Skylight Music Theatre Presents Skylight on Broadway: An Evening with Kate Baldwin and Michael Unger
Two-Time Tony Award Nominee Joins Skylight’s New Artistic Director
for a Broadway Insider’s Conversation
Monday, September 9, 2019 at 7:30 p.m.
Milwaukee, Wis. (August 19, 2019) — Skylight Music Theatre announced a special evening with two-time Broadway Tony Award nominee Kate Baldwin in conversation with Skylight Music Theatre’s new Artistic Director Michael Unger on Monday, September 9, 2019 at 7:30 p.m. in Skylight’s Cabot Theatre, 158 N. Broadway, in Milwaukee’s Third Ward.
The one night only event will give audiences an opportunity to hear two New York theatre professionals share stories about theatre and their careers. Baldwin will also sing a few selections, including the song that helped her land her first Broadway job.
Baldwin grew up in Milwaukee and went on to a Broadway career. She attended Shorewood High School where she was a student of legendary drama teacher Barbara Gensler and studied voice with acclaimed singer and vocal coach Lee Dougherty Ross. Baldwin has received two Tony Award nominations, the most recent being for her role as Irene Molloy in the revival of Hello Dolly! starring alongside Bette Midler and Bernadette Peters. She was also nominated in 2009 for her starring role in Finian’s Rainbow.
Baldwin will return to Skylight on Saturday, October 26, 2019 to headline the Skylight Night Gala, an annual fundraiser benefiting Skylight Music Theatre. Skylight is Milwaukee’s professional Equity music theatre company celebrating its 60thanniversary in 2019-2020.
Unger is a theatre and opera director who begins his new role as Skylight Music Theatre Artistic Director in September. He grew up in Chicago and was previously Associate Artistic Director and Director of Education at Off-Broadway’s The York Theatre Company which, like Skylight, produces only music theatre. He is also the Producing Artistic Director of NewArts in Newtown, Conn., which he started with a local father in response to the Sandy Hook Elementary School tragedy.
“I am delighted that one of my first official acts at Skylight will be to welcome the Milwaukee community to our Skylight home for this in-depth conversation with the eminently marvelous Kate Baldwin,” said Unger. “It will be fun and fascinating to have a conversation with Kate about what has influenced, shaped and inspired her; and give audiences an insider’s look at our journeys in the professional theatre.”
Box Office Information
Skylight on Broadway: An Evening with Kate Baldwin and Michael Unger will take place on Monday, September 9, 2019 in the Cabot Theatre, Broadway Theatre Center, 158 N. Broadway in the Historic Third Ward of Milwaukee. Ticket prices for current Skylight Music Theatre subscribers are $15 (plus taxes & fees).
Ticket prices for the general public are $20 (plus taxes & fees). Seating is general admission. Tickets are available at the Broadway Theatre Center Box Office, 158 N. Broadway, by calling (414) 291-7800, or visiting www.skylightmusictheatre.org.
Box Office hours are Monday- Saturday, noon - 6 p.m. The Box Office window is also open two hours prior to performances. Please let the Box Office know if accessible seating is needed, or if patrons will have a wheelchair or walker.
Skylight Bar & Bistro
Skylight Bar & Bistro is located on the second floor of The Broadway Theatre Center and will be open for bar service and snacks one hour prior to this event.
Parking Vouchers
Purchase $5 discounted parking vouchers from the Broadway Theatre Center Box Office for use in the Historic Third Ward parking garage at 212 N. Milwaukee Street (one block east and one block north). Vouchers are valid beginning at 5 p.m. for evening performances only.
About Kate Baldwin
Baldwin is a veteran of Broadway and national stages alike. She starred in the hit 2017 Broadway revival of Hello Dolly as Irene Molloy alongside Bette Midler, Bernadette Peters and Donna Murphy, earning Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critic Circle Award nominations. She has been nominated for numerous awards, the most recent being the Lucille Lortel for Outstanding Actress in a Musical for her work in Superhero by Tom Kitt and John Logan at Second Stage.
Her work on Broadway includes principal roles in Big Fish and Wonderful Town and appearances in the casts of The Full Monty and Thoroughly Modern Millie. But it was her starring role in the 2009 revival of Yip Harburg's and Burton Lane's hit classic musical, Finian's Rainbow, which drew Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critic's Circle Award nominations and put her on the map as a Broadway leading lady.
Baldwin has appeared Off-Broadway in the revival of John and Jen at Keen Company and in Michael John LaChiusa and Sybille Pearson’s Giant at the Public, garnering Drama Desk nominations for both. She starred in The King and I at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, Irving Berlin's White Christmas in San Francisco, Detroit, and Toronto, The Women at The Old Globe, Henry V at the Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, I Do, I Do at Westport Country Playhouse, She Loves Me at the Willliamstown Theatre Festival, and The Music Man and South Pacific at Arena Stage, drawing a Helen Hayes Award nomination.
In NYC, she has performed in concert with the New York Pops, New York Philharmonic and at the American Songbook series at Lincoln Center as well as the legendary New York nightclubs Feinstein's at the Regency, Birdland and 54 Below. Her concert work also includes several appearances with Stephen Sondheim as a featured performer in his critically acclaimed evening, "A Conversation with Stephen Sondheim." Kate has sung as part of the Chicago Humanities Festival, with the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, DC, the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, the Portland Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Phoenix Symphony Orchestra and the River Concert Series. On television, her work includes a guest star on NBC's "Law & Order: SVU," the PBS filming of Stephen Sondheim's Passion and Kander and Ebb’s First You Dream.
“We suppose there are some things that Baldwin cannot do, but over the past decade we have yet to see her be anything but superb,” says Steven Suskin of Playbill. Her debut album on PS Classics, Let's See What Happens features Lane and Harburg songs from both stage and film. Her second album celebrates the work of lyricist Sheldon Harnick and is entitled, She Loves Him. Both are available at www.psclassics.com. She is a graduate of Northwestern University and lives with her husband and son in Maplewood, NJ.
About Michael Unger
Michael Unger is a theatre and opera director who has directed on stages both nationally and internationally. He has been the Associate Artistic Director and Director of Education at Off-Broadway’s The York Theatre Company in New York City. He is also the Producing Artistic Director of NewArts which utilizes the performing arts as a vehicle to heal and promote creativity, collaboration, and confidence for the children in Newtown, CT.
World premieres include The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Caligula, Retribution, Two Point Oh (NY Times Critics Pick), La Gioconda, and Haven. Opera directing credits include D’Albert’s Tiefland, at Sarasota Opera (soon to be on DVD and VOD on Naxos), Floyd’s Of Mice and Men, Ward’s The Crucible, Puccini’s La rondine, Mascagni’s L’amico Fritz, Barber’s Vanessa, and Strauss’ Die Fledermaus at the Sarasota Opera Company, The Magic Flute (Nominated for Best Director and Best Musical – Theatre Tampa Bay Awards) and Floyd’s Susannah at St. Petersburg Opera (DVD available on Naxos), Gilbert and Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore and Menotti’s The Consul at Opera NJ, William Bolcom’s opera of Arthur Miller’s A View From the Bridge for Vertical Player Repertory and Kalman’s The Duchess of Chicago at the Sverdlovsk Academic Theatre of Musical Comedy in Yekaterinburg, Russia (still running).
At Off-Broadway’s The York Theatre Company, he directed You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown – the first professional production of that musical to involve all Broadway-level child performers, the musical Big starring John Tartaglia, Kerry Butler and lyricist, Richard Maltby, Jr., as well as many readings and concerts.
Other directing credits include: A Christmas Carol (18 years at McCarter Theatre, 2 years at NewArts in Newtown – designed by the legendary Ming Cho Lee with choreography by Rob Ashford), My Sister in this House (new version – Deaf West – Ovation Recommended), Grease (Paramount Theatre), Crimes of the Heart (Theatre Aspen), The Mikado, Kiss Me, Kate and Pippin (Depot Theatre), Knickerbocker Holiday and Milk and Honey (York Theatre – Mufti Series), and, upon the request of composer John Kander, new versions of The Happy Time and The Rink starring Leslie Uggams and Janet Metz.
Unger directed From Broadway With Love benefit concerts for both the Sandy Hook, CT and Parkland, FL communities – which amassed hundreds of volunteers and major Broadway and Hollywood stars showing their support for these idyllic towns ravaged by gun violence. The concerts also featured hundreds of local children performing alongside their Broadway and Hollywood heroes. He also co-directed his production of A ROCKIN’ Midsummer Night’s Dream at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, FL.
He recently directed The York Theatre’s Oscar Hammerstein Award ceremony honoring five-time Tony Award-winner Susan Stroman, hosted by Matthew Broderick, which included a cast of sixty recreating some of Stroman’s most iconic numbers, as well as appearances by many of Broadway’s most successful theatre makers.
He is married to actress Janet Metz and his favorite productions are their twins, Phoebe and Nathaniel.
About Skylight Music Theatre
Skylight Music Theatre celebrates its 60th Anniversary Season in 2019-2020. Its mission since 1959: To bring the full spectrum of music theatre works to a wide and diverse audience in celebration of the musical and theatrical arts and their reflection of the human condition. Skylight performs in the beautiful, intimate 350-Cabot Theatre, which allows audiences to feel close to the vibrant emotions on stage.