke box office records, but was widely recognized for bringing in the most diverse audience Broadway had seen in decades.

Traditionally, the theater has catered to a very limited audience. Seasoned producers often warned Binder that productions targeting alternative groups would fail. Defying their advice and forging new territory on the theatrical landscape, Hedwig and the Angry Inch ran for two years Off-Broadway before subsequently being produced around the world and finally becoming an award-winning, critically acclaimed feature film. Off-Broadway sensation De la Guarda has been produced across 5 continents, everywhere from Las Vegas to Tokyo, London to Tel Aviv.

Binder's biggest risk also turned out to be his greatest success thus far. The Broadway revival of Lorraine Hansberry's classic A Raisin in the Sun starring Sean Combs, Audra McDonald, Phylicia Rashad and Sanaa Lathan. This production, that had Broadway insiders gambling on its painful demise, won two Tony Awards, became the second highest grossing play in the history of Broadway and earned Binder the Robert Whitehead Award for Outstanding Achievement in Commercial Theater Producing.

Binder insists, and his successes prove, that it is neither young nor ethnic audiences that have failed the theater... but that it is too often the theater that has failed these audiences. By creating quality productions that not only entertain but inspire theater-starved demographics, Binder has shown that these groups will not only show up by the thousands, but that they will support the theater financially and commercially.

It is this philosophy that allows David Binder to succeed where so many others fail and it is this ethic that will surely make this producer ultimately one of the most positive forces on the entertainment industry.

David Binder (www.DavidBinderProductions.com) has spent the last decade bringing alternative audiences and new artists to the theater. David is the original producer of John Cameron Mitchell and Stephen Trask's Hedwig and the Angry Inch, the long-running international hit De la Guarda and Lisa Kron's critically acclaimed 2.5 Minute Ride. He was recently awarded the Robert Whitehead Award for outstanding achievement in the commercial theatre for producing the Broadway revival of Lorraine Hansberry's classic, A Raisin in the Sun. The show starred Sean Combs, Phylicia Rashad, Audra McDonald and Sanaa Lathan, and was directed by Kenny Leon. He is currently partnering with the Donmar Warehouse to produce a West End revival of Guys and Dolls starring Ewan McGregor.