Susan L. Schulman Dies: Longtime Broadway Publicist Worked With Lauren Bacall, Vanessa Redgrave & Katharine Hepburn

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Susan L. Schulman, a longtime Broadway publicist whose five-decade career included such theater milestones as Applause starring Lauren Bacall, Death of a Salesman with George C. Scott and Bob Fosse’s Dancin’, died Wednesday, October 18, at Mt. Sinai West Hospital in New York City following a brief illness.

Her death was announced by friends Leslie Krakowe, actor Kathleen Chalfant and Roy Bernstein. Her age was not immediately available.

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A member of the theatrical union ATPAM (Association of Theatrical Press Agents and Managers) since 1973, Schulman, a New York native, opened her own theatrical Times Square press office in 1978, with early clients including Jack Gilford, Manhattan Theatre Club, Joffrey Ballet, and Garrison Keillor.

Over the years she would take on clients from Broadway, Off Broadway, dance, film, TV and books. A small Broadway sampling: Requiem For A Heavyweight (with John Lithgow and George Segal), City Of Angels, Death And The Maiden with Glenn Close, Richard Dreyfus and Gene Hackman, A Streetcar Named Desire starring Jessica Lange and Alec Baldwin, and The Madwoman of Chaillot with Kim Hunter and Anne Jackson.

Throughout her career, Schulman also represented a wide spectrum of actors and performers, including Chalfant, Karen Ziemba, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Karen Mason, Karen Akers, Guiding Light star Ron Raines, Carol Lawrence and Pia Zadora, among others.

Early in her career, she worked at WNET/Channel 13, handling publicity for the original The Forsyte Saga and the landmark cinema verite series An American Family. During a stint at United Artists, she worked on campaigns for Last Tango in Paris, among other films.

Schulman recounted her long career in the 2013 memoir Backstage Pass to Broadway, updated several years later with the subtitle “More True Tales From A Theatre Press Agent.” The book includes anecdotes about working with Bacall, Fosse, Mary Martin, Robert Redford, David Merrick, Raul Julia, Zero Mostel, Vanessa Redgrave, Katharine Hepburn, Diana Ross and Henry Winkler, among others.

Winkler, the Happy Days and Barry star, was among the clients that provided blurbs for the book: “Take this backstage tour from an insider who lived it,” he wrote. “Like Susan, this book is smart and funny.”

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