StudentsLive Kicks Off First Multilingual Domestic & International 'Passport to Broadway' Program Today, 7/23

StudentsLive, the Premier Broadway Education Company, has announced its first-ever multilingual international and domestic "Passport to Broadway" Program for students from today, July 23, 2012 to August 3, 2012 at Pearl Studios and Manhattan Movement and Arts Center (MMAC). The musical theatre intensive final performance takes place over 10 days from approximately 8:30am to 6:00pm, Monday through Friday, at Pearl Studios led by Broadway Musical Directors, Choreographers and Interactive Intensives with Broadway Performers and Guest Artists.

The "Passport to Broadway" program offers international and domestic students of all ages the opportunity to experience first hand the best live, interactive Broadway theater education programs, taught by the top professionals working on Broadway today. The program allows students to experience the intensive training of a professional, successful and highly disciplined Broadway artist and to develop the many skills it requires to become one, including collaboration, interpersonal relations, communication and human exploration.

The goal is to expand and deepen students' understanding and familiarity with Broadway. Through challenging music, dance, acting and production studies, the program prepares students to become highly competitive in whatever career they may choose to pursue. The Final Performance features students performing "Journey to America's Broadway Dreams" – an original musical that featuring a medley of 40 classic and contemporary Broadway show numbers. Students and others also have the opportunity to take part in the "MaDonna Grimes Broadway Boot Camp" the weekend of July 28, 2012.

The "Passport to Broadway" Creative Team includes: Amy Weinstein - Director/President of StudentsLive, Michael Sansonia - Musical Director Pump Boys and Dinettes), LeeAnna Smith - Choreographer ("Contact" and Radio City Rockettes), Angel Reed – Choreographer (Rock of Ages) and MaDonna Grimes- Dance Boot Camp Leader (In Living Color). Current and Past Broadway Guest Artists Include: Kat Ventura (Hair and Make-Up Artist, "Chicago"), Kevin Woodworth (Costume Designer, "Chicago"), Benton Whitley (Casting Associate - Duncan Stewart & Co.), Nick Pramik (Director, Marketing and Partnerships, SpotCo), Douglas Lyons (The Book of Mormon), Rachelle Rak (Catch Me If You Can), Erica Mansfield (Evita), Christopher Jackson (In The Heights), Bernard Dotson (Merrily We Roll Along) and more).

StudentsLive's mission is to create highly effective, interactive and innovative workshops and new audience development programs in partnership with the best theater our country has to offer: Broadway. The organization aims to enrich audiences' access to and understanding of live theatre, create and inspire newer, wider and more educated audiences and artists alike; connect and provide deeply engaging, experiential visits to Broadway shows by offering the highest quality education programming and services.

The company began partnering with producers to develop future audiences of critical thinkers who would return time and again to seek out quality theatre, and instill appreciation and love for the arts at an early age. Since 2000, StudentsLive's curriculum-based programs have attracted over 100,000 new audience members from the widest range of cultural, ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds.

StudentsLive supports alternative learning, cross-cultural and interdisciplinary opportunities for a wide range of new audiences by creating, developing, managing and implementing interactive Broadway Educational Workshops and study materials that can be used in classrooms worldwide. StudentsLive trains, hires, and organizes teams of Broadway artists and professionals to serve each audience's needs.

StudentsLive Programs enable a new generation of audiences to make the arts a permanent part of their lives.

Since 2000, StudentsLive's Award-Winning live interactive education programming have attracted over 100,000 participants from as far away as Guam, United Kingdom, Italy, South Korea and from all across the United States. The League of American Theatres and Producers and Theatre Development Fund have awarded StudentsLive grants six years in a row for Outstanding Education Programs on Broadway. StudentsLive's programs are now attracting adult groups and tour internationally in collaboration with presenters throughout the world.

Guest Speakers and workshop participants at StudentsLive's Student Matinees and
Workshops on Broadway have included: Judge Judy, Geraldine Ferraro, Johnnie Cochran, Tommy Hilfiger, Kathy Lee Gifford, Susan Lucci, George Hamilton, Reba McEntire, Chazz Palminteri, Bernadette Peters, Joey Fatone, and Scary Spice.

StudentsLive's programs have been recognized as vital to New York City's arts and education initiatives by Mayors Michael Bloomberg and Rudolph Giuliani, and have received letters of support and praise from Former President Bill Clinton and Secretary of State Hilary Clinton.

These programs have also been covered and written about in national and local print and electronic media by The New York Times, The Jane Pauley Show, Court TV, Variety, The Daily News, The New York Post, ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, UPN, and NY1.

Past/current shows and select Broadway partnerships have included a wide range of National Actors Theatre Productions including The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui starring Al Pacino and Judgment at Nuremberg starring Maximillian Schell, Broadway Productions of A Class Act, Annie Get Your Gun, The Civil War, Def Poetry Jam, The Exonerated, Metamorphoses, Flower Drum Song, Baz Lurhman's La Boheme, I Am My Own Wife, Movin' Out, Peter Pan (National Tour with Cathy Rigby), Wonderful Town, Seussical, Little Women: The Musical, Cookin', Sweet Charity, Avenue Q, The Phantom of the Opera, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (National Tour, Broadway League Grant 2006), Rent, Grease, and Spring Awakening (Broadway League Grant 2007), Chicago and In the Heights.

Current and continuing partnership shows include Wicked and Cirque du Soleil's Zarkana at Radio City Music Hall. StudentsLive supports alternative learning and cross-cultural and interdisciplinary opportunities for all ages, and provides educators, schools and organizations with expert consultation, staff support and informational materials and resources.

Call StudentsLive: (212) 220-6000, email inquiries: info@studentslive.net, or visit www.passporttobroadway.com.