Mentors

HAROLD PRINCE directed the original productions of She Loves Me, It’s a Bird…Superman, Cabaret, Zorba, Company, Follies, A Little Night Music, Pacific Overtures, On the Twentieth Century, Sweeney Todd, Evita, Merrily We Roll Along, The Phantom of the Opera, Kiss of the Spider Woman, Parade, and LoveMusik. He has also directed acclaimed revivals of Candide and Show Boat. Before becoming a director, Mr. Prince produced the original productions of The Pajama Game, Damn Yankees, New Girl in Town, West Side Story, Fiorello!, Tenderloin, Flora the Red Menace, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, and Fiddler on the Roof. Among the plays he has directed are Hollywood Arms, The Visit, The Great God Brown, End of the World, Play Memory, and his own play, Grandchild of Kings. His opera productions have been seen at Lyric Opera of Chicago, the Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Dallas Opera, Vienna Staatsoper and the Theater Colon in Buenos Aires. His most recent version of Candide was seen at New York City Opera in January of 2017. Prince of Broadway, a musical compendium of Mr. Prince’s entire career, opened on Broadway in August of 2017. Mr. Prince is a trustee for the New York Public Library and instrumental in developing the Theatre On Film and Tape collection for the Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center. He previously served on the National Council on the Arts for the NEA. Mr. Prince is an Officier in the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, given to him by the French government in 2008. He is the recipient of 21 Tony Awards, a Kennedy Center Honor, and the Eugene O’Neill Theatre Center’s Monte Cristo Award. Mr. Prince was inducted into the Lincoln Center Hall of Fame as a part of their inaugural class and received a National Medal of the Arts from President Clinton for a career in which “he changed the nature of the American musical.” 

 MARGO LION is a theatre producer whose career has spanned thirty-seven years of both not-for-profit and commercial theater in New York City. Her productions include: Catch Me If You Can, Radio Golf, Caroline, Or Change, Hairspray, Elaine Stritch: At Liberty, The Crucible, Seven Guitars, The Cryptogram, Triumph of Love, Angels in America: Millennium Approaches; Perestroika, Jelly’s Last Jam, Frankie and Johnnie in the Clair de Lune, and The Garden of Earthly Delights.  Lion’s productions have garnered 20 Tony Awards, 4 Olivier Awards and 1 Pulitzer Prize.  Her co-production of Monsoon Wedding premiered at Berkeley Repertory Theatre in May 2017. She is also currently developing musical adaptations of the Russian film, Hipsters, and The Secret Life of Bees. Lion is a member of the Dean’s Council at the NYU Tisch School for the Arts and serves on the advisory board of the Baltimore Young Women’s Leadership School.  In 2009, Margo Lion was selected by President Barack Obama to co-chair the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities, a position she held through both of his administrations..

GREGORY MOSHER is the former Director of the Lincoln Center and Goodman Theatres, and the producer and/or director of nearly 200 plays at those theatres, on and off Broadway and in the West End. Recent work on Broadway includes directing and producing A View from the Bridge (with Liev Schreiber, Scarlett Johansson, and Jessica Hecht) and That Championship Season (with Kiefer Sutherland, Jason Patric, Chris Noth, Jim Gaffigan, and Brian Cox.) He will direct Richard Nelson’s new translation of Ferenc Molnar’s The Guardsman (with Finn Wittrock, Sarah Wayne Callies, Shuler Hensley and Julie Halston) at the Kennedy Center, opening June 2013. Mr. Mosher is currently a professor at Columbia University, where one of his classes explores new producing models for the 21st century.

JEFFREY SELLER (Producer) is the winner of four Tony Awards for Best Musical: Hamilton (2016); Rent (1996), both of which won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama; Avenue Q (2004); and In the Heights (2008). Jeffrey has also produced and/or developed De La Guarda (1998), Andrew Lippa’sThe Wild Party (2000), Baz Luhrmann’s production of Puccini’s La Bohème (2002), High Fidelity (2006), the 2009 Revival of West Side Story, andThe Last Ship (2014). Jeffrey is a graduate of the University of Michigan.

 THOMAS SCHUMACHER (President & Producer, Disney Theatrical Group) Since 1988, Thomas Schumacher has worked with The Walt Disney Company setting new standards of excellence in film, television and theatre.  Currently, he serves as President & Producer of Disney Theatrical Group, where he oversees the development, creation and execution of Disney’s legitimate stage entertainment around the globe, including Broadway, touring and licensed productions, as well as Disney on Ice and Disney Live! shows produced in partnership with Feld Entertainment. The division’s Broadway, West End, touring and international production credits include Beauty and the Beast, King David, The Lion King, Der Glockner von Notre Dame, Elton John and Tim Rice’s Aida, On the Record, High School Musical, TARZAN®, Mary Poppins, The Little Mermaid, Peter and the Starcatcher, Newsies, Aladdin, Shakespeare in Love, and Frozen which will open on Broadway in spring 2018. The company has collaborated with the country’s leading regional theatres to develop new stage titles including The Jungle Book, The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Freaky Friday. Most recent projects include the in-cinema Fathom Events release of Newsies and the new live-action film Beauty and the Beast, for which he served as Executive Producer.  With more than 20 productions currently produced or licensed, a Disney musical is being performed professionally somewhere on the planet virtually every hour of the day.  

Intensely passionate about theatre from an early age, Schumacher recognized the impact that theatre has on the lives of young people and developed a licensing program with Music Theatre International to make select Disney theatrical titles available for performance in schools and amateur theatres throughout the world.

Schumacher’s career at Disney began in Walt Disney Feature Animation producing the animated classic The Rescuers Down Under.  He was ultimately named President and oversaw some 21 animated features, including The Lion King, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Pocahontas, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Mulan, Tarzan, Hercules and Lilo & Stitch, and worked closely with Pixar on their first five films.

Prior to joining Disney, he was associate director of the 1987 Los Angeles Festival of Arts, presenting the American premiere of Cirque du Soleil and the English-language premiere of Peter Brook’s The Mahabharata. Previously, he spent five years on staff at the Mark Taper Forum, served as a line producer on the 1984 Olympic Arts Festival, and served as assistant general manager of the Los Angeles Ballet.

Mr. Schumacher is the author of the book “How Does the Show Go On? An Introduction to the Theater,” as well as a member of the Board of Trustees for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, the Board of Directors for Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, the Tony® Administration Committee, the College of Fellows of the American Theatre, and was a longtime trustee of the Actors Fund, now serving as a member of the Chairman’s Council.  He is a former mentor for the TDF Open Doors program and serves as an adjunct professor at Columbia University. He is currently serving as the Chairman of The Broadway League.

DAVID STONE is currently represented by Boys in the Band and Wicked. He has also produced War Paint, If/Then, Next to Normal, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Three Days of Rain, Man of La Mancha, The Vagina Monologues, Fully Committed, Lifegame, The Diary of Anne Frank, Full Gallop, The Santaland Diaries and Family Secrets.  David serves on the boards of The Broadway League and Broadway Cares/Equity Fights Aids.  He also serves on the advisory boards of V-Day and Second Stage Theatre. David has lectured on theatre at Yale, Princeton, Columbia and his alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania.