Been away for a while, I'm back, promoting Actorfest

14th Annual ACTORFEST® NEW YORK, an actors' tradeshow

Back Stage®
Presents the 14th Annual
ACTORFEST® NEW YORK
An Actors’ Tradeshow
www.backstage.com/actorfestny
October 29, 2005
9am – 5pm
New York Marriot Marquis
1535 Broadway

ACTORFEST® NEW YORK extends our deepest sympathy and concern for the many people impacted by Hurricane Katrina.

New York, NY (August 31, 2005) – ACTORFEST® NEW YORK 2005 is an opportunity for actors to PROACTIVELY improve their career. ACTORFEST®, “a trade fair for actors and actresses” (New York Times) is the country’s most significant conference dedicated to bringing together the business’s most influential agents, casting directors, managers, producers and directors with actors.

ACTORFEST® is an opportunity for actors, from across the country, to learn from experts, essential career planning in regards to film, TV, theatre and other performing arts disciplines. Career Seminars, moderated by an entertainment industry professional, include Auditioning for Film & Television: Warming Up to Cold Readings; Switch Hitters: Actors Who Work Both Stage and Screen; Pursuing the Indie Film Scene: The Actor’s Angle. Attendees can interact with agents, casting directors, managers and niche professionals in Focus Sessions such as Be a Smart Actor; Getting an Agent: You Have a Say in the Matter; Stage & Screen Auditions: Insights & Tips; The How’s, Why’s, and When’s of Joining the Unions; Making It in Voice-Overs; How to Prepare for a Sitcom Audition; Breaking Into Daytime Drama; How to Make a Positive Impression with a Casting Director.

The Free Exhibit Hall, a place for actors to mingle and network, consists of over 90 booths of industry professionals from all aspects of the business from acting services and coaches to web development.

A portion of the proceeds from ACTORFEST® go to Adopt-a-School, a joint program with Inside Broadway™, Broadway’s Not-for-Profit Educational Organization. This program was initiated, by ACTORFEST®, four years ago to support New York City’s public school children by promoting arts in education and building relationships between individuals, groups, corporations and their local communities.

ACTORFEST® (www.backstage.com/actorfestny)
When: Saturday, October 29 from 9am - 5pm
Where: New York Marriott Marquis (Times Square, 1535 Broadway, 5th floor).
Cost: The Exhibit Hall is FREE and open to anyone. A package of classes is $45 and includes one Career Seminar and one Focus Session.
Registration and Information: www.backstage.com/actorfestny, 646.654.5706, actorfest@backstage.com.

Back Stage, the industry’s foremost informational business resource for the aspiring and established actor, is proud to present this unique event, which provides career resources and encourages career development for individuals pursuing the performing arts.

Sponsors: FOCUS FEATURES, National Sponsor; JETBLUE AIRWAYS®, Gold Sponsor; PROCTER & GAMBLE PRODUCTIONS, producers of As The World Turns and Guiding Light, Silver Sponsor; INSIDE BROADWAY™, Benefit Sponsor.

FOR MORE INFORMATION: PLEASE VISIT OUR WEBSITE AT www.backstage.com/actorfestny. ACTORFEST® New York is produced by actor/producer Jeff Riebe, the Career Seminars and Focus Sessions are produced by Back Stage Editor-in-Chief Sherry Eaker. They can be reached at 646.654.5706, actorfest@backstage.com. Press contact is Katie Rosin, Kampfire Films Marketing and Public Relations, 917-562-5670 or krosin@kampfirefilms.com.

# # #

News from Groove With Me:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 12, 2005

GROOVE WITH ME
Free Dance School Summer Recital
Girls Discover Their Own Self Worth

New York, NY: East Harlem’s free dance school Groove With Me presents the summer program on Monday August 15th at 6:30 pm in Central Park’s Harlem Meer – entrance 110th and 5th. Seventy girls will take the stage to display vast improvements in jazz, hip hop, ballet and Afro-Cuban. Most importantly they will demonstrate an increased sense of self and self confidence.

Groove With Me’s mission is to engage girls with free and accessible dance classes, as an alternative to negative behavior and to prevent destructive choices by building self-esteem and other achievement skills. The summer program collaborates with the Association to Benefit Children’s Echo Park Summer Program, to give girls (and their counselors) a respite from the pool and arts-n-crafts. Many teenagers come every afternoon for two hours, receiving intensive dance training in different styles, and developing friendships and belonging.

One class explored self identity from more angles than dance alone. The “Who Am I?” curriculum utilizes drama exercises, journaling, spoken word, poetry, video portraits, photo portraits, and discussion to further explore the girls’ self image. This summer the focus was on images of women in hip hop lyrics and videos. The intention of the instructors was to spark ideas of ways the girls could protect themselves from absorbing and believing the messages – that women are for sex alone, that money is the most important thing, that women can be bought, that men can talk to women a certain way. Remarkably the girls were ready to take it one step further and change the way things are now! They have created a video with their thoughts as voice over to send to the music video t.v. stations.

Groove With Me, Inc., founded in 1996 by Abigail Rosin, began with two students at Loisaida, Inc., a community center on the Lower East Side. In 2001 it acquired its own dance studio in Spanish Harlem and quadrupled to serve 160 children. With a social worker Program Director at the helm today it serves 220 girls a year with 21 volunteer teachers.

This fall Groove With Me will be honored by The Harlequin More Than Words Award, a segment on CBS’s new show Real Simple, and a workshop in the studio by Savion Glover.

For more information, visit www.groovewithme.org or contact Abigail Rosin at 917-514-7171.

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To quote Jeremy Pepper "I'm semi famous now, in a blog"

http://www.allbusiness.com/blog/ThePRBlog/4167/002974.html

An exerpt:

"Now, I am biased toward The Gift List - I have used it, and it has proven its worth to me by landing articles in publications I would have not likely had found, or thought of, to pitch clients and clients' products. But, I also knew of a colleague who had been contemplating using The Gift List and I kept bugging her telling her that she needed to get it.

So, I pinged Katherine Rosin from Kampfire PR. Rosin specializes in entertainment publicity and consumer goods - and was looking at The Gift List for one of her clients.

Via an IM interview the other day ...

Me: you're the one that got gift list media, right?
Rosin: yes
Me: you liking it?
Rosin: yes, it’s fabulous!
Me: cool
Rosin: the list is a great help...as there are some deluxe consumer interest items on there - those who want high end products.

Plus, in talking with Rosin today - after using The Gift List for a week - she's landed a hit in a top women's health publication."

Thanks Jeremy!

In addition, some PR brags:

OUR NAME IS MUD:

August Gift Basket Review: The cover had our thankful oval platter.

August Giftware News Baby & Kids: Reasons to Party featured our DIY Birthday Plate

Gift & Dec Newswire:

Our Name Is Mud Sells Retail Stores
New York — Ceramic and pottery wholesaler Our Name is Mud sold three of its Manhattan-based, do-it-yourself pottery stores to the private equity firm Goode Partners. Our Name Is Mud owners Lorrie and Kip Veasey, and partner John Nelson, will concentrate on the wholesale market while maintaining the company’s fourth retail location, at Grand Central Terminal, in order to test consumer reaction to new product. Launched in 1995, the retail outlets, while successful, were “very customer intensive,” according to Kip Veasey. “We didn’t see doing it long-term.” Veasey also noted that Goode Partners sees an opportunity investing in craft, paint-your-own pottery, and other, mostly independent, children’s entertainment outlets. Goode Partners previously invested in The Children’s Place clothing stores and Tommy Bahama, before taking them public.

News from my client OUR NAME IS MUD

Media Alert: Corporate News From Our Name Is Mud

For Immediate Release:
August 1, 2005

OUR NAME IS MUD is pleased to announce the acquisition of their do-it-yourself contemporary pottery studios by Goode Partners. The stores allow customers the opportunity to create their own functional ceramics and regularly host children’s birthday parties, corporate teambuilding events, adult nights and other organized outings. OUR NAME IS MUD caters primarily to children ages five and up and their parents, as well as artistic adults.

OUR NAME IS MUD launched its flagship store on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in 1995. Based upon its overwhelming success, the company quickly expanded to include three additional retail outlets. OUR NAME IS MUD became an innovator in this $400 million dollar industry and served as a model for other contemporary pottery studios throughout the country.

OUR NAME IS MUD will retain its name and its Grand Central Terminal gallery location, which the company will continue to use as a testing ground for new product. Former owners Lorrie & Kip Veasey, and partner John Nelsen, look forward to the opportunity this provides for growth and expansion of their wholesale line of finished ceramics.

For More Information: Please conact Katie Rosin, Director of Media Relations, OUR NAME IS MUD, 212-849-8210 or katie@ournameismud.com

Infamous Party Crasher at my event...

The infamous New York City Party crasher, SHAGGY, crashed my clients performance and reception last night. (FYI the performance was a huge success the we had 120-130 both nights in a 150 house!!!) The worse part of it all was that Chris Wilson (co-writer at Page six) was the one who pointed him out to me—as I had NO CLUE...if someone tells me he’s press, hey, I let them in. There was another guy there who seemed to be with Shaggy who also was a crasher, again Wilson pointed him out to me. What was I to do? It was too late for me to kick him out although I hear he has been kicked out of plenty of movie premieres lately. I’ve attached some funny articles on him:

http://nichellenewsletter.typepad.com/newsletter/2005/01/
bust_a_move.html

http://www.bizbash.com/newsletter/issue199.html

http://sfindependent.com/article/index.cfm/i/111003c_scoop

http://archive.salon.com/mwt/feature/2005/02/16/dog_show/
index_np.html

http://www.gawker.com/news/culture/stalker/
gawker-stalker-david-beckham-to-name-child-dumbo-106563.php

Testing, one...two...(don't have time to say three)...

Today starts out as a good day, with a listing in the New York Times, for Von Ussar... wait, I take that back... The prices are wrong??? Not even what was in the press kit, where did that $25 price come from?

Dance Listings

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

Published: July 8, 2005

VON USSAR DANCEWORKS (Through Sunday) A choreographer from Slovenia explores themes of personal perseverance. Tomorrow at 8 p.m., Sunday at 7 p.m., Citigroup Theater, Joan Weill Center for Dance, 405 West 55th Street, Midtown, (917) 363-4229 $30, performance with reception, $15 performance only, $25 students and 65+, tomorrow; $15, $12 students and 65+, Sunday (Anderson)