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David Rothenberg: From Broadway to Jailbird Benefactor
| Article
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14246 |
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Section : |
LIFE
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| Issue
Date : |
7 / 1988 |
2,840 Words |
| Author
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Steven Kaplan
Steven Kaplan is a widely published writer living in St. Paul,
Minnesota, and a contributing editor of St. Paul magazine. |
Why did David Rothenberg, successful Broadway producer/publicist, give up the glittering company of theater stars to be with former murderers, drug addicts, and other assorted criminals? After all, he had been at the pinnacle of success: He was the publicist for the biggest stars on Broadway, including Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, John Gielgud, and Julie Harris; his plays include such successful productions as Hair, Burton's Hamlet, and The Boys in the Band.
But the real-life drama he chose is impacting the lives of generations of ex-cons. He is the founder of the Fortune Society, which provides former prisoners with vocational rehabilitation, counseling, and employment assistance. When adults and juveniles come to his office, they find fellowship with peers and information from counselors that they can trust. His volunteer staff of over one hundred people is available to tutor the one out of every two ex-cons who leave prison as they entered it--totally illiterate. How did this upwardly mobile young man become so vital to the outcasts of society?
In the fifties, when he was barely in his twenties, Rothenberg came to New York from neighboring New Jersey, looking for any job he could find. He answered an ad for a public relations assistant and began cranking out press releases, working twelve hours a day, six days a week, for sixty-five dollars a week. His willingness to work hard and his ability to work smart caught the attention of a successive hierarchy of theatrical publicists. One day, he was approached by Alexander Cohen, the best and most famous in the business. Cohen produces the Emmy and the Tony shows each year, and he is not a man to whom people say no. When he asked Rothenberg to sign on with him as his assistant, David said no.
"I didn't feel I was ready to take all that on," he says. "I had only been doing this for two years. Later he told me that by turning him down, he was determined to get me, no matter what. For the next year he wooed me, until I finally joined his organization."
In the Fast Lane
At Cohen's office, Rothenberg ascended with Cohen's stars. He began hanging around celebrities ("they were hanging out with me, as well") and was becoming a celebrity in his own right. But at the very summit of his career, the Broadway opening of Richard Burton's Hamlet, Rothenberg decided to drop out of it
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