thank you! - Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS

BROADWAY CARES/EQUITY FIGHTS AIDS
NATIONAL SUPPORT
A strong commitment to BC/EFA extends far beyond New York City. In regional, stock, and dinner
theatres across the country, as well as in cities that play host to Broadway’s national touring shows, casts come together as they do in
New York to raise funds continually for BC/EFA.
Broadway’s national tours are BC/EFA’s ambassadors on the road. Without the added administrative expense of official chapters
in cities across the country, BC/EFA is able to raise funds through these traveling autographed poster sales and curtain speeches.
These efforts raise hundreds of thousands of dollars each year and are an important piece of the financial support BC/EFA provides
through the National Grants Program to many AIDS service organizations in the very cities visited by the national tours as they wind
their way across the country. These special appeals have been made by such touring shows as 42nd Street, Aida, Beauty and the Beast, Blue
Man Group, Cinderella, Contact, The Full Monty, Jesus Christ, Superstar; Les Misérables, The Lion King, Mamma Mia!, The Phantom of the Opera, The
Producers, Saturday Night Fever, The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife, tick, tick, BOOM!; and West Side Story.
Cast members from many tours go to the added effort of presenting special cabaret evenings in a local club or theatre, the
proceeds of which are then shared with a local AIDS organization and BC/EFA. However you measure it, the generous efforts of our
friends on the road amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars that come back through BC/EFA to local AIDS service organizations
nationwide. 14 years ago, the first “Equity Fights AIDS Week” was declared. What was then the Equity Fights AIDS Committee sent
letters to every Equity theatre asking that an appeal be made during Thanksgiving Week. That first year brought in over $70,000 from
a few dozen theatres. Over the years, more local theatres joined in what became annual efforts, and in 1992, EFA Week became
BC/EFA Week, which continues to this day. More importantly, over time, many regional theatres became allied with their local AIDS
service organizations, raising funds for them as the national tours do for BC/EFA. Some theatres continue to do both. The Actors’
Playhouse at the Miracle Theatre in Coral Gables, FL; The Alliance Theatre in Atlanta, GA; Cincinnati’s Playhouse in the Park;
Florida Repertory Theatre; Fulton Opera House in Lancaster, PA; Connecticut’s Goodspeed Opera House; San Francisco’s
American Conservatory Theatre; Mill Mountain Theatre in Roanoke, VA; North Shore Music Theatre in Beverly, MA; Portland
Center Stage; Syracuse Stage; The Shakespeare Theatre in Washington, DC, and The Carousel Dinner Theatre in Akron, Ohio are
just a few of our most stalwart out-of-town supporters. For all these collective efforts, we are most grateful.
More than 90 regional theatre, summer stock, and dinner theatre productions across the country pitched in to raise funds through audience appeals and special cabaret
performances. These included the Syracuse Stage production of The Wizard of Oz; one of our most stalwart supporters, The Carousel Dinner Theatre in Akron, Ohio,
where the casts of The Music Man and Smokey Joe’s Cafe raised $11,600 and $7,983; the cast of The Media Theatre’s production of The Secret Garden
in Pennsylvania raised $2,670 from audience appeals; the cast of Jacques Brel at the Second Stage Theatre in Boston raised $1,033.
national support
38