David Gersten has worked as press representative, marketing consultant, and producer on Broadway, Off-Broadway, and across the country, for over thirty years. David Gersten & Associates is a full-service boutique firm, providing effective publicity and marketing for a diverse range of clients, through print, broadcast, electronic, and social media.
David has been privileged to work with some of Broadway's finest producers, including both Alexander H. Cohen and David Merrick. Among his favorite Broadway productions are the American premieres of Noel Coward's Waiting in the Wings (starring Lauren Bacall and Rosemary Harris), the Royal Shakespeare Company's The Herbal Bed, and Taking Sides starring Ed Harris and Daniel Massey; Linda Ronstadt in Canciones de me Padre, Avery Brooks as Paul Robeson, Kenny Loggins: On Broadway, the Georgian State Dance Company, Stardust (the last show to play the Biltmore Theatre, now home to MTC), Late Nite Comic (the last show to play the Ritz Theatre - now the Walter Kerr), and the gala 6000th performance of A Chorus Line. Most recently he represented the World Premieres of Home for the Holidays on Broadway, featuring three of the greatest voices of their generation: winners of “American Idol,” “The Voice,” and “America's Got Talent” and Ruben & Clay’s First Annual Christmas Carol Family Fun Pageant Spectacular Reunion Show, starring Ruben Studdard & Clay Aiken.
From world premiere plays and musicals from some of our best emerging writers, to acclaimed revivals of classics of world theater as well as great contemporary works, to solo pieces featuring beloved actors like Len Cariou, Fyvush Finkel, Nancy Giles, Valerie Harper, Jackie Hoffman, Jackie Mason, Kate Mulgrew, Jean Stapleton, and Liliane Montevecchi, David Gersten has publicized and promoted hundreds of shows Off-Broadway, too numerous to name. Some favorite past productions include Altar Boyz (five years Off-Broadway, 2 National Tours, Korea), Birds of Paradise by Winnie Holtzman (Wicked) directed by Arthur Laurents (Gypsy, West Side Story), the New York premieres of Shear Madness, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein starring & choreographed by Robert Fairchild (An American in Paris), Black Angels Over Tuskegee, End of the World Party by 5-time Emmy Award winner Chuck Ranberg, and the international hit Potted Potter - The Unauthorized Harry Experience - A Parody; revivals of Jonathan Larson’s Tick, Tick... Boom!, Stephen Sondheim’s Marry Me A Little, Blues in the Night starring Carol Woods, Godspell directed by its original star Don Scardino, Happy Days directed by Joseph Chaiken, and Carl Reiner’s Enter Laughing: The Musical; the world premieres of Ernest Hemingway’s The Fifth Column, Roulette starring Anna Paquin by Paul Weitz (American Pie, “Mozart in the Jungle”), Adam Rapp’s Finer Noble Gases, Faster, Trueblinka, and Stone Cold Dead Serious; Harry Kondoleon's final play Saved and Destroyed directed by Craig Lucas; Romance/Romance (winner of 4 Outer Critics’ Circle Awards), Martha Clarke's celebrated Garden of Earthly Delights, The Kathy & Mo Show: Parallel Lives, Late Nite Catechism (eight years Off-Broadway!), Mademoiselle Colombe starring Tammy Grimes, The Majestic Kid by Pulitzer Prize & Tony Award-winning playwright Mark Medoff, David Ives’s The Metromaniacs, Naked Boys Singing!, Craig Wright's Orange Flower Water, Tina Howe’s Painting Churches, D.H. Lawrence’s The Daughter-In-Law and The Widowing of Mrs. Holroyd, Leo Tolstoy’s The Power of Darkness, and the long running hit Tony n' Tina's Wedding (24 years!), among many others. Numerous National Tours represented include The Music Man starring Patrick Cassidy and Shirley Jones, Saturday Night Fever, Man of La Mancha, and Sophisticated Ladies (first Russian-American co-production), as well as two National Tours of Altar Boyz.
Among the many not-for-profit theater companies he has represented are Adirondack Theatre Festival, the american vicarious, Aquila Theatre Company, Ars Nova, Culture Project, En Garde Arts (including JP Morgan Saves the Nation by Rent’s Jonathan Larson), Ensemble for the Romantic Century, Ensemble Studio Theatre (12 years), Folksbiene Yiddish Theatre, Gingold Theatrical Group/Project Shaw, Godlight Theatre Company*, INTAR (twelve years), Irish Arts Center, Jean Cocteau Repertory, Keen Company (12 years), La MaMa E.T.C., Mint Theater* (29 years!), Music Theater Group, NAATCO* The National Asian American Theatre Co (13 years), Woodie King’s New Federal Theater, Perry Street Theatricals, Rattlestick Theatre, Red Bull Theatre* (17 years), Victoria & Michael Imperioli’s Studio Dante, Summer Shorts Festival at 59E59 (eight years, featuring World Premieres from Christopher Durang, Marian Fontana, Nancy Giles, Lucas Hnath, Tina Howe, William Inge, Albert Innaurato, Neil LaBute, Warren Leight, Terrence McNally, José Rivera, Paul Rudnick, Will Scheffer, Lucy Thurber, Paul Weitz, Alan Zweibel, among others), TACT – The Actors Company Theatre, Theater Breaking Through Barriers, TheaterWorksUSA , and York Theatre, among many others. (*indicates current clients)
Some of the many clubs and cabarets represented include Windows on the World (launching its reopening after 1993 bombing until its tragic end on 9-11-2001), Rainbow & Stars and the Rainbow Room, Michael’s Pub (over twenty years), Café Carlyle & Bemelmans Bar, the Oak Room at the Algonquin, The Ballroom, Freddy’s, and Roseland, working with some of the greatest names in pop music, jazz, R&B, comedy, and Broadway, including Rosemary Clooney (12 years), Mel Tormé (16 years), Peggy Lee, Sid Caesar & Imogene Coca (Together Again! The 40th Anniversary of “Your Show Of Shows”), Karen Akers, Vernel Bagneris (Jelly Roll), LaVern Baker, Kaye Ballard, Laurie Beechman & Sam Harris, Ruth Brown, Betty Buckley, Ann Hampton Callaway & Liz Callaway (“Sibling Revelry”), David Carroll , Nell Carter, Petula Clark, Johnny Crawford (of TV’s “The Rifleman”), Vic Damone, Tony Danza, Christine Ebersole, Marianne Faithful, Fyvush Finkel, Stan Freeman as Oscar Levant, Savion Glover, Lesley Gore, Ellen Greene, Mary Cleere Haran, Jane Harvey, Richie Havens, Rupert Holmes, Grace Jones (New Year’s Eve at Roseland!), Jack Jones, Larry Kert & Carol Lawrence, Linda Lavin, Barbara Lea, Jo Sullivan Loesser, Darlene Love, Patti LuPone, Marilyn Maye, Amanda McBroom, Maureen McGovern, Lonette McKee, Mark Murphy, Anthony Newley, Anita O’Day, Freda Payne, Kurt Peterson & Victoria Mallory (When Everything Was Possible - New York City Center), Faith Prince, Phylicia Rashad, Helen Reddy, Betty Rhodes, Joan Rivers, Mickey Rooney, Helen Schneider, Jonathan Schwartz, George Shearing, Frank Stallone, Sandy Stewart & Bill Charlap, Sylvia Syms, Tommy Tune & Manhattan Rhythm Kings, Leslie Uggams, Margaret Whiting, Ronny Whyte, Joe Williams, Julie Wilson, Carol Woods, and for over 20 years, Woody Allen with the Eddy Davis New Orleans Jazz Band. Founding member Manhattan Association of Clubs & Cabarets.
Gersten has also provided publicity and strategic consulting for such diverse clients as Actors Studio, American Ballroom Theatre (creating “Ballroom Week”), Cherry Lane Mentor Project, The David Merrick Arts Foundation, The Drama League, 30th Annual Greenwich Village Halloween Parade, League of Off-Broadway Theatres & Producers’ annual Lortel Awards (which he wrote, produced and publicized for ten years), the Loesser Family (Jo Sullivan Loesser, Hannah Loesser, Emily Loesser & Don Stephenson), Lucille Lortel Foundation, New World Stages, New York Musical Theatre Festival (NYMF), Pasadena Playhouse, Reduced Shakespeare Company as part of the first New York International Festival of Arts, Stage Entertainment the international entertainment group (US press representative), PBS television’s “Theater Talk,” and Treatment Action Group, as well as exhibitions by Hilary Knight, Francesco Scavullo, Patrick McMullen, Rosie O’Donnell, and Ken Fallin, among others. David has also repped numerous recordings and books including ‘A Chorus Line’ and the Musicals of Michael Bennett and Not Since ‘Carrie:’ 40 Years of Flop Musicals, both from St. Martin’s Press.
As a producer, David presented the New York premieres of Bash’d - the gay rap opera, Shear Madness, Tea at Five starring Kate Mulgrew as Katharine Hepburn (NYC, West Palm Beach, San Francisco), Dr. Sex, My First Time, as well as the New Cast Recording of Stephen Sondheim’s Marry Me A Little (Ghostlight Records). He has also been involved in the Broadway productions of 13 the Musical; David Mamet's A Life in the Theatre starring Patrick Stewart and T.R. Knight; Addams Family starring Nathan Lane, Bebe Neuwirth, Carolee Carmello, Kevin Chamberlin, and Jackie Hoffman; Blithe Spirit starring Christine Ebersole, Angela Lansbury, and Rupert Everett; Impressionism starring Joan Allen, Jeremy Irons, André De Shields, Aaron Lazar, Marsha Mason, and Michael T. Weiss; It’s Only a Play starring F. Murray Abraham, Matthew Broderick, Stockard Channing, Rupert Grint, Nathan Lane, and Megan Mullally; the Tony Award-winning Best Musical Kinky Boots (Broadway, National Tour, Australia); Speed the Plow; Will Ferrell’s You're Welcome America - A Final Night with George W Bush; and Altar Boyz (NYMF, Off-Broadway - 5 years, two National Tours). In the not-for-profit world, he has produced numerous benefits and galas for the such organizations as National Alzheimer’s Foundation (Rita Hayworth Gala), God’s Love We Deliver, People with AIDS Coalition, Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, the Actors Fund, Bailey House/AIDS Resource Center, PWA Theater Workshop, and the Hetrick-Martin Institute.
A proud union member (IATSE, AFL-CIO), David currently serves as Vice-President and Off-Broadway Steward as well as a Fund Trustee for ATPAM, the Association of Theatrical Press Agents & Managers, after having served for almost twenty years on the Board of Governors, including two terms as the Press Agent Chapter Chair. He has also served on the Press Agent committee for the Broadway League. He is a member of the Off-Broadway League and founding member/Vice-President of the Off-Broadway Alliance. David recently became one of the owners of the newly renovated Ninth Avenue Saloon, a theater district mainstay serving the community for over 40 years, and one of the oldest LGBTQ+ bars in New York City.
A native New Yorker, he is also a volunteer firefighter on Fire Island, where he maintains a summer home.