Jeff Lunden
Jeff Lunden is a freelance arts reporter and producer whose stories have been heard on NPR's Morning Edition, All Things Considered and Weekend Edition, as well as on other public radio programs.
Lunden contributed several segments to the Peabody Award-winning series The NPR 100, and was producer of the NPR Music series Discoveries at Walt Disney Concert Hall, hosted by Renee Montagne. He has produced more than a dozen documentaries on musical theater and Tin Pan Alley for NPR — most recently A Place for Us: Fifty Years of West Side Story.
Other documentaries have profiled George and Ira Gershwin, Stephen Sondheim, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein, Lorenz Hart, Harold Arlen and Jule Styne. Lunden has won several awards, including the Gold Medal from the New York Festival International Radio Broadcasting Awards and a CPB Award.
Lunden is also a theater composer. He wrote the score for the musical adaptation of Arthur Kopit's Wings (book and lyrics by Arthur Perlman), which won the 1994 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Musical. Other works include Another Midsummer Night, Once on a Summer's Day and adaptations of The Little Prince and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn for Theatreworks/USA.
Lunden is currently working with Perlman on an adaptation of Swift as Desire, a novel of magic realism from Like Water for Chocolate author Laura Esquivel. He lives in Brooklyn, N.Y.
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The 6-year-old children's book character struck a chord when she debuted in the 1950s. Now a new exhibition shines a light on how Eloise came to be. -
The class-action suit brought against the hit musical doesn't seek damages. The attorneys say the hope is to draw attention to Broadway's spotty record in serving audiences with disabilities.
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Saariaho isn't the first woman composer to stage an opera at New York's Metropolitan Opera — just the first in more than a century. Her opera, L'Amour de Loin, has its New York premiere this week. -
You might not know Marni Nixon's name, but you've probably heard her. Nixon dubbed the voices for Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady, Natalie Wood in West Side Story and Deborah Kerr in The King and I. -
Every year, NPR's Jeff Lunden talks to some of the hardworking people in the theater biz who aren't eligible for Tony nominations. -
For one 14-year-old fan, BroadwayCon was a chance to meet people who understand her theater obsession. "We can share what we love," she says. -
The Masters of Sex actress is no stranger to Broadway; in fact, she's already won a Tony. Now she's in her first starring role, in Sylvia — and prepping by watching her pet, because she plays a dog. -
This year, several writers are up for Tony awards for the first time. But while the experience may be a time to celebrate, they're sticking to their day jobs and already eyeing the next project. -
"Our paths haven't crossed — we've beaten a path towards each other," says playwright David Hare. "Bill is my favorite leading man." Nighy is now starring in a revival of Hare's Skylight on Broadway. -
The off-Broadway play Every Brilliant Thing tackles its dark subject through audience participation and comedy. Both critics and audience members have described it as incredibly moving.
