Expression Fall 2005

ExpressionT H E M A G A Z I N E F O R A L U M N I A N D F R I E N D S O F E M E R S O N C O L L E G EFa l l 2 0 0 5

College graduates 1,100 in spirited ceremonies

Rock & Roll CameraFrom MTV to AOL, alumni-produced music videos rock the house

125Emerson atPresident Liebergott reflects on the history and future of the College

Lounge ActOn a vibrantly colored set, director Michael Reich ’03, Emerson senior Talia Glass and actress Kelsey Collins (a former Emerson student) prepare for a music video shoot in Los Angeles for the group The 88 (Erik Messerschmidt ’03 is director of photography). Reich, who co-directs videos with fellow alum Mike Pinkney ’02, is one of several alumni making their mark in music video production. See the story on page 6.

ExpressionT H E M A G A Z I N E F O R A L U M N I A N D F R I E N D S O F E M E R S O N C O L L E G EFA L L 2 0 0 5

Expression

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Campus Digest

Notable Expressions

Rock & Roll Camera

College graduates 1,100 in 2005 ceremonies

Emerson at 125

Alumni Digest

Class Notes

Four major media executives appointed to Board of Trustees

A compendium of accomplishments by alumni

From MTV to AOL, alumni-produced music videos rock the house

Photo coverage ofCommencement 2005

President Liebergott reflects on the history and future of the College

Photo coverage of alumni events from around the country

Read the news about yourclassmates

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Executive Editor David Rosen

Editor Rhea Becker

Writer Christopher Hennessy

Editorial Assistant Catherine Sheffield

Expression is published threetimes a year (fall, winter and spring) for alumni and friends of Emerson College by the Office of Public Affairs (David Rosen, Vice President) in conjunction with the Department of Institutional Advancement and the Office of Alumni Relations (Barbara Rutberg ’68, director).

Office Of Public Affairs [email protected] 617-824-8916

Office Of Alumni [email protected] 617-824-7807

Copyright © 2005Emerson College120 Boylston St.Boston, Massachusetts 02116-4624

Memory Lane In This Issue

Compare and contrast

Expression welcomes short letters to the editor on topics covered in the magazine. The editor will select a representative sample of letters to publish and reserves the right to edit copy for style and length. Send letters to: Editor, Expression, Office of Public Affairs, Emerson College, 120 Boylston St., Boston MA 02116-4624; [email protected].

When Charles Wesley Emerson opened the doors in 1880 to his Boston Conservatory of Elocution, Oratory, and Dramatic Art at 13 Pemberton Square, 10 students en-rolled in the first class. The course offerings included Vocal Culture, Emphasis, Reading of Prose and Poetry, Bible and Hymn Reading, English Literature, Art Criticism, and Defects of Speech.

Professor Emerson, whose named was affixed to the school in 1890, could not have envisioned the depth and breadth of the academic offerings at the College in 2005 nor the growth of the institution – growth in the size and diversity of the student body, growth in the size and expertise of the faculty and the incredible growth in facilities to support a burgeoning academic enterprise.

In this 125th anniversary issue, College President Jacqueline Lieber-gott reflects on the past, present and future of Emerson College. She also discusses her plans to build a truly residential campus, to add faculty resources and to selectively add new programs.

Colorful expressionJust in case you haven’t

noticed, Expression magazine has gone full color with this issue. We think you’ll find the change breath-taking. We sure did! Let us know what you think.

–Rhea Becker, editorWHAT A DIFFERENCE 125 YEARS MAKES.Emerson College’s very first classroom (top) is lined with oil paintings and contains a raised platform for the lecturer. Today’s classrooms (above) feature high-tech teaching and learning tools, ranging from computer monitors to editing bays to comprehensive audio/visual capabilities and more.

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Campus Digest

Emerson’s Huret and Spector Gallery hosted the U.S premiere of a unique and award-winning exhibi-tion that “aims to celebrate, empower and bring dignity back into the lives of those who live with real disfigure-ment,” as one newspaper put it. The Saving Faces exhibition is a gallery of before-and-after painted portraits of individuals who have undergone reconstruc-tive surgery to correct facial deformities in Britain.

The paintings, by ac-claimed artist Mark Gilbert of Glasgow, Scotland, were shown at the Gallery, which is located in the Tufte Center.

In conjunction with the exhibition, the College held a daylong multidisciplinary event called “Exploring the Healing Power of Art” in September.

Gilbert’s portraits, which have been displayed at the National Portrait Gal-lery and the Royal College of Surgeons in London, explore the power of art to engage and transform.

Financial support for the exhibition and the event was provided by the Norman Knight Charitable Founda-tion. Knight, artist Gilbert and surgeon Dr. Iain Hutchi-son, and nearly 100 invited guests attended a viewing.

Emerson hosts premiere

Three top communi-cation and media industry executives and a prominent television producer have joined the College’s Board of Trustees. They are: Tom Freston, co-president and co-chief operating officer of Viacom; Jonathan Miller, chairman and chief ex-ecutive officer of America Online Inc.; Terry Semel, chairman and chief execu-tive officer of Yahoo!; and Max Mutchnick ’87, creator

and executive producer of the Emmy-winning sitcom Will & Grace.

The election of the new trustees was announced by President Jacqueline Lieber-gott and Board Chair Ted Cutler ’51.

“We are delighted that Tom, Max, Jonathan and Terry have agreed to serve on our board,” Liebergott added.

“Their desire to become in-volved with our college vali-dates its distinctive mission, which is to educate men and women for leadership roles in communication and the arts.”

New trustees include

Cutler added, “These gentlemen are acknowl-edged industry leaders who will bring valuable expertise, insight and connections to our board,” Cutler said. “As we prepare to celebrate the 125th anniversary of our college, we look forward to welcoming them at our next meeting in October.”

Tom FrestonIn addition to sharing

oversight responsibilities for all Viacom operations, Fres-ton oversees the operations

of MTV Networks, Show-time, BET, Paramount Parks, Simon & Schuster and the motion picture operations of Paramount Pictures.

Prior to assuming his current position in 2004, Freston was chairman and chief executive officer of MTV Networks. During his 17-year tenure there, MTV Networks grew to reach over 400 million households in 164 countries. It produced programming such as Nick Jr.’s Blue’s Clues, and Dora the Explorer; Nickelodeon’s Rugrats and SpongeBob

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SquarePants; MTV’s Emmy-winning The Osbournes, and The Real World; Comedy Central’s Chappelle’s Show and the Emmy-winning series The Daily Show with Jon Stewart; VH1’s Behind the Music, Driven and I Love the ’80s; Crossroads and the Flameworthy Video Music Awards at CMT; and Joe Schmo at SpikeTV.

Jonathan Miller

As chairman and chief executive officer of America Online Inc., Miller oversees the businesses and opera-tions of the world’s leading interactive services company.

Before joining AOL in 2002, Miller was president and chief executive officer of USA Information and Services (USAIS), a 15,000-employee unit that included Ticketmaster, Ticketmaster.com, Citysearch, Match.com, USA Electronic Commerce Solutions, and the USA Travel Group comprising HRN, USA Travel Channel, and Expedia.com. Prior to

that, he served as president and chief executive officer of USA Electronic Commerce Solutions and as president and chief executive officer of USA Broadcasting.

Miller worked for Nick-elodeon in the mid-1990s, joining as chief executive officer/managing director of Nick UK in 1993 and rising to managing director of Nickelodeon International. Miller previously served as chief executive of Para-mount’s first branded inter-national channel, launching the Paramount Comedy Channel in London.

Max MutchnickMax Mutchnick ’87 is

the creator and executive producer of the Emmy-win-ning sitcom Will & Grace and several other television shows.

In collaboration with creative partner David Kohan, Mutchnick has also created and is producing Twins, which debuted this fall. The pair also created and produced Good Morn-ing, Miami and Boston Common and produced The Stones. Their other television

New trustees

credits include The Wonder Years, Evening Shade, and the acclaimed Dream On. For his work on Will & Grace, Mutchnick has been hon-ored with an Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy Series; two People’s Choice Awards (Favorite Com-edy); and six Golden Globe nominations (Best Comedy Series), among other honors.

Since graduating from the College, Mutchnick has returned to campus several times to meet with students and faculty, and he has established a scholarship fund to support incom-ing freshmen who have distinguished themselves as effective advocates for gay students. In June 2005, the College presented an alumni achievement award to Mutchnick.

Terry Semel

Terry Semel has been a leading force in the enter-tainment and information industries for over three

Jonathan Miller Max Mutchnick ’87Tom Freston Terry Semel

decades. He was named chairman and chief execu-tive officer of Yahoo! Inc. in 2001 and has led a success-ful transition of the company by identifying and pursuing new opportunities within Yahoo!’s core businesses and increasing Yahoo!’s reported revenues by almost 500 per-cent from 2001 to 2004.

Prior to Yahoo!, Semel spent 24 years at Warner Bros. As its chairman and co-chief executive officer at Warner Bros., Semel and his partner built the company into one of the world’s larg-est and most creative media and entertainment enter-prises, generating nearly $11 billion in total revenues from multiple businesses in 50 countries. He led Warner Bros. during production of more than 400 major motion pictures, 13 of which brought Best Picture Oscar nominations and three Acad-emy Awards (Chariots of Fire, Driving Miss Daisy and Unfor-given). He also oversaw the production of thousands of hours of television program-ming, including Murphy Brown, Friends and ER.

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FILMStephanie Higgins, MA

’00, recently premiered her film, The Gay Marriage Thing, at M.I.T. in Cambridge, Mass. The film tells the story of a 15-year relationship between two women and interweaves it with the politi-cal debate going on around them.

The award-winning documentary Holy Water-Gate: Abuse Cover-up in the Catholic Church, produced, written and directed by independent filmmaker Mary Healey-Conlon, MA ’94, has been acquired by Showtime Networks and premiered on the cable channel. The nearly hour-long documentary examines the Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandal and the fallout of a decades-long cover-up to conceal the truth. Healey-Conlon’s film was awarded a Cine Golden Eagle in investigative journalism. The film has been screened internationally.

Jeff Arch ’76 was named a finalist for the 2005 Humanitas Prize for his work writing the teleplay for

TELEVISIONSeveral Emersonians

won Emmys at the 32nd annual Daytime Emmy Awards. William Ludel ’70 was a member of the team winning for “Outstanding Drama Series Directing Team” for his directing work on the ABC soap opera Gen-eral Hospital. Henry Winkler ’67 won as “Outstanding Performer in an Animated Program” for his perfor-mance as the voice of Nor-ville on Clifford’s Puppy Days on PBS. Linda Corradina ’81 won as executive producer of Martha Stewart Living (syndicated) in the category Outstanding Service Show.

Judy Tygard ’80 is the new senior producer at CBS News’ 48 Hours Mystery. Tygard worked previously as producer for the CBS news special Dan Rather: A Reporter Remembers. Prior to that, Tygard was a producer for 48 Hours, a producer at ABC News’ Primetime and 20/20.

Notable Expressions

Saving Milly, which aired on CBS last spring. Saving Milly starred Bruce Greenwood and Madeleine Stowe as two real people – political journalist Morton Kondracke and his activist wife, Milly, who battled Parkinson’s disease. Arch also penned the screenplay for Sleepless in Seattle.

THEATERJoseph Guglielmo ’99

has spent the last six months as managing director of the Provincetown Theater (Mass.). Prior to that he was programming manager for Broadway in Boston, book-ing the Wilbur and Colonial theaters and the Opera House. He is currently as-sociate producer of Shout! The 60’s Mod Musical, which is scheduled to open Off-Broadway in 2006.

Debbie David ’92 recently accepted the posi-tion of director of the Poway Performing Arts Company in Poway, Calif. An actor herself, David won an Au-brey Award last year for her performance with the Poway Performing Arts Center in Once Upon A Mattress.

Joe Guglielmo ’99

LITERATUREEric Wasserman, MFA

’02, has published his first collection of short stories, The Temporary Life (La Questa Press). His book, by the way, features cover photography and jacket con-cept by Thea Ledendecker, MA ’03.

This year one of the five prestigious Wallace Steg-ner Fellowships in poetry from Stanford University went to alumnus Matt Miller, MFA ’01. Miller, a published poet, follows in the footsteps of previous Stegner Fellows such as former Poet Laure-ate Robert Pinsky, Ken Kesey (One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest), Scott Turow (Presumed Innocent) and Tobias Wolff (This Boys Life).

Jay Kirk ’93 has won one of just 13 coveted fellowships from the Pew Foundation for his work as a fiction and creative non-fiction writer. Kirk’s writing has been included in Best American Crime Writing 2004, The New York Times Magazine, Philadelphia City Paper, Harper’s, and on Nerve.com.

A scene from The Gay Marriage Thing, a film directed by Stephanie Higgins, MA ’00

Eric Wasserman, MFA ’02

Rock & Roll CameraCamera


From MTV to AOL, alumni-

produced music videos

rock the house

By Christopher Hennessy

Some of the most suc-cessful feature film directors got their start making music videos for bands big and small. And now, established directors ranging from Da-vid Fincher (Fight Club) to Rob Minkoff (The Lion King, Stuart Little) to Zach Braff (Garden State) are seeking out the video director’s chair in between big-budget films.

“Music video directors weren’t considered really popular people when I got into videos,” says direc-tor Ethan Lader ’02, who is based in Los Angeles. “I grew up on Hype Williams, Chris Robinson, Joseph Kahn and Marc Klasfeld before they were doing features. Now everyone wants to be a music director.”

Emerson alumni who are currently directing and pro-ducing music videos say the genre offers fertile ground for creativity and enables the intrepid in the industry to quickly pick up the tricks of the trade and learn how to create stunning visuals. For example, Matthew Cooke ’96 reveals on his website that working with some of his

Facing page: Ali Shaheed Muhammad in a scene from “Banga,” a video by Ethan Lader ’02. Far left: A scene from another Ethan Lader video. Left: On the set of a Ken Franchi ’00 music video production.


trolled chaos!” Zachary Merck ’98, who has directed videos for all of the major labels, agrees. He says his days are “16 hours of chaos and fun.”

These and other Emerson alumni are working with both up-and-coming artists and major-label bands (Geffen, Columbia, Epic, Universal, Atlantic), and their work is reaching international audiences via music channels like MTV, VH1, BET and CMT and on popular websites like AOL Music and channels like HBO. These alumni tell stories about everything from the trials of working with head-banging rockers, to having to close down a massive bridge to shoot a dance number, to creating computer-generated helicopters to satisfy a director’s vision. Their tales re-veal what directors have to go through to succeed in what they unanimously describe as a high-paced, competitive, chaotic and ever-changing business.

Behind the MusicThe process of making a video begins when a director submits a three-page treatment on the song he or she wants to direct, explains Merck. If the director is then hired by the label, the level of hands-on control they and the band want to have may vary widely, say al-

ums in the business. “[The label might] literally send you the song…and then say, ‘We want something cool,’” says Lader, noting he relishes the creative control he enjoys at those times. For one project, a video for country music singer Troy Johnson’s “It’s You” track, the label simply told Lader they wanted something “classy – pure and true ro-mance.” Not much to go on, but Lader ran with it. He suggested shooting the video on location with huge vistas (like a piano overlooking a rolling meadow, a couple strolling on a hilly path, an expansive horizon at sunset). “What if we [use] huge, wide locations – but it’s only the two of them there, and that’s what makes it intimate,” he recalls pitching. “They loved it.” The video played in more than 18,000 movie the-aters nationwide in summer 2004.

Merck finds “the page is your canvas,” when he’s putting together his conceptual treatment. “And you are usually in competition with anywhere from 10 to 50 other directors, so you have to be a master of words. Once he snags a job, Merck finds “the key is to be open to [the band’s] ideas and just go with the flow.”

favorite music video directors (Wayne Isham, Matt Mahurin, Samuel Bayer and Martin Weisz) helped him hone his craft. (Cooke won “Best Music Video” at the 2000 10th Annual Los Angeles Music Awards for the It’s Not Me video that he directed for the band Swag.) Of course, making a video can also mean having a blast with rockers and musicians from the wild to the wildly talented.

Music videos “are a world of their own,” says producer Ken Franchi ’00, who is based in Los Angeles. “They don’t follow any of the rules of the normal film community. It’s, ‘What can you throw together in a week,’ or ‘Let’s smash the camera if it means getting a good shot.’”

The differences can also add up to a more enjoyable, more creative work environment, say alums. “You don’t have to jump through all the hoops, and there aren’t millions and millions of dollars on the line,” adds David Lebensfeld ’04, who owns a special effects company, based in Los Angeles, that works with dozens of major labels, groups and directors. “You’re working in a creative atmosphere,” he stresses. Franchi puts it another way: “It’s con-

Making a music video for a well-known rock band with an international reputation for bringing down the house might sound like just a dream for a college student.

But at Emerson, the dream became reality for a team of talented students, marking a first-of-its-kind collaboration among Emerson, MTV Networks, mega-label Interscope Records, and the band And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead (or simply Trail of Dead).

Emerson Channel Manager Amy Grill calls the collaboration “truly the first student production of its kind, a landmark.” (An on-campus TV production unit staffed by students and managed professionally, the Emerson Channel acquires, creates and packages 18 new programming hours weekly.) Grill sees Emerson as a trailblazer,

working with major media corporations like MTV Networks and Viacom, in partnerships where the companies allow students to do professional-quality, funded productions.

Ross Martin, head of programming for mtvU (MTV’s channel exclusively for college audiences), said, “Our collaboration with Trail of Dead and students at Emerson is . . . yet another way for us to showcase the incredible talent of our audience in an unprecedented way.” Adds Grill,

“Content providers like MTV that are targeting student audiences are definitely looking to schools like Emerson and places like the Emerson Channel because they know that we cull all this talent [for the Emerson Channel], and they know we’ll get it done.”

The Emerson students proved Grill’s words more than true. The video for the band’s song “Caterwaul” premiered on mtvU in late May, where it aired in heavy rotation during the summer, and a behind-the-scenes special also aired on the channel. Then, in an unprecedented surprise, the “Caterwaul” video made the jump to the big leagues of MTV2.

“Companies that collaborate with Emerson will get more than they expected,” said the video’s director Pearl Wible ’05, “because everyone takes themselves very seriously, but we all work together as friends.”

The making of…

With a team of about 30 Emerson students, Wible descended upon popular Cambridge, Mass., nightclub

You just roll through your index really fast and throw out another idea.”

For Jeff Wager ’95, the process of coming up with concepts is more visual. “I put together a large piece of foam core filled with images and cutouts that share the same vibe as what you’re doing.” During production, he explains, if “communication issues” arise, he goes back to his art board to sort things out.

Co-directors Michael Reich ’03 and Mike Pinkney ’02 discovered that a great relationship with a band can lead to a quality video. They’ve directed two videos for The 88, who have a song on a soundtrack for the popular show The OC. “They were really supportive and enthusiastic about the video, which helps a lot,” explains Reich. Having

Developing a clear, strong and visually interesting concept isn’t easy, say directors. “Coming up with the concepts is brutal,” says director Todd Strauss-Schulson ’02, who says he listens to the track “a million times” as he works up a concept. “I rarely get to speak with the band, except to pitch an idea that I have already pitched to the label,” he explains. To make matters more complicated, “You usually don’t have any time, so you go through a cache of old ideas and see if you can update them.” Strauss-Schulson, in fact, keeps a list of about 100 ideas. “When you’re on the phone and you pitch your idea, if they hate it, you can’t freeze up.

fun on set helps, too. “While the crew was working, the band was playing an acoustic set and taking requests. It cre-ated a really good work environment.” Reich and Pinkney have also directed a video for the Brazilian Girls, a Verve (Universal Records) band, which featured a monkey, a disco ball and 36 men dressed up as Shriners, reports Reich.

“It’s kind of unprecedented the creative control the directors have,” says special effects wizard Lebensfeld, who, as a junior at Emerson, worked with Strauss-Schulson on a video for the band Slick Shoes. Lebensfeld, who started the company Ingenuity Engine, says when directors have more creative

Rocking on Campus: Undergrads impress MTV executives

Far left: Director Todd Strauss-Schulson

’02 and Director of Photography Erik Messerschmidt ’03 on location in the desert on a shoot for the band Big Dismal. Left: A scene from Mr. Mister, directed by Ethan Lader ’02.


The Middle East with a mission – complete every aspect of the videomaking process. She had 10 days to put it all together (during final exams!), a mere two days to shoot, and four days to edit – with a budget of $10,000.

Luckily, Wible was already a pro. She had directed five videos and worked on 18 – for a mix of artists, including local bands, touring groups and more well-known national bands. In fact, she came to Emerson wanting to make music videos, she says.

What does a seasoned student music-video director do to prepare? Catch a concert, of course. Wible and fellow Emersonian Matt Ardine ’05, the video’s producer and director of photography, jumped at a chance to see Trail of Dead play live in Boston. “We witnessed the

fans rushing the stage, the band tearing the instruments apart, the roadies not knowing what to do,” recalls Wible. “So that’s everything we put into the video. It’s as genuine as you can get while having to do so many takes to get different angles.” Shot from the audience-level, the video captures crowd-surfing and extreme close-ups on the intense performance. This kind of performance video suited Trail of Dead perfectly, Wible says. “They really get into their music and tear apart the stage at every show.”

The list of challenges Wible and her team faced was daunting and included a humorously rowdy band and the pressure of label and MTV representatives on set. “They’re investing a lot of money in your idea, so you have to show them you know what you’re talking about,” she says.

The video’s challenges, however, also provided rewards. Explains Grill, “A lot of students are interested in music videos, but the true selling point was having the opportunity to work on something that had serious distribution beyond Emerson, to work on a music video with a major label artist.” As for working with a rock band, Grill believes Wible “learned a lot about how to work with people who aren’t easy to pin down, wrangle, or tell what to do.”

Wible says she most enjoyed the “fusion of my idea bringing the artists’ idea to life. It’s a level of collaboration that’s really touchy at times, but when you get it right it’s so fun.”

Wible sums it up expertly: “I wish every kid at Emerson could learn the things I learned. I’ll already know what to expect, what people want.”

control, that often means he in turn gets more control of effects as well.

“[The directors] really don’t have to answer to [as many people].”

Merck agrees. Unlike the world of commercials, which is where he started out (where “the idea is already written [up] by someone else when you receive the script”), when he makes a music video “it’s my vision based on the song

– which is just killer,” he enthuses. Merck’s clients have included Sony Music (Columbia, Epic, etc.), Universal, Atlantic, Epitaph and Century Media, among others. He has worked with the bands Cold, Shadows Fall, Converge, Bad Religion, Dropkick Murphys and Blindside, and his work has aired on MTV, MTV2, mtvU, Fuse and HBO.

Lader has worked with such well-known artists as Ali Shaheed Muham-

mad (formerly of A Tribe Called Quest), rappers Juvenile and the pathbreaking hip-hop artist KRS-ONE, and up-and-coming artists like pop star Angel and female rapper Euricka. His experiences making music videos have taught him how to envision and execute knockout visuals and impressive scenes. Take for example his latest clip for Angel. When he got the job to direct her top-40 single “Just The Way I Am,” he had to shut down the Colorado Street Bridge in Pasadena and create a huge traffic jam. That video is being aired on the popular AOL Music website.

But it is certainly not simply about creating splashy scenes, says Lader, though that can be part of making an artist look his or her best. “I think it’s

Rocking on Campus: Undergrads impress MTV executives

Emerson undergraduates shoot a video for the band Trail of Dead at a local nightclub. The finished product, Caterwaul, was aired on mtvU and MTV2.


Alumni who direct music videos and alumni who work as musicians are collaborating their way to success.

Emerson senior Pearl Wible (see page 6) produced a video for popular touring band Syd (led by Erin Sidney

’04). The video was directed by Dylan Allen, the band’s

important to use this medium to tell stories and/or to really come up with ex-perimental, cool visual styles,” he offers. In Angel’s video, she sings about being an individual as she dances confidently among the stalled cars – with a legion of people from all walks of life joining her march.

Style maketh the bandSo what makes a good video? Wager admits, music videos can be “all about the eye candy.” But the director, who has shot several videos in San Francisco, says

bassist and a member of the Emerson Class of 2004. The film was the first music video the campus student-group Frames Per Second made. Syd has produced two albums.

The streets of Boston serve as the backdrop for a music video for singer-songwriter Eric Hutchinson ’02, directed by Todd Strauss-Schulson

’02. The video was screened

at the 2003 Emerson College Los Angeles Film and Video Festival. Erik Messerschmidt

’03 served as director of photography for that video.

Ken Franchi ’00 produced a concert video for alum Dan Finnerty’s (’92) highly successful The Dan Band. What’s more, Franchi has produced the majority of Todd Strauss-Schulson’s

Banding Together:Alumni in the music and video worlds seek each other out

Above: Erik Messerschmidt ’03 readies the camera for a scene with actress Kelsey Collins (who attended Emerson) on the set of a video, directed by Michael Reich ’03 and Mike Pinkney ’02, for the band The 88.

Right: Director Ethan Lader ’02 watches singer Angel during a dance segment in her video, shot on a Pasadena bridge in a mock traffic jam.


Special effects whiz David Lebensfeld ’04 poses on location for a video for the popular band My Chemical Romance.

For Lader, that meant turning what could have been just another performance video (footage of the art-ist performing at some venue), into a sharp, highly stylized and coordinated creation. The video, for rapper Euricka and featuring the multi-platinum artist Juvenile, was shot in New Orleans. “We pretty much locked down [parts of the city],” says Lader. His vision was to cre-ate a perfectly coordinated aesthetic of black and white images, from Euricka’s white top hat or black sequined top to uniformed “step” dancers complete with black-and-white-swirled “step” canes to an infinite black backdrop. His style is getting him noticed. Lader has signed with production company Karma for representation as a music video director. This, he hopes, will allow him to work with more major labels and artists.

Strauss-Schulson also under-stands the importance of a singular style. His video for the band Slick Shoes (“Now’s the Time”) – shot almost entirely in black and white – featured computer-generated, moving stick figures that flicker onto the screen in place of the band members and the dancing audience. The video topped the charts on mtvU (MTV’s College TV net-work), beating out videos from bands like Limp Bizkit and Stained. The video was also showcased on MTV’s Advance Warning program and was in rotation on MTV2.

For those computer-generated images that are so popular these days in music videos, directors must turn to

Matthew Cooke ’96Ethan Lader ’02Zachary Merck ’98Mike Pinkney ’02Michael Reich ’03Todd Strauss-Schulson ’02Jeff Wager ’95

David Lebensfeld ’04

Ken Franchi ’00

Dave Kalvert ’99 Erik Messerschmidt ’03

professionals like Lebensfeld. Through his company, Lebensfeld has worked on videos for such big names as Pras, Gavin DeGraw, My Chemical Romance, Hot Hot Heat and Incubus, and his work has aired on MTV’s flagship program TRL, among other places. One of his most recent tasks had him integrating footage from the big-budget film Stealth (starring Jamie Foxx) with performance scenes from the band Incubus (who produced the film’s soundtrack).

Lebensfeld says it’s important for him to be on set (which, in the case of the Incubus video, was Death Valley) during the video shoot so he can answer the director’s questions. When he was working on a video for the hot new East Coast band My Chemical Romance, the director wanted to know if it was pos-sible to use computer-generated images to create a fleet of helicopters for the video. Lebensfeld promised him his fleet and production resumed.

From his years of making videos, Merck has discovered that “digging” the music is key. “I have seen directors who don’t really dig music…attempt to direct, and they fall flat on their face. [When making a video], the band has to look amazing, so you have to know the musi-cians in and out so you can pull that performance out of them.” Merck adds,

“I love making videos, because I get to create art with my heroes that get me through each day.” E

videos and much of Michael Reich ’03 and Mike Pinkney’s (’02) work. Reich and Pinkney work exclusively with Messerschmidt and report “at least 50 percent” of their crew members have been Emersonians.

Continuing this theme, David Lebensfeld ’04 was working on videos for Strauss-Schulson when Lebensfeld was a junior at Emerson and

has gone on to provide special effects for several alums, including Ethan Lader

’02. Zachary Merck ’98, who has directed about 30 videos, uses Dave Kalvert ’99 as director of photography for the majority of his videos.

Perhaps an anecdote from Strauss-Schulson offers the most striking testament to the collaborative spirit of

he “prefers some sort of story line to the song, so it has some inherent direc-tion to begin with.” (Besides music vid-eos Wager has filmed interviews with superstars like Metallica, Joe Satriani and D-12, among other film projects.) Wager has learned “there aren’t really ‘rules’ for [making] music videos. You can pretty much get away with just about anything – lens choices, screen direction, color schemes.” His advice:

“Pick a strong aesthetic and stick to it, and everything will turn out cool.”

Emerson alumni: On the last video he directed, his crew and production staff, save for one Emersonian, were “an older, wiser team of pros I didn’t know,” he says. The pros didn’t meet muster at all; so, he called in what he refers to as his “Emerson posse” – who saved the day, he says. “I ended up being able to do it my way with my Emerson crew, and the video got done cheap, efficient and awesome.”

Directors

Special effects

Producer

Editors


On a spring day that began in rain and ended in brilliant sunshine, Emerson College presented nearly 1,100 baccalaureate and gradu-ate degrees during back-to-back ceremonies, on May 16, at the Wang Center for the Perform-ing Arts in Boston.

The College also presented honorary degrees to Robert F.X. Sillerman, a leading entrepre-neur and innovator in the media and entertain-ment industries; actor-comedian Denis Leary ’79; Peter Meade ’70, a former College trustee and executive vice president at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts; Evan Thomas, assistant managing editor of Newsweek; and Jean Picker Firstenberg, director and CEO of the American Film Institute.



she said, arts and entertainment “have the potential to unite people of divergent backgrounds and beliefs by tapping the human emotions and aspi-rations that all of us share.”

President Liebergott also noted her pride in the students’ activism in organizing local and state voter regis-tration last fall.

In a high point of the ceremony, President Liebergott acknowledged student leaders, award winners and community service activists. She sa-luted Fulbright Fellowship winners Em-ily Garr and Edwin Corbin, who both received loud applause, as did Kristen Belcher, Class of 2005 president, when President Liebergott noted her wide-ranging involvement in campus life.

President Liebergott also lauded the seniors who made possible the EVVY Awards and campus publications like the Berkeley Beacon, the Emerson

need.” After Sept. 11, he urged his fel-low graduates to “rise to the challenge and act as a nexus when the stories begin to tell themselves.” His words of advice were simply: “Be the one to do it! Obscurity is forever. Avoid people who justify their mediocrity.”

Sillerman, who Liebergott noted “changed the landscape of the commu-nication and entertainment industry,” gave the Commencement address. His remarks focused on what he described as a “seismic shift” taking place in the entertainment industry in which con-trol is moving from mass distributors to consumers and content creators. He told the budding communicators and

Review and the Journalism Students On-Line News Service (JSONS).

Vice President of Academic Af-fairs Linda Moore introduced the Class of 2005 Valedictorian, Joaquim ‘Jack’ Encarnacao. She praised the senior for his 3.96 GPA, his work as a Boston Globe correspondent and an EVVY award he won for his work as a Berkeley Beacon writer and editor. Encarnacao’s speech emphasized that “Emerson is what you made of it.” He stressed that the College might not give you what you want, “but it gives you what you

Sillerman presented the un-dergraduate address, and Thomas delivered the address at the graduate student ceremony.

The undergraduate ceremony began with an invocation delivered by Rabbi Albert Axelrad, chair of the College’s Center for Spiritual Life, in which he recalled the loss of

“treasured comrades” student Victoria ‘Torie’ Snelgrove, recent alum Nicole DuFresne ’99, and the “gifted and colorful” Assistant Professor Alan Hankin, whose name was met with loud applause. Each were members of the Emerson community who lost their life unexpectedly this year.

At the ceremony, assembled stu-dents thanked friends and family with vigorous applause and gave Emerson faculty a standing ovation. Graduate students cheered each other on as they received their degrees in the afternoon ceremony. Both events included warm words of praise and offerings of wis-dom from administrators and distin-guished guest speakers.

The event was also broadcast live for an overflow crowd in the Cutler Majestic Theatre and streamed live on the Web.

Words of wisdomIn her remarks to the graduates, Presi-dent Jacqueline Liebergott congratu-lated them on their many accomplish-ments while at Emerson and urged them all to take what they had learned and to continue their pursuit of excel-lence.

Noting that this year’s graduates began their careers at Emerson days be-fore the tragic events of Sept. 11, 2001, President Liebergott took a moment to express the institution’s pride in how both students and faculty responded to the tumultuous events of that day. She added that communications and the arts have always been important fields,

“but they take on a new urgency in the post-9/11 era. The need for timely, ac-curate, responsible and culturally sensi-tive reporting of news and information has never been greater.” In addition,

Media entrepreneur Robert F. X. Sillerman gave the Commencement address during the undergraduate ceremony.

1� Expression Fall 2005

Another honorary degree recipi-ent, Blue Cross Blue Shield CEO and alumnus Peter Meade, noted during his brief remarks that the academic hood he was wearing had been worn by the late David Brudnoy, his friend and an honorary Emerson Phi Alpha Tau fraternity brother and friend to the Col-lege who passed away last year.

Two faculty members received fac-ulty emeritus honors to the sheer delight of the audience – including boisterous standing ovations from both assembled faculty and graduating seniors. Per-forming Arts Professor Harry Morgan ’59, MSSp ’65, offered his heartfelt

media professionals, “Artists will be able to communicate directly with their target audience rather than relying on the big execs to do it for them.”

Special momentsAt another high point in the ceremony, actor-director and Emerson alumnus Denis Leary took the podium – to deafening applause and a standing ovation – after receiving his honorary doctorate. “Look at me, I’m a doctor!” he proclaimed. Leary told the students

that they had a long life ahead of them but that the friends and memories made at Emerson would last a lifetime. He pointed out that he’s still married to his wife, whom he met at Emerson, and his friends in his comedy band, whom he met at Emerson, are still his friends. Leary also said that the late James Randall, a professor of writing during Leary’s time at Emerson, “made a big difference for me.”

Above: Honorary degree recipient and comedian Denis Leary ’79 is hooded, as is Jean Picker Firstenberg, director and CEO of the American Film Institute. Commencement Speaker Robert F.X. Sillerman greets valedictorian Joaquim Encarnacao.


The graduate student address was delivered by M.F.A. graduate Christo-pher Tonelli, a published poet, teacher, essayist, editor and a guitarist in a band of fellow Emersonians. Tonelli dis-cussed a famous poem by German poet Rainer Maria Rilke in which he writes,

“You must change your life.” Tonelli proclaimed, “We are here today, we came to Emerson, because we too were convinced, by something or someone, that a transformation needed to take place.”

A catered reception took place on Boston Common after both ceremonies, offering students and their families a chance to take pictures, reminisce and meet faculty mentors. E

thanks to his wife, whom he met at Emerson, and Emerson administrators, trustees and colleagues. History Associ-ate Professor Rev. John Coffee offered these words: “Improve your vocabulary. Every day learn a new word.” As he left the microphone, he shouted, “I’m gonna miss you guys!”

Graduate student ritesLater in the day, at the graduate cer-emony, Commencement speaker Evan Thomas, an award-winning editor at Newsweek, delivered his address. He spoke about lessons learned as a young man trying to find his vocation and throughout his career as a journalist. Noting that Emersonians are “in a way, all storytellers,” he urged the graduates to write for an audience, not oneself.

“Storytelling should not be self-indul-gent,” he remarked.

Above: Newly minted graduates celebrate on Boston Common.Below left (clockwise): President Liebergott prepares to bestow a diploma upon a graduate; graduates and families of graduates rejoice; Evan Thomas, assistant managing editor of Newsweek, delivers an address; valedictorian Joaquim Encarnacao speaks to the audience; Peter Meade ’70, an executive at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, delivers comments after receiving an honorary degree.


President Liebergott reflects on the history and future of the College

125Emerson at


Emerson College was founded in 1880 as the Boston Conservatory of Elocution, Oratory and Dramatic Art by Charles Wesley Emerson, a minister and orator. Classes were held in rented space at Pemberton Square. Ten students were enrolled. The school was briefly known as Monroe Conservatory and Monroe College before the Emerson name was adopted in 1890.

While retaining its focus on communication and the arts, Emerson has evolved into a diverse and multifaceted institution that enrolls 3,000 fulltime undergraduates and 950 full and part-time graduate students from 48 states and several dozen countries. The College’s two schools – the School of the Arts and the School of Communication – offer bachelor’s degrees in 18 disciplines and master’s degrees in 10 fields.

This year the College celebrates its 125th anniversary. To mark the occasion the Alumni Office is organizing a series of events that will take place during the alumni reunions in June 2006.

In the interview that follows, the woman who has presided over the College for the past 12 years, Jacqueline Weis Liebergott, reflects on the significance of the 125th anniversary from the perspective of her 32 years as a faculty member, graduate dean and vice president, as well as president. She also discusses the current state of the College and her vision for the future. The interview was conducted by Vice President for Public Affairs David Rosen.

Emerson celebrates its 125th anniversary this year. From your perspective as a long-time faculty member and administrator at the College, what is the significance of this event?The anniversary is a significant mile-stone in the history and evolution of a rather unique and important institu-tion. It provides an opportunity for all members of the Emerson community

– students, faculty, staff, alumni, par-ents and friends – to reflect on our past achievements and to assess the current state of the College. It is also an ap-propriate time for us to consider where we are headed in the years to come and what will be required to get us there.

The anniversary is especially meaningful for our 19,000 alumni. They represent all that we strive to achieve as a College, and they have a permanent stake in its future. Many alumni are active in the life of the Col-lege but many are not. I hope that the 125th celebration provides an opportu-nity for these alumni to renew their ties to the College and to each other.

You’ve used the words ‘unique’ and ‘evolution’ to describe Emerson. What do you mean by these terms?Emerson is unique in several respects. It is the oldest college of communica-tion and it is the only major college or

university that is dedicated exclusively to communication and the arts. Many fine academic institutions offer pro-grams in these disciplines. Some uni-versities have individual schools that focus on these fields. But at Emerson, communication and the arts is all that we do. This creates a unique communi-ty of students, faculty and alumni who share common interests. In addition, because of who we are and what we do, we have a special obligation to remain current and to educate creative and ethical industry leaders.

I used the word evolution in part because it appears in the College’s motto, but also because it describes


President Jacqueline Liebergott

1251904 First black student, Mary Burrill, graduates from Emerson.

1932 The College offers its first courses in radio.

1931 Emerson establishes the nation’s first college-level Children’s Theatre program.

1935 Emerson starts one of the nation’s first academic programs in speech pathology and audiology.

1945 Post-WWII, the GI Bill and the broad-casting curriculum combine to increase the number of men within the once primarily female student body.

1941 The FCC awards WERS at Emerson College the first non-commercial FM broadcast license in New England.

Milestones in the History of Emerson College

exactly what Emerson has done over the years. It has evolved from a small, regional school of oratory to a multi-faceted institution that enrolls students from virtually every state in this coun-try and from three dozen other nations. As we have enhanced the quality of our programs and facilities, our national as well as local reputation has grown sig-nificantly. The accomplishments of our alumni have reinforced and enhanced our reputation.

So how would you assess the state of Emerson College today?I would say that the College is strong and getting stronger. We’ve increased our full-time equivalent enrollment from 2,750 in 1995 to 3,600 this semester, and that’s roughly where we intend to stay. Applications for admis-

sion have soared to record levels in recent years, with the number of un-dergraduate applications this past year exceeding 5,000. The academic profile of the students we admit has also increased substantially. To use just one measure, the average combined SAT scores of this year’s freshman class is 1240 – some 100 points higher than it was a decade ago.

Over the past 13 years, we have created an entirely new campus in the Theatre District. It provides substantial-ly more space and gives our students access to world-class facilities with state-of-the art technology. At the same time, we have stabilized the College’s finances after decades of instability that nearly drove the College out of the city 20 years ago. We achieved stability through a series of shrewd real estate transactions coupled with sound fiscal and investment management. For this

we owe an enormous debt of gratitude to Vice President for Administration and Finance Robert Silverman, who is retiring at the end of this school year.

While stability is certainly better than instability, this does not mean that the College is now well off financially. Quite the contrary. Compared to other private institutions with which we compete, we have a small endowment relative to the number of students we enroll. And because we are not a research university, we receive very little federal support. So we have to rely almost entirely on tuition and fees to support academic programs and pro-vide financial aid to needy students.


1953 Professor Samuel D. Robbins, a pioneer in communication sciences and disorders, opens a clinic to treat children and adults with hearing impairments and other communication disorders.

1972 Emerson begins a Bachelor of Fine Arts program in film.

1980 The College creates the country's first graduate program in professional writing and publishing.

1983 Emerson purchases the historic Majestic Theater, saving it from demolition. The theater reopens in 1989 and is fully restored and renamed the Cutler Majestic Theater in 2003.

The restored theater receives awards from numerous organizations, including the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

1986 The College launches a combined academic/internship program in Los Angeles.

Looking at the admission and enrollment numbers, it seems that Emerson has become a ‘hot’ college. What do you attribute this to?There are several factors and they are related. The overriding factor is the continued strength and relevance of our academic programs. Communica-tion and the arts have grown in both importance and popularity. Students interested in these fields are attracted to our curriculum because it integrates theory and practice and includes a liberal arts perspective. Our graduates continue to find jobs in their chosen fields and they succeed because they are well educated and trained to use the latest tools of their trade.

Another major factor is the devel-opment of the world-class facilities I referred to previously. No other college our size can match Emerson’s perform-ing arts, television and radio facilities.

Our new journalism and marketing communications facilities are also state-of-the-art.

Last but by no means least, the upturn in applications, enrollment and student retention reflects the hard work and accomplishments of dedicated fac-ulty members and staff throughout the College. Emerson remains a relatively small and intimate school that encour-ages meaningful interaction between students and faculty. That’s one of the reasons students choose Emerson over other fine institutions. Satisfied stu-dents are our best source of advertising.

So we have increased enrollment, stabilized our finances and created a new campus. Where do we go from here?It’s one thing to build a campus and an-other thing to build a community. The next logical step in the evolution of the

College is to do the latter. The adminis-tration and the trustees are committed to building a truly residential campus – one that will house 75 to 80 percent of our students and provide greatly enhanced living and learning opportunities and extracurricular activities. Right now we house around 48 percent of our under-graduates. We offer several interesting learning-community programs, but these are available only to a handful of students.

The opening of a new residence hall at 150 Boylston Street next fall and the completion of the Paramount Center in the fall of 2008 will bring us closer to our housing goal. But we will still have to create more student housing. We will also need to provide housing on or near campus for selected faculty and staff who will be available to work with students.


1997 Emerson reorganizes its academic programs and departments around a new School of the Arts, a new School of Communication and an Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies.

Family Television Studio and many other facilities. The opening of the Tufte Center, along with the Levy Journalism and Marketing Wing in the adjoining Walker Building,

and renovates four buildings and installs state-of-the art teaching and communication facilities.

1988 Emerson purchases a 13th-century castle in the Netherlands and offers a semester abroad program.

1992 A new administration initiates an ambitious program to relocate all facilities from the Back Bay to the Theatre District. Over a six-year period, the College purchases

2003 College opens its first entirely new building – the Tufte Performance and Production Center, which includes the Semel and Greene theaters, the Di Bona

And, as I mentioned, we will need to expand co-curricular and extra-curricu-lar programs and make them available to the community at large.

We’ve been talking primarily about finances and facilities. What about academic programs? What are your goals in this area?The overall academic goal for Emerson is, and must be, to establish itself as the premier college of communication and the arts in the nation. Nothing less than this will do. Right now we are a very good college, but we are not the best in every respect. We offer some outstanding programs, including two nationally ranked graduate programs,

but we also have programs that need improvement. If we are to become the premier college of communication and the arts in the country, we must increase the size of our full-time faculty. We must recruit and support nationally recognized scholars and professionals, and we must assure that the skills and interests of faculty and staff continue to match the demands of our curriculum.

What about the curriculum itself? Do you foresee any changes in the years ahead?We have to continually monitor our courses and programs to assure that they remain both rigorous and relevant to the communication and media industries that employ our graduates. As we all know, these industries are constantly changing.

I believe the thrust of the cur-riculum right now is sound. So I do not envision any major restructuring at this

time. I do, however, expect to add some new offerings as resources to support them become available. I am commit-ted to adding a Master of Fine Arts pro-gram in Media Arts, and to expanding our digital arts offerings. I believe there is a market for these programs and that adding them to our curriculum is essential if we want to be a premier institution in the arts. I also hope to add a group of core business courses to the undergraduate curriculum. These courses would be opened to students in all of our majors, and could serve inter-ested students as a minor. Many of our alumni and students have commented on the need for such courses.


2004 Emerson breaks ground for a new residence hall and campus center. When the facility opens in 2006, the College will complete the campus relocation.

2004 Lois and Henry Foster establish the first endowed chair at Emerson (in contemporary art). A second endowed chair (in

2005 With City of Boston support, Emerson announces plans to build the Paramount Center complex, which will include a performance

enables Emerson to complete the relocation of all of its academic and administrative offices.

development center, residence hall and a restored Paramount Theatre.

screenwriting) is established by an anonymous donor a year later.

Is the College considering any other proposals or initiatives that might be of interest to alumni and friends?Again, subject to the availability of resources, I would like to significantly enhance our artist-in-residence pro-grams. With financial support from an anonymous donor, we now bring a distinguished artist to campus each spring for about a week. In addition, well-known artists who are performing in Boston stop by the College for infor-mal sessions with students from time to time. We can significantly enhance the quality of academic life on campus by bringing such individuals to campus for more extended periods of time, like an entire semester. They would live in appropriate facilities on or near campus. They would teach, mentor and interact informally with our students.

We are also considering expand-ing and enhancing our Los Angeles Program, which currently enrolls around 100 students per semester. I think we can increase enrollment in L.A. I also think we should explore the feasibility of buying or building suit-able academic and residence facilities there. Right now we rent space and it is barely adequate. In planning new and expanded facilities there, we should provide space and resources to support Admission and Advancement staff as well as academic programs. We have a lot of alumni in L.A. We need to be more accessible to them and to make it easier for them to connect with the Col-lege and access its resources. Likewise, we need to service the increasing pool of L.A.-area high school students who are interested in applying to Emerson.

You’ve articulated an ambitious agenda for the future. What will it take to achieve it?The first step is to reach a consensus on what needs to be done. As a community, we need a shared vision and common set of goals to pursue. The next step is to prioritize goals and objectives. The last and most difficult step is generating the financial resources that will be needed to succeed. To secure these resources, we will be looking to our Board of Trustees for leadership and to our alumni and friends for sustained support. We are building a strong Board as is evident from the new trustees who have joined the Board in recent months [see Campus Digest in this issue]. We are connecting and reconnecting with alumni. And we are developing strong ties to parents of Emerson students. Enthusiasm and sup-port for the College are growing, and I am quite optimistic about the future. E


Crannell scholarship fund launched

Thanks to the many friends and former students of retired faculty member Ken Crannell, the man who taught many Emersonians the power of words to explain and persuade, the College has a new endowed scholarship.

The Kenneth C. Cran-nell Sr. Scholarship in Speech Communication and Public Leadership will ben-efit a first-year or transfer student interested in oral communication and a career in public life.

The scholarship honors Crannell as a peerless teach-er of oral communication to generations of Emerson students over a 42-year-long career. In fact, two genera-tions of one Emerson family

– Vin DiBona ’66 and his daughter, Cara ’94 – made the lead gift of $25,000 to establish the scholarship, challenging the College to match that amount from other donors by Alumni Weekend 2005. Thanks to the tireless efforts of Arleen Sorkin ’77, Helaine Miller ’55 and many others, the initial goal of $50,000 was reached by Alumni Weekend. Garen Suzan ’79, a former stu-dent of Crannell’s, pledged $20,000 to the scholarship, ensuring that the initial goal would be exceeded.

The scholarship fund is now three-quarters of the way to $100,000. “This is a wonderful opportunity for everyone who benefited from Ken’s teaching to participate in attaining that

goal,” said Barbara Rutberg, acting vice president of Institutional Advancement.

“The Kenneth C. Crannell Sr. Scholarship in Speech Communication and Public Leadership is a wonderful way to honor Ken and to invest in Emerson College and its students.”

Checks made payable to the Emerson College Crannell Scholarship may be sent to Institutional Advancement, Emerson College, 120 Boylston St., Boston, MA 02116-4624. Or visit https://www.emerson.edu/alumni/giving/ and click on the Fund Account Designation drop-down menu near the bottom of the form.

Alumni Digest

Los Angeles

A reception to welcome incoming students and their parents to Emerson was held in August at the Pacific Palisades (Calif.) home of Bob and Jaime Madden, parents of Class of 2005 graduate Mary Madden. Among the attendees were (middle row, right) Emerson President Jacqueline Liebergott and actor Henry Winkler ’67.

Contributions $465,000

Largest $25,000individual gift

Alumni 19%participation

Number of 4,000+alumni and parent gifts

Thank you!

Annual Fund

Ken Crannell

The Emerson College New England Alumni Chapter didn’t let the drizzle dampen their spirits at The Day at The Races in May. Laughter filled the spectacular Suffolk Downs Topsider Gallery banquet room as members and their guests picked pony winners – or not.

New England

Emerson calling. . .

Every year, more than 40 Emerson students spend their evenings calling alumni and parents as part of the Annual Fund Phonathon. More than 6,100 alumni and parents connected with a student through the Phonathon program last year, and many of them are contributing to the Annual Fund, which supports programs such as scholarships, financial aid and new technology. This year, when a student calls,

consider donating $125 to the Annual Fund in honor of the College’s 125th anniversary. You’ll be helping the student who calls and all of his or her peers. To find out more about the Annual Fund and how it supports students, please contact Emily Bersin at 617-824-8272 or [email protected].

Emerson students at the Annual Fund phonebank.

Online Community Expanded

You asked for better online service: we heard you! You asked for alumni club web pages: we heard you! You asked for online event registration: we heard you! You asked for more opportunities to connect with other alumni online: we heard you!

Your Emerson Alumni online community is about to get even better.

The Office of Alumni Relations will unveil a new and improved online community in the coming months. Stay tuned for more details on this powerful, new tool. New and improved features include:

• personal member’s page that alerts you when classmates post updates • free e-mail forwarding (you will never have to change your emerson.edu e-mail address) • improved message boards • online career networking • alumni yellow pages • and online surveys so you can continue to give us your valuable feedback

www.emersonalumni.com

Don’t miss out. Be sure we have your e-mail address. Update it at [email protected].

Coming to a Computer

Near You…

Alumni Weekend 2005

More than 500 alumni, family and guests came back to campus in June for Alumni Weekend 2005. They came to see today’s Emerson College and to be-come re-acquainted with the school and each other.

Friday night’s GOLD (Graduates of the Last De-cade) cruise around Boston Harbor drew nearly 100 alumni from all classes who danced, schmoozed and en-joyed the beautiful evening. Many of the non-seagoing alumni attended a moving

tribute to Professor of Per-forming Arts Harry Morgan, who retired after a 45-year teaching career.

To give alumni the op-portunity to see some of the College’s new facilities, class luncheons were held in the lobby of the Semel Theater, the DiBona TV Studio, and Tufte Center Room 1114, featuring a spectacular view of the Boston Common and Beacon Hill.

At the College’s Cutler Majestic Theatre, Presi-dent Jacqueline Liebergott accepted a 2004 Preserva-tion Honor Award from the National Trust for Historic

Preservation for the Majestic restoration. Campus tours on Saturday and Sunday gave alumni the opportu-nity to see the new campus through the eyes of today’s undergraduates.

The Faculty & Alumni Brunch was the high point of

Classmates from the Class of 2000 catch up (from left): Zachary Fuerst, Stephanie Sherwood, Alynn Albert and Michael David Arlington.

Marguerite Morgan Broman ’37 and Barbara Rutberg ’68, director of the College’s Alumni Relations Office, meet.

the weekend for those who wanted to reconnect with friends and favorite faculty members. Professor of Writ-ing, Literature and Publish-ing John Skoyles gave a witty and engaging presentation on his department and left everyone feeling that he or she could be a poet, too.

Actor John Kuntz ’90 and Robbie McCauley, associate professor of performing arts, gave a special performance after the Alumni Achievement Awards ceremony in the Cutler Majestic Theatre.

Attending the Class of ’85 picnic were (top; from left): Sandra (Davis) Paone, Julie Mermelstein, Terry Wells, Don Walden, Marianne (Sarazen) Lonati, Bruce Hrozenchik and Scott Lief. Bottom (from left): Julie Ray Poulin, Eric Rhoden, Gloria (Giordano) Homiski, Ken Brady, Ruth (Twichell) Crane and Kim (Blethen) Rotondo.

From left are Mary Ishkanian ’50; Nannette Clark ’50; Sarah Smyth ’51, MA ’52; and Mary Geddes Avery ’50.

Winners and presenters of Alumni Awards included (from left) outgoing Alumni Association President Sandi Goldfarb ’78, Robert C. Tull ’50 (Leonard J. Riendeau ’64 Award), Steve Farrier ’75 (presenter), Brent Jennings ’74 (Alumni Achievement Award), Robert Jones (presenter), Denise Kaigler ’85 (Alumni Achievement Award), Wayne Larrivee ’77 (Alumni Achievement Award), Rob Rudnick ’77 (presenter), Max Mutchnick ’87 (Issachar Hoopes Eldridge Award) and Emerson College President Jacqueline Liebergott.

Standing from left are Jeanne Allen Dew ’45 and Roberta Swan Miller ’45. Seated from left are sisters Janet Bergman Dobrer ’50 and Evelyn Bergman Shatkin ’40.

The Class of 1955 celebrates its 50th reunion during a class lunch on the Cutler Majestic Theatre stage.

A scene from the Alumni Weekend Boat Cruise

Celebrating 125 Years of Leadership in CommuniCation and the arts

June 2-4, 2006Classes with years ending in ‘1’ and ‘6’ will be celebrating their reunions.

CELEBRATING EMERSON’S 125TH ANNIVERSARY

Alumni WeekendSave the Date!

The 25th anniversary of the EVVYS

The 30th Anniversary of EIV

The 25th Anniversary of This is Pathetic

The 20th anniversary of the semester abroad program at Kasteel Well in Holland

From left are Monica Robinson Matthews ’80, President Jacqueline Liebergott, Director of Alumni Relations Barbara Rutberg ’68 and Brent Jennings ’74.

Longtime pals (from left) Dennis Blader ’75, Robert Friend ’79 and Tobie Stein ’79

Maureen Dunn O’Keefe ’55 (left) and Dorothy Peterson Cooke ’55 view class mementoes.

The informal “Class with the Most” awards went to the Class of 1955 for raising the most money ($17,080), the Class of 1950 for the most par-ticipation in the Annual Fund (50%) and to the Class of 1995 for recruiting the most class-mates (40+) to come to Alumni Weekend.

A message from Peter Loge, new president ofthe Emerson College Alumni Association

Many of us are far removed from our days at Emerson College. But regardless of when we graduated or what our major was, we will always be Emersonians. Some of the buildings and majors have changed, but the heart and soul of the students remains the same. That continuity is our success, and continuing that success depends on our continued involvement. If you’re helping recruit new Emersonians, attending local alumni events, help-ing students find jobs or internships, or contributing

to the College, thank you. And if you aren’t, you should be. Staying connected is energizing and fun, and it’s important to the students. Visit Emerson’s alumni web page at www.emerson.edu/alumni or call the Alumni Relations Office at 800-255-4259 to get involved. While on the alumni web page, take a moment to contribute to the Annual Fund (as I do) and help solve the big-gest problem most of our students face: the financial resources needed to attend Emerson College.

I look forward to working with you and the Alumni Board to strengthen our Emerson connections, support our next generation

Emerson College Regional Chapters

of graduates, and help make Emerson College possible for anyone with the qualifica-tions and desire to attend.

– Peter Loge ’87

Nashville

In May, Nashville-area alumni gathered for dinner at Bound’ry. From left: Matt Munger, Jennette Merwin

’04, Jessica French ’03, Bob August ’85, Janice Soled ’84, Jay Cooper, Carolyn Snell ’97, Ted Schempp ’73, Sharon Schempp, David Dwortzan ’75 and Tonia Evans ’02.

Atlanta Mary Ann Cicala ’99 [email protected]

Chicago Amy Frankel ’85 [email protected]

Connecticut Sharon Lefkin Jacobson ’74 [email protected]

Camilla Ross ’89 [email protected]

Washington, D.C. William H. White III ’69 [email protected]

Denver Ron Bostwick ’81 [email protected]

Rosalie Sheffield ’81 [email protected]

Boston Graduates of the Last Decade (G.O.L.D.) Amber Haskins ’04 [email protected]

Greater Boston Diane Purdy-Theriault ’55 [email protected]

New York Andre Archimbaud ’94 [email protected] www.emersonnyalumni.com

Rhode Island Amber Haskins ’04 [email protected]

Philadelphia Mary Ann Cicala ’99 [email protected]

San Francisco Amber Haskins ’04 [email protected]

South Florida Jane Guterman ’73 [email protected]

Southern California Robert Tull ’50 [email protected]

Young Alumni of California Melinda Valente ’97 G ’99 [email protected] www.emersonlaalumni.com

For more information, contact: Alumni Relations Office 800-255-4259 or [email protected].

1935Louise Monroe is 91 and living independently in Concord, N.H. She writes: “I’m just wondering, how many of the Class of 1935 are still alive?” Louise was class president in her day.

1957Mort Glovin, Bonnie Glovin, Meredith O’Gorman Shapiro ’58, Cynthia Crane Storey and Sheila Krute Savitsky ’58 cel-ebrated Mort’s 70th birthday.

1960Barry Mandel is semi-retired but still works as a visit-ing professor in the Beijing International M.B.A. program at Peking University. He sold his communication business to the Madison Consulting Group, but happily stayed on as senior vice president.

1961Eleanor Brenner Glovinsky was elected president of the Missouri Crime Prevention Association.

1964Glenn Laxton’s recent book, Rhode Island: A Genial His-tory, was published by New River Press. He says some of the stories included came from his TV series Not To Be Forgotten on WPRI (TV 12) in Providence, R.I., where he is a reporter and community affairs director.

Abby Feller Straus Morris is retired from practicing law and is living in Winnipeg, Canada.

1965Gail Gold, MS ’68, is a speech and language therapist in the Chicago Public Schools, where a literacy program tar-geting third-graders has been launched. She writes: “Going into the classroom and work-ing with students is fun and interesting…and their reading and language skills are on the upswing!”

1967After teaching theater for 30 years, Tom Marcello is retiring from the Swansea School System at the end of 2006. Tom also worked with Trinity Repertory Company in Provi-dence, R.I., where he founded the apprentice program. His daughter, Rachel, is a district manager for Coach Co. in Florida, and son Adam is a musician in Los Angeles who was recently nominated for an Emmy.

1968After more than two decades at Dow Jones and the Wall Street Journal Radio Net-work Steve Guggenheim has moved to Fox News Radio as news editor and anchor. If that doesn’t keep him busy enough, Steve is also involved in real estate.

The Rev. Jennifer Worden Cashman (now Flagg) was recently married to Bill Flagg, a country and rockabilly singer and producer who had such hits as “Go Cat Go” in the ’50s. She writes: “I have had three careers, reinventing myself about every 10 years.” She re-members 319 Commonwealth Ave. and Ted Phillips.

1969Carroll Cook, executive direc-tor of America on Wheels, is overseeing the building of a 43,000-sq.-ft. museum of transportation.

1971Duane Kimball met Barry Scheur in college while the two presided over their respec-tive debate teams, Duane as president of the Emerson debate team and Barry the president of the Tufts team. Barry and Duane have now joined forces. Barry, who has been blind since birth, is

working with Duane, CEO and president of RewardsNOW Inc., to develop an affinity credit card for the 13 million visually impaired Americans who have difficulty using the credit/debit card payment apparatus.

1972After a 24-year run in New York City, Peter Reinhard says he came to his senses and moved to Boca Raton, Fla., where he can play tennis 12 months out of the year. Peter says anyone from the ‘hippie/up in smoke days’ can give him a holler if they are coming down.

Sherry Reiter received the 2005 Art Lerner Pioneer Award at the annual confer-ence of the National Associa-tion for Poetry Therapy.

Toy and game inventors Richard C. “Ricardo” Levy ’64 and Sheryl S. Levy ’64 have two new family board games. Players can match wits with Jeopardy champ Ken Jennings (front) in “Can You Beat Ken?” The other, “Mental Floss,” is a funny, quirky game for trivia lovers. Daughter Bette Levy is also pictured (right).

Class Notes

1973Marcia Blau, LCSW, went from portraying characters to analyzing them. For the past 19 years she has been a psychotherapist in New York City. She is also writing, but she says her favorite role these days is being the mother of two beautiful boys.

Robin Staver Hoffman moved to New York City four years ago and loves it. She works as an advocate for adults with disabilities in a joint program with FEGS, a social service agency, and UJA Federation. She keeps in touch with Max-ine Baker, Jane Guterman and Ann Morganstern Kapneck. She can be contacted at [email protected].

1974After 23 years of blissful marriage Richard Campbell writes that his wife, Marie, passed away last year. Richard is finishing his first novel while raising two teenagers in Norwalk, Conn.

1926 Elizabeth W. Sampson of Wayne, N.J.1931 Elizabeth Hardwicke Miller of Fort Myers, Fla.1933 Rose Scolnik Goldman of Philadelphia, Pa.1942 Doris (Wait) Wolters of Exeter, N.H.1943 Dorothy Unger of New York, N.Y.1944 Barbara (Selib) Greenberg of Newton, Mass.1944 Shirlee-Anne Schaffer of Provo, Utah1945 Phyllis Hoffman Goldsmith of Orlando, Fla.1949 Claire E. DiMeo of Melrose, Mass.1950 Edward P. Hassett of Springfield, Mass.1955 Henry Weiss of Las Vegas, Nev.1959 George Newman Peters of Portsmouth, N.H.1960 John Pierce Jr. of Hudson, Mass.1969 Robert P. Bourque of Newark, N.J. 1984 Barbara Conroy of Woburn, Mass.1987 Charles S. Urso of Provincetown, Mass.

In Memoriam

Lisa Sanders Harwin founded and is director of the Wood-land Hills/Calabasas Speech and Language Center in Woodland Hills, Calif. Lisa and husband Michael, a Supe-rior Court judge, have a son, A.J., who is an attorney, and a daughter Jessica, publisher of a magazine, who have both gotten married within the last six months.

1975Bill Lally is working for Clear Channel in Los Angeles. He is assistant program director and operations manager of KFI-AM 640 and assistant program director of Clear Channel’s progressive talk sta-tion, KTLK-AM 1150.

1976Bruce Abels’ advertising cre-ative consultancy in Denver, Colo., Ready, Willing & Abels, marked its 20th anniversary on May 15, 2005. Bruce says the small creative firm specializes in creating big ideas for clients in television, radio and print.

Mark Bell is president of ENGsafety.com and recently won the J. Winton Lemen Award from the National Press Photographers As-sociation for “providing the photojournalism community with a sensible, constant voice on safety issues.”

Colette Phillips was selected by Women’s Business Boston as one of Boston’s Top Ten Public Relations experts.

Alan Tulin has found a unique niche in the world of enter-tainment. He is “Al Tulane: The Man of a Million Names.” At corporate dinners Al memorizes everyone’s name (sometimes as many as 150 people) and sings a medley of show tunes incorporating each name. Old friends can write to [email protected].

1979Tobie Stein was named the Murray Koppleman Profes-sor at Brooklyn College. She serves as graduate deputy

chair of the Brooklyn College Theater Department and is di-rector of the M.F.A. Program in Performing Arts Manage-ment.

1981Joe Rocco hosts and produces the TV program LIUNA Issues and Answers on NESN every Sunday at 11 a.m. The show is about the New England Laborers Union and discusses healthcare, education and training issues that affect working families.

1982Jim Frangione played the lead role in American Buffalo at the Berkshire Theatre Festival.

After 12 years of “winter-free” living in North Carolina Rachel Spielvogel is back in New York City working for the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and loving it. She can be contacted at [email protected].

Fred Nadelman ’65 (pictured) recently visited China.

1986David Patillo has spent two years working in his New York City studio developing several young artists. One artist he’s been working with, Cilla, is being described by people in the business as the new Sade.

1987Michael Boothroyd recently adapted and directed Stars in My Eyes, based on the poetry of Edward Field, which Michael says he discovered at Emerson. The show played at the Actors Movement Studio in NYC in September.

George Falkowski recently won a Garden State Asso-ciation of Black Journalists Award for TV Sports Report-ing and was nominated for a New York Emmy in Sports News. He has a new son, Michael Jesus Falkowski, born May 12.

Bill Geerhart has gotten divorced for a second time. He wants to give a ‘shout out’ to his trusted attorney and veteran best man, Charles O. Geerhart.

1988Joe Blumenfeld, a strategic public relations consultant, is opening a Tradewind Strate-gies office in Beijing.

Thomas Tate was married to Carolyn DesLaurier in June 2001 at Old Sturbridge Village in Sturbridge, Mass. Atten-dants included fellow Emer-sonians Fil Kovisars ’86, Fred Gendron ’86, Dan DesLaurier ’86 and Jennifer Reid DesLau-rier ’85. Thomas works at Keurig in Wakefield, Mass., as director of marketing.

1990Valerie Bijur Carlson, MA ’90, begins her seventh year of directing and teaching the-ater and English to Catholic high school girls, a job she loves. Valerie wants to give a ‘shout out’ to Teresa, Mark and Christine and would love to hear from Karen and Rick. She can be contacted at [email protected].

Michelle Kholos and husband Max Brooks announce the birth of their son, Henry Mi-chael, in March. Michelle has had two plays produced, Two Parents, Two Weddings, Two Years, at the Wings Theater in Manhattan’s Greenwich Vil-lage, and Allergic to Walnuts, at the Hollywood Court The-ater in Hollywood, Calif.

Suzanne Owens, MFA ’90, won the A. Poulin Jr. New Poets of America series prize for her book, The Daughters of Discorda (BOA Editions), which is about women crimi-nals. She placed first in the Strong RX Medicine contest, and second in the Anne Stan-ford award contest and has also won the Frank Cat Press Chapbook Award.

1991Diana (Kuhns) Barton has left Los Angeles and retired as production supervisor for the Academy Awards, the Em-mys and other variety/award shows, but she’s keeping a foot in the entertainment world on the East Coast. Last summer she was production supervisor for the Democratic and Republican conventions and she coordinated the 9/11 commemorative event at the World Trade Center site. Friends can write to: [email protected].

When husband Sean received an exciting opportunity in Taipei, Taiwan, Eileen Leahy Keohane left her job at Inc. magazine in Boston and joined him on a two-year adventure. They had “amaz-ing experiences.” Now back in the Boston area, Eileen works at Harvard Business School as director of the Global Initia-tive and is a new mom to son Sean Leahy.

Tom Misuraca was inter-viewed by MidnightTimes.com about his short story, “Friends of Dracula,” which they cited as “one of the best stories we’ve had the pleasure to publish.” Tom has pub-lished some 70 stories. His children’s book, The Mystery of the Messy Room, will be published this year.

Art Stewart ’82 is working toward his master’s degree in policy management at Georgetown University. In January he celebrated 12 years as head of his own strategy and communications management firm that is now based in Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia.

1983Christopher Santos has a new novel out, The Loves of a D-Girl (Plume, 2005).

1984James Ford Nussbaum was featured in the July issue of the New Jersey Jewish News for his work on a new documen-tary about ultimate Frisbee. He has also produced work for Harley Davidson Motorcycles for its regional campaign.

Christopher Palazini has joined Charlex Design, a visual effects and animation company based in Manhattan, as senior smoke editor/artist. One of his projects was the Visa CheckCard ad, which ran during the Super Bowl. Chris commutes to his job from Methuen, Mass.

Kenneth Pratt ’84 is living in Portsmouth, N.H., enjoy-ing the seacoast, writing and painting in all media. He can be spotted at local coffee-houses. Friends can write to: [email protected].

1985Maria D’Arcangelo-Lapides has launched ‘angel reten-tive,’ a professional organiz-ing company. She formerly managed the careers of Adam Sandler, Ellen DeGeneres, Lenny Clark and others. She is happily married to fellow alum Howard Lapides ’72 and has two children.

After many years directing theater in New York City, Jan (Murphy) Mason earned her M.F.A. degree in direct-ing from the University of Virginia in May and recently served as assistant director of August Wilson’s The Piano Lesson at Arena Stage in Wash-ington, D.C.

Paul Santinelli has joined North Bridge Venture Capital, an early-stage venture capital firm focused on technology investments. Paul lives on a ranch in Northern California with wife Siobhan. Friends can write to: [email protected].

1992Jennifer Mann Berman (Doc-tor Jenn) is on air Monday through Thursday nights from 10 p.m. to midnight on Star 98.7 in Los Angeles hosting a call-in advice show with deejay Bradley Wright.

Josh Fisher was promoted to vice president of creative af-fairs for Mike Young Produc-

Island in a 100-year-old house with wife Bernadette and their three children. Harry says new or recent grads who are plan-ning to work in New York can get in touch: [email protected].

1994Meghan Goldstein Chapman and husband Adam (“Adam 12” of WBCN) are pleased to announce the birth of Jacob Clifford Chapman. Meghan says they are deliriously sleep-deprived and loving it. She is taking a break from the 9-to-5 world to raise Jacob and build her personal coaching business.

Lesley Goldberg released her first EP at the famous Cherokee Studios with the Robb Brothers producing (Lemonheads, Steely Dan). She also shot her first TV pilot “Howz it Made?” based on her two-woman show called “Out Scouts” in which she and her co-star play wacky Girl Scouts who sing dirty campfire songs and play guitars.

Jen Deaderick ’94 says her daughter Rosie (10 months) will be walking any minute now. Although having a baby is keeping Jen busy she says she has also been teaching computer courses at the New England Institute of Art, where her boss is Debra Leahy ’94. With luck, she will finally get her short film edited this fall.

tions/Taffy Entertainment (Clifford the Big Red Dog, Pet Alien, ToddWorld, Jakers). He and wife Jen Klein are expecting their second child, who will be joining 2-year-old brother, Jake. Josh has also launched Urbaniacs.com, a “cool” superheroes site.

Paul Louis recently marked his 10th anniversary with the Norwood, N.J., branch of the Bank of New York. He was re-cently named teller manager. Paul is still living the single life and despite the events of last October he says he is still a diehard Yankees fan. Friends and WECB colleagues can write to [email protected].

Jay Mooney and Tracy Johnson Mooney moved from Santa Monica, Calif., to Chicago with their sons Zachary and Bryce. Jay has been promoted to sales manager-Midwest for Market Wire Inc. and will be leading the company’s sales efforts for the Midwest (U.S.) and central Canada.

1993Tracie DeJulio Michelson and Kevin Michelson ’95 have had a second child, Zachary Tyler, born in March. He joins his brother, Austin Matthew, 4. Tracie and Kevin live in West Palm Beach and are enjoying the family-oriented atmo-sphere. Kevin works for the Creative Directors advertising agency and Tracie loves being a stay-at-home mom. Friends can write to [email protected].

Chris Smalley, MA ’93, has been recording voiceovers for radio and TV commercials and independent movie trailers. He’s also developing his free-lance PR and video production business.

Harry Smith ’93 has been active in the New York theater scene, running his own scene shop and as a journeyman carpenter at the Metropolitan Opera, on Broadway, and now at Carnegie Hall. He lives on the South Shore of Long

Boom operator Patrick Martens ’98 often meets other Emerson alumni on the TV and movie sets on which he works. A new Showtime series, Sleeper Cell, employed a “whopping five graduates,” he reports. They got together for a group photo (from left): Lee Jordan ’01, Aimee McCue ’94, Patrick Martens, Jessica Lowrey ’02 and Rob Schulbaum ’04.

Sean Gorman ’99 has been touring throughout New England and New Jersey as a manager for Premier Wrestling Federation. He has worked in the past with Ricky ‘The Dragon’ Steamboat, The Sandman and Christopher Daniels.

Melanie Guerra moved back to Boston after living in the Rocky Mountains for 10 years. She has brought her jewelry design company with her. She would love to hear from other alums, especially in the Bos-ton area: [email protected].

Jeff Perino and Ashley (Yeo-mans) Perino are proud to announce the birth of their twins, Julia Rose and Wil-liam Robert, in July 2004. Big brother Michael is now 4. Jeff is creative director in pharmaceutical advertising for Sudler and Hennessey/Young & Rubicam and the family resides in Madison, N.J.

Mary Saliba, MFA ’94, has been named editor of The Baysider, a newspaper in the Lakes Region of New Hamp-shire. She remains editor-in-chief of the Granite State News in Wolfeboro. Mary has begun a “Book and Author” section and welcomes submissions from New England writers. She can be reached at [email protected].

Desi Washington was co-executive director of the Com-munity Art Center in Cam-bridge, Mass., for three years. He has moved to Providence, R.I., where he lives with wife Mwenya and son Dakarai. He is freelancing in video produc-tion and is in the process of starting a nonprofit group called Media Youth Television, for teenagers of Providence.

Jennifer White, MFA ’99, is happily residing in East Rochester, N.H., with husband Claude and daughters Chloe and Esther. She recently left her position as a high school English teacher and has been named Rochester’s first poet laureate. She is now writing the cultural plan for the city and, one of these days, hopes to write a book.

2000Valerie Diallo (Parker) orga-nized a world music event called Culture Fest in Lowell, Mass., in September via her organization, Second World.

Una Kwon, MA ’00, is an account director with Leo Burnett for Kellogg’s in Seoul, Korea. She recently starred in a reality show called Singles in Seoul III. Una says the

Scott Whittaker has had his first chapbook, Barleyhouse Letters, published by Finishing Line Press. The book, which has received great reviews, was named the publisher’s book of the month.

1996Patricia Murphy received the 2005 Edward R. Mur-row Award for Best Large Market Documentary from the Radio-Television News Directors Association for her long-form radio documentary on IV drug use, “Taming the Snake.” Patricia is a reporter and local host of NPR’s “All Things Considered” at KUOW in Seattle, Wash.

1997Paul Doiron, MFA ’97, has been named editor-in-chief of Down East, the monthly maga-zine celebrating the Maine way of life. While Paul was the magazine’s managing editor, he helped the circulation grow to more than 100,000.

Matt Schreiber and Flora John-stone ’98 live in New York City and were engaged in De-cember 2004. Matt has spent the last five years working as a casting director for theater, film and TV and is now per-forming on Broadway in the Tony Award-winning Avenue Q. Flora works in documen-tary and series development for MTV.

1998Chris Fernandez is father to Abigail Grace Fernandez, born in April.

Danielle Ledesma was work-ing at The Jane Pauley Show until its cancellation. She is now associate producer of Ride with Funkmaster Flex, a celeb-rity/pro-athlete car customiza-tion show that had its first two seasons on Spike TV and will be airing on ESPN this season.

1999Payal Kumar is broadcast director for KKJZ in Los Angeles. He will marry Ashwin Anand this fall. Many Emerson alums will be in at-tendance, including Matt ‘The Cat’ Baldassarri ’98 and for-mer WERS General Manager Fran Berger. Cindy Peters ’98 is producing an indie feature called Coffee

Date. On the set are (from left) Cindy Peters, director Stewart Wade, actress Sally Kirkland, actor Jonathan Bray, actor Jonathan Silverman, and ’80s pop icon Deborah Gibson.

program features women who pursue success and a career more than love or marriage.

Julia Maranan, MA ’00, is living in Malden with husband Dan and their new Lhasa Apso puppy. Julia freelances for many Boston-area publica-tions and websites.

Matthew McGovern, a script supervisor in L.A., recently celebrated the first anniversary of his web comic toptobottom.org, which is currently read in 25 countries. The comedic soap opera features the faces of several Emerson alumni.

Michelle Roberts is a com-munications officer at Boston University Medical Center and writes for the Center’s internal publications.

Eric Shapiro has written a sec-ond book, It’s Only Temporary (Permuted Press), which he calls “an apocalyptic novella.”

2001Tara DeRogatis is living in Los Angeles, building up a portfolio of black and white photography, oil paintings and numerous commercials, indie films and print model work. She is looking to team up with other Emersonians. She has

her SAG card and is interested in working on short films. Contact her at www.taradero-gatis.com.

Jon Gursha is working in radio as an account manager for KTIE (590 AM). He also represents KRLA (870 AM), KKLA (99.5 FM) and KFSH (99.9 FM) in L.A. He was a production assistant for many television shows, including Paradise Hotel (FOX), Celebrity Mole 1 &2 (ABC), Abby (UPN) and The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (NBC).

2002Heather Beard has graduated from the Maine College of Art with an M.F.A. in studio art and lives in Brooklyn, N.Y., where she works at Dance Theater Workshop.

Briana Guthrie, MFA ’02, was married on April 20 to Erik Senland in Great Falls, Va.

2003Jeanine Falinski and Rockiss Estrada were married in Sep-tember in Newark, N.J. (www.rockyandnini.com). Jeanine says she met Rockiss in the fall of 2001 at Kasteel Well and have been together ever since. They live in Jersey City.

Morag MacLachlan was one of 12 electronic journalists to travel to Germany and Brussels last summer as part of the RIAS Berlin Commis-sion and Radio-Television News Directors Association German-American Journalists Exchange Program. He is the first reporter in the history of his station, WAGM-TV in Presque Isle, Maine, to be chosen.

Amanda Monteiro is moving up the ladder in the fashion world. After being recruited as an assistant buyer for French Connection she was recruited by Giorgio Armani. She travels several times a year to Milan and says she owes her success to Emerson’s Rafael Jaen, who always encouraged her to “fol-low your dreams regardless of what others think.”

Bradley Smith (who uses the pen name Brad Chanska) was featured in a story in the Johnson City (Tenn.) Press about his comic book series, Boom Comix. In addition, Brad toured in a Shakespeare troupe this year.

Josh Zagoren’s production, Real Aural Talent, was per-formed at the Conservatory Theatre in Chicago. Emerson alumnus Tom Sigsby was director and alumnus Danny O’Connor played the lead. Josh joined the conservatory company of Second City last year.

2004Jeff DePaoli has been putting the finishing touches on a project he began at Emerson: an independent talk show, The Jeff DePaoli Show. You can view it at www.JeffShow.com. Jeff interviews celebri-ties to gain insight about the professional entertainment world, along with having lots of laughs, he says.

Emma Donoghue is production manager of Opera Boston and is happily living with her boyfriend in Jamaica Plain.

Jayk Gallagher has moved to L.A. to pursue his acting career. He recently appeared

Bradley Grill ’03 handles all the marketing and public relations for Debra Brown, principal choreographer from Cirque du Soleil. He also works alongside Barry Garber, “one of the world’s most renowned agent/managers.” Friends can write to: [email protected].

Sara Lavoie ’04 braves a Nor’easter in Marshfield, Mass., to interview Michael Maresco, a town selectman and assistant secretary of state.

Kimberly Ratner-Miller ’03 is performing as Leah (the bride) in the off-Broadway production of A Match Made in Manhattan every Monday night at the Center for Jewish Discovery in New York City.

on E! Networks’ My Crazy Life and reports that he has signed a five-year deal with MTV Networks to appear in a series of short films and wireless content as a disembodied head.

Martha Koster has been appointed to the Massachusetts Legal Assistance Corporation for a five-year term as un-paid director of qualified legal service programs. The Massachusetts Legal Assistance Corporation provides financial support to legal assistance programs for persons involved in civil legal matters who cannot afford legal representation.

Nicholas Lapolla has been working on several independent films in Boston. He’s always looking to involve Emerson graduates or students in his work. He’s at [email protected].

Upon graduation Mike Navin worked for WCVB-TV, then was hired by WMTW-TV, the ABC affiliate in Portland, Maine, as a newscast director. He is directing the morning show and the noon show.

2005Breton Ingraham has started a job as marketing promotions manager for MPRM. The company is based in Beverly Hills. Breton is living in North Hollywood and says his Emerson internship and hard work paid off with this job offer.

Where Are YouAnd What are You Doing

New job? Received an award? Recently engaged or married? New baby? Moving? Recently ran into a long-lost classmate? Let us know. Use this form to submit your news or send it to [email protected]; 1-800-255-4259; fax: 1-617-824-7807. You can also submit Class Notes online at www.emerson.edu/alumni.

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Mail to: Class Notes, Emerson College, Office of Alumni Relations, 120 Boylston St., Boston, MA 02116-4624

Happy Birthday to a Unique and Venerable Boston Institution

My Turn

By Thomas M. Menino Mayor of the City of Boston

One of the many things that makes Boston a truly world-class city is its rich array of colleges and universi-ties – some 34 of them at last count within the city limits and another 40 or so located nearby.

Educationally, culturally and economically, Boston derives many benefits from the students, faculty and alumni of local institutions who live,

work, volunteer and raise families here. As The Boston Foundation has noted, higher education in Boston generates billions of dollars in purchases of goods and services and thousands of jobs. And it is no coincidence that some of the world’s leading medical, cultural, technological and financial services institutions are located in Boston.

Within this context I want to pay special tribute to Emerson College, a unique and venerable Boston institu-tion that celebrates its 125th anniversary this year.

Literally and figuratively, Emer-son has come a long way since it was founded in 1880. Literally, it has moved from Pemberton Square to Huntington Avenue to the Back Bay, and, finally, to the Theatre District, where it has created a magnificent new campus. Figuratively, it has transformed itself from a small, local school of oratory to a multifaceted and internationally recognized college of communication and the arts enrolling nearly 4,000 stu-dents from 48 states and several dozen countries.

Emerson’s impact on the commu-nication and entertainment industries is profound. Tune your television to any channel and you’ll see Emerson alumni like Jay Leno, Denis Leary, Ed Hard-ing, Pam Cross, Gene Lavanchy, and numerous others at work. You’ll also see shows like Friends, Will and Grace and America’s Funniest Home Videos that were created and are produced by Emersonians.

The College’s impact on the city of Boston during my tenure as mayor, which coincides with that of Emer-son President Jacqueline Liebergott, has been equally profound. From the outset, we have formed a partnership that has worked to the benefit of all concerned.

Emerson’s decision to relocate to what was then a rundown area was a visionary step that reflected faith in the future of downtown Boston. It was also a bold move for a financially strapped institution trapped inside charming Back Bay brownstone buildings that could not be adapted or expanded to meet the needs of a modern college. The situation had become so desperate back in the 1980s that Emerson consid-ered moving its campus to suburban locations 20 miles from Boston. Fortu-nately for Emerson and for Boston, that did not happen.

The results of Emerson’s move to the Theatre District – from the purchase and renovation of the Ansin, Little, Walker and Union Bank build-ings; to the restoration of the land-mark Cutler Majestic Theatre, where I have delivered two State of the City addresses; to the construction of the magnificent Tufte Performance and Production Center and the soon-to-be-completed Piano Row residence hall and campus center – are stunning. So, too, is the impact that this investment and infusion of human capital has had in rejuvenating the Theatre District and sparking private investment in the adjoining Lower Washington Street neighborhood.

And there is more to come. Em-erson will begin work soon on a new Paramount Center complex that will in-clude a renovated Paramount Theatre, a residence hall and a performance development building.

In closing I congratulate Emer-son College on its 125th anniversary and commend the leadership that has been demonstrated by President Liebergott, Vice President for Administration and Finance Robert Silverman and Trustee Chairman Ted Cutler.

Profile

Extreme Explorer Kira Salak ’93 writes about the danger– and wonder – of her solo travels around the world

make a terrifying escape. Four Corners chronicles this experience as well as a harrowing trip into Papua New Guinea, where she traversed the island from south to north, by boat and on foot. The threats of violence and danger were ever-present.

What motivates her? “Ever since I was a child, when someone tells me I can’t do something…I just eat that up.”

She downplays the attention she draws as a woman alone. “It’s a percep-tion of women being more fragile than men. Male editors are very hesitant to send me on certain stories. I find that frustrating,” she sighs. “I don’t have any problem being in dumpy rooms with cockroaches crawling over me.”

But travel for Salak is not just about fear and discomfort. The beauty of the people she meets and the lands

she roams often strike her. “The joy I get is the communion with the local people, like the Berber women in Libya. We had no common language but we smiled and connected with each other.”

In between trips, Salak, a former college track star, keeps in shape by lifting free weights and riding a bike.

While earning her B.F.A. at Emerson, she encountered several teachers who fanned the flames of her creativity, among them Jonathan Aaron and Barbara Beckwith. Salak also holds a Ph.D. in English literature and creative writing from the University of Missouri in Columbia.

Salak has no idea where she will travel next. “It can be sort of spontane-ous,” she says. “The journey finds us.”

– Rhea Becker

“This is the year for visiting totali-tarian, insanely oppressive regimes,” Kira Salak ’93 recently said upon returning home from an assignment in Burma. Accompanied 24 hours a day by a ‘government minder’, she had no access to a telephone or email the entire time. “It was two months of constant fear.” Before that, she’d spent time in Libya, whose borders were closed to Americans for many years.

Salak has made a life of going places few have gone before. Not only that, she usually goes alone. “I’ve al-ways had an overwhelming curiosity to see parts of the world that are unfamil-iar and undocumented,” she says.

Her trips to remote spots have re-sulted in two books – Four Corners: Into the Heart of New Guinea, One Woman’s Solo Journey (National Geographic Books) and The Cruelest Journey: Six Hundred Miles To Timbuktu (National Geographic Books) – and a rising pro-file as an intrepid traveler with a talent for documenting the travails and joys of her unusual treks. This year Salak was named an “Emerging Explorer” by the National Geographic Society, which fea-tured her on its website and cable chan-nel. The New York Times has dubbed her a “real-life Lara Croft.” And her ac-count of the civil war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and its effect on the country’s mountain gorillas won her the prestigious 2004 PEN Award in Journalism. Salak is a contributing editor for National Geographic Adventure magazine.

Salak made her first solo trip at the age of 19. At 20, she was back-packing through Mozambique dur-ing its brutal civil war, when she was kidnapped by soldiers and forced to

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Emerson College’s Huret and Spector Gallery hosted the U.S premiere of a unique and award-winning exhibition, “Saving Faces,” a collection of before-and-after painted portraits of individuals who

have undergone reconstructive surgery to correct facial deformities in Britain. Financial support for the exhibition and the event was provided by the Norman Knight Charitable Foundation. Knight, artist Gilbert and surgeon Dr. Iain Hutchison (above, center), and nearly 100 invited guests attended a viewing and reception. (Above, left) Artist Mark

Gilbert (left) discusses his work with Norman Knight. Those in attendance included Henry and Lois Foster ’49 (above, right), noted Boston art patrons who have endowed a chair in contemporary art at Emerson.

Exploring the Healing Power of Art

to keep the tradition aliveBecause it’s important

Why Emerson College?

If you had told Julie Coulter ’81 she would become a successful insurance executive when she enrolled as a theater arts student at Emerson in 1977, she’d have said you were crazy. Nevertheless, that’s what has happened – but with a twist. Her clients are performing artists.

Coulter has worked for several insurance companies and co-owned a firm that specialized in coverage for musicians for seven years. Today, she is senior vice president of MusicPro Insurance Agency, a joint venture of Manhattan-based ASCAP (American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers) and Sterling & Sterling Inc., a Long Island insurance company.

“When I was three I knew that I would be an actress when I grew up,” Coulter says. “So when I graduated from high school I applied to several colleges with acting programs. Emerson was at the top of the list.”

For information about the Annual Fund and other giftopportunities, please contact: Carolyn Jasinski,associate director of annual giving, Emerson College,120 Boylston St., Boston, MA 02116-4624; 617 824-8561.Visit www.emerson.edu/alumni/ and click “Giving.”

Julie Coulter ’81

Coulter performed in several Emerson productions and worked on the technical side as well. “I loved theater,” she recalls, “but I didn’t sing or dance. My options were limited, so I decided to pursue other fields.”

At the suggestion of her father, whom she describes as “a pioneer in providing insurance for musicians,” she had taken insurance courses during her student days. She became licensed after graduation and went to work for her father before going off on her own.

Coulter contributes regularly to Emerson’s Annual Fund because “Emerson helped me become who I am. It taught me how to get on a stage, and it taught me how to deal with the public. Emerson is a very special place. It accepts individuals for who they are. By supporting the Annual Fund, I am helping to keep the Emerson tradition alive.”

Exploring the Healing Power of Art

Emerson College120 Boylston StreetBoston, Massachusetts02116-4624

Nonprofit OrganizationU.S. Postage PaidBurlington, VT 05401Permit Number 4

GOING TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTHKira Salak ’93 makes it a habit to venture to some of the most dangerous places on earth. This intrepid traveler/author has penned two books about her experiences. See story inside.

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Expression Fall 2005

Documents

Transcript of Expression Fall 2005