The Acting Company's 2018 Fall Gala Honors Bill Rauch, Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel And Ambassador Carl Spielvogel

The Acting Company (Ian Belknap, Artistic Director; Elisa Spencer-Kaplan, Executive Director) will honor director and artistic leader Bill Rauch and the married civic leaders Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel and Ambassador Carl Spielvogel- individuals whose exemplary work aligns with the artistic and educational ideals of the storied repertory company that produces nationally recognized theater productions and arts education programs-at the Company's 2018 Fall Gala, on November 12. Held at the historic Metropolitan Club (One East 60th Street), the event will bring together awards, live entertainment, silent and live auctions, dinner, and cocktails in celebration of theater and its contribution to American society.

Tickets and tribute opportunities are available now. Information is available at www.theactingcompany.org or by calling (212) 258-3111.

Timothy K. Saunders is Chairman of the gala. Earl D. Weiner is Chairman of The Acting Company's board.

Bill Rauch will be presented with the John Houseman Award, which honors individuals who have extended the legacy of The Acting Company founder John Houseman's profound commitment to the development of American classical actors and cultivation of a new audience for the theater. Rauch has cut a trailblazing path in the American theater as artistic director of Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF), co-founder and artistic director of Cornerstone Theater, and the incoming inaugural artistic director of Perelman Center for Performing Arts at the World Trade Center. His work at OSF includes the commissioning of such watershed new plays as Lynn Nottage's Pulitzer Prize-winning Sweat, Paula Vogel's Indecent, and Robert Schenkkan's Tony Award-winning All the Way, which Rauch also directed on Broadway.

The John Houseman Award has previously been given to such colossal acting and writing talents as Patti LuPone, Kevin Kline, John Guare, and Uta Hagen; influential figures like Theatre for a New Audience founder Jeffrey Horowitz, Spelman College President/former Dean of NYU's Tisch School of the Arts Dr. Mary Schmidt Campbell, Zelda Fichandler, and Public Theater founder Joseph Papp; directorial greats like Yale Repertory Theatre's James Bundy and former Old Globe Theatre Artistic Director Jack O'Brien; and various others.

The Acting Company will honor Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel and Ambassador Carl Spielvogel with the Joan M. Warburg Civic Engagement Award, bestowed on individuals who have demonstrated admirable dedication to philanthropic and civic causes in the arts and other areas. A noted authority in art, architecture, historic preservation, and public policy, Dr. Diamonstein-Spielvogel is a former White House Assistant, the first Director of Cultural Affairs in New York City, the longest-term New York City Landmarks Preservation Commissioner, and former Chair of the New York State Council on the Arts. Ambassador Spielvogel is the former U.S. Ambassador to the Slovak Republic, a leading global business executive, and a board leader of numerous civic and cultural organizations including Lincoln Center, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the New York Philharmonic.

Previous Warburg Award recipients include Harry Belafonte, Tom Viola, Abigail Disney, Gerald Schoenfeld, Phyllis Newman, Barbara Fleischman, and the Honorable Thomas Kean, among others.

About the Gala Honorees

Bill Rauch was appointed the inaugural Artistic Director of the Perelman Center for Performing Arts-the new multi-space arts complex at the World Trade Center-in February 2018. His work as a theater director has been seen across the nation, from low-income community centers to Broadway in the Tony Award-winning production of Robert Schenkkan's All The Way starring Bryan Cranston. Since 2007, Bill has been the Artistic Director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. At OSF, he led the commissioning of numerous new plays including Lisa Loomer's Roe, Lynn Nottage's Sweat (2017 Pulitzer Prize), Paula Vogel's Indecent, and both of Robert Schenkkan's plays about LBJ, among others. Bill is also co-founder of Cornerstone Theater Company, where he served as artistic director from 1986 to 2006, directing collaborations with rural and urban communities nationwide. He has directed world premieres at Signature Theatre, Portland Center Stage, Center Theater Group, and South Coast Rep, and also has directed at Lincoln Center Theater, American Repertory Theater, Yale Rep, the Guthrie, Arena Stage, Seattle Rep, Long Wharf Theatre, Berkeley Rep, Pasadena Playhouse, and Great Lakes Theater Festival. Bill is a recipient of the Independent Reviewers of New England Award, the 2018 Ivy Bethune Award from Actors' Equity Association for his commitment to diversity in casting and producing, a 2015 Ford Fellowship, the 2012 Fichandler Award from the Society of Directors and Choreographers, Theatre Communications Group's Visionary Leadership Award in 2010, the Margo Jones Medal for his commitment to living writers in 2009, and the United States Artists Prudential Award in 2008. Other honors include Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Award nominations for Best Direction of All the Way, as well as Helen Hayes, Ovation, Los Angeles Weekly, DramaLogue, Garland, and Connecticut Critics' Circle Awards. He is the only artist to have won the "Leadership for a Changing World" award from the Ford Foundation. He was a Claire Trevor Professor at the University of California Irvine, and has also taught at the University of Southern California and U.C.L.A. Bill was educated at Harvard College.

Dr. Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel is a leading voice for civic and cultural engagement through her unparalleled commitment to the arts, architecture, design and public policy. As a White House Assistant, she helped to create the White House Fellows and Presidential Scholars programs, and the first and only White House Festival of the Arts. Her dedication to preservation and cultural enhancement includes serving as the first Director of New York City's Department of Cultural Affairs, as the longest-term Commissioner of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, as the Chair of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Foundation, and as a member of the Art Commission of New York City and the NYC Commission of Cultural Affairs. She was appointed by President Ronald Reagan to the Board of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, and to the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts by President Bill Clinton. President Barack Obama appointed her to the American Battle Monuments Commission. Since 1995, she has served as Chair of the Historic Landmarks Preservation Center, and she was Chair of the New York State Council on the Arts from 2016-2018.

Dr. Diamonstein-Spielvogel has shared her experience and scholarship as the author of twenty-three books about art, architecture, photography, crafts, design, and public policy. Her reach extends into other media as well, where she has acted as interviewer/producer for seven television series focusing on art, culture and public policy for the Arts & Entertainment Network, NBC, CBS and others. Within her long history of board service is work with the Fresh Air Fund; Friends of The High Line (Founding Member); the Brooklyn Academy Of Music; the Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts; the New York State Historic Archives Partnership Trust; the Drawing Committee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum; the Museum of Modern Art; Municipal Art Society; New 42nd Street Theatre; the New York Landmarks Conservancy; the Film Anthology Archives; Big Apple Circus; the Central Park Conservancy; P.E.N.; the American Council on the Arts; Museum of African Art (Founding Member); the Bicentennial Commission (Chair); the White House Endowment Fund; and the Trust for the National Mall (Founding Member).

In October 2010, Duke University initiated the Diamonstein-Spielvogel Visiting Filmmaker Series to address significant contemporary topics of social, political, economic, and cultural urgency from a global perspective. In 2015, she initiated the Diamonstein-Spielvogel Artist in Residence Program at Duke University, to provide an annual on-campus residency; and in November 2016, she initiated a three-year pilot of the Sanford Innovator-in-Residence Program, also at Duke University.

She is a recipient of numerous honors, among them the inaugural John Jay Bronze Medal from the Jay Heritage Center; the Pratt Institute Founder's Award; the Visionary in the Arts Award from the Museum of Contemporary Crafts/The Museum of Arts and Design; the Ralph Menapace Award of the Upper East Side Historic District; the Humanitarian Award of the Jewish Women's Foundation in New York; PEN-Slovakia's Gen. Milan R. Stefanik Award; Pride of Landmark Lions recognition from the Historic Districts Council; the St. Nicholas Society Medal of Merit; the inaugural Preservation Award of the New York Preservation Archive Project; the NY Landmark Conservancy's Lucy G. Moses Preservation Leadership Award; lifetime achievement awards from Partners for Livable Places in Washington, D.C., the Citizens Committee of New York, the NYC Historic Districts Council, and the Women's Forum of NY; and honorary doctorates from the Pratt Institute (which also named her a "Legend"), The Maryland Institute of Art, Longwood University, and Purchase College, SUNY.

Carl Spielvogel is a former United States Ambassador to the Slovak Republic, appointed by President Bill Clinton. He is a member of the Council of American Ambassadors, and the Council on Foreign Relations. Prior to serving as ambassador he served as chairman of the United Auto Group and co-founded the advertising firm of Backer Spielvogel Bates Worldwide, Inc. Mr. Spielvogel was appointed by President Bill Clinton to the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors in 1995. A graduate of Baruch College of the City University of New York, he is also a recipient of an honorary LL.D. degree from the College and an inductee of the City College Communications Hall of Fame. Baruch's annual lecture series, "The Carl Spielvogel Lecture Series on Global Marketing," is named in his honor. As one of the nation's leading global business executives, Mr. Spielvogel has conducted trade and commerce in fifty-five countries during a forty-year career. He was named chairman of the International Advisory Board of the Financial Times in 1997 and was appointed a Fellow at the Center for Business and Government, at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University in 1998. Mr. Spielvogel's lifelong involvement in civic and cultural organizations includes current service as a member of the board of trustees, and former chairman of the business committee of The Metropolitan Museum of Art; a member of the board of trustees and the executive committee of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts; a former member of the board of trustees of Mt. Sinai Hospital; a former member of the board of trustees of the Philharmonic Symphony Society of New York, Inc.; a former member of the executive committee and the board of trustees of the Asia Society, where he is Trustee Emeritus, and current co-chair of the Business Council of the Asia Society. He has been a member of the International Advisory Board for the Business Council for the United Nations; the board of the New York State Council for the Humanities; and the board of the International Media Fund.

About The Acting Company

Founded in 1972 by legendary producer/director/actor John Houseman and previous Producing Director Margot Harley with members of the first graduating class of Juilliard's Drama Division, The Acting Company has performed 144 productions for over 4 million people in 48 states and 10 foreign countries. The Company has given two generations of actors the opportunity to master their craft by touring a repertory of classic and news plays to diverse communities nationwide and in New York City-most recently the critically acclaimed world premiere of Marcus Gardley's X: Or, Betty Shabazz v. The Nation. Alumni include Kevin Kline, Rainn Wilson, Patti LuPone, David Schramm, Jesse L. Martin, David Ogden Stiers, Frances Conroy, Jeffrey Wright, Harriet Harris, Hamish Linklater, Roslyn Ruff, and Keith David. Among over a dozen new plays and adaptations commissioned by The Acting Company are works by Lynn Nottage, Tony Kushner, Beth Henley, John Guare, Rebecca Gilman, Maria Irene Fornes, Ntozake Shange, Marcus Gardley, David Mamet and Jeffrey Hatcher. The Company's education programs - Learning Through Theater Artistic Residencies, Student Matinees, Workshops, Master Classes, Primary Shakespeare and Shakespeare for Teachers - reach students in disadvantaged schools where achievement levels are often considerably below average. These programs have fostered a renewed interest in learning, improved grades, and expanded communication and social skills. The Acting Company has been honored with numerous awards, including the Obie, Audelco, and Los Angeles Critics Circle Awards and a special Tony Honor for Excellence in Theater.