The Theater Development Fund (TDF) is a non-profit corporation dedicated to assisting the theatre industry in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

. Created in 1968 to help an ailing New York theatre industry, TDF has grown into the nation's largest performing arts nonprofit, providing support to more than 900 plays and musicals and returning upwards of $1.5 billion in revenue to thousands of Broadway

Broadway theatre

Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...

, Off-Broadway

Off-Broadway

Off-Broadway theater is a term for a professional venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, and for a specific production of a play, musical or revue that appears in such a venue, and which adheres to related trade union and other contracts...

 and off Off-Broadway music and dance productions.

Theatre Development Fund (TDF) was created with the conviction that the live theatrical arts afford a unique expression of the human condition that must be sustained and nurtured. TDF’s twofold mission is to identify and provide support, including financial assistance, to theatrical works of artistic merit, and to encourage and enable diverse audiences to attend live theatre and dance in all their venues.

TDF accomplishes their mission through several programs. The TKTS

TKTS

The TKTS ticket booths in New York and London sell Broadway and Off-Broadway shows, music and dance events and West End theatre tickets, respectively, at discounts of 25–50% off the face value.-New York:...

 Booth in Times Square is the most visible of all programs. TDF has several programs that helps strengthen their mission including TDF Accessibility Program (TAP), Education Programs, Ticketing Programs and The Costume Collection.

TDF Accessibility Program (TAP)

TDF Accessibility Programs, also known as TAP, is Theatre Development Fund’s invitation to theatergoers with physical disabilities. TAP arranges for special discount tickets in the orchestra to be made available to individuals who are hard of hearing or deaf, partially sighted, blind, require aisle seating for medical reasons, use wheelchairs or cannot climb stairs.

Access for Young Audiences

Access for Young Audiences, TAP’s Arts-in-Education program, offers tri-State elementary and secondary school students the opportunity to attend accessible Broadway performances. For these mostly first-time theatregoers who are hard of hearing or deaf, TDF simultaneously provides sign language interpreting and open captioning. In 2008, TAP launched a pilot program for students who have low vision or are blind, whereby audio description is provided. These programs are offered free of cost to the school. This school year, TDF’s Access for Young Audiences reached students from 35 schools in the tri-State area.

Open captioning performances

TAP Open captioning performances provide the audience with an electronic text display to the side of the stage displaying what the actors are saying or singing in real time. The display also describes sound effects on stage. TDF open captions several Broadway and Off Broadway shows each month for people with mild to severe hearing loss.

Sign language interpreting performances

TAP Sign language interpreting performances provides the audience with an interpreter who uses American Sign Language to describe what the actors are saying or singing, as well as sound effects on stage. TDF interprets bi-month signed performances of Broadway shows.

Interpreting for the Theatre

Interpreting for the Theatre, a one-week intensive workshop, held at The Juilliard School

Juilliard School

The Juilliard School, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City, United States, is a performing arts conservatory which was established in 1905...

, was founded in 1998 to raise the level of expertise for theatrical sign interpreters from across the United States. Participants, many of whom interpret Broadway road shows in their local cities, have the opportunity to translate, rehearse and participate in the signing of a Broadway show as a final project.

Educational Programs

It is TDF’s belief that future audiences are built by engaging students, first-hand, in the vital and exciting activity of the creative process, as well as providing opportunities to attend live performances of great theatre.

Stage Doors

‎Stage Doors, TDF’s largest arts education program, provides students with an in-depth introduction to live theatre. Each class attends a Broadway or Off Broadway performance and participates in eight in-class workshops that include scene writing, improvisation, etc., which serves as preparation for their theatregoing experience. This year, Stage Doors serves 6,000 students in 65 schools.

Open Doors

Open Doors, TDF’s theatre arts mentoring program, started in 1998 by Tony Award-winning and Pulitzer prize-winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein

Wendy Wasserstein

Wendy Wasserstein was an American playwright and an Andrew Dickson White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University...

, offers small groups of high school students an in-depth introduction to live theatre and dance. Each group works with one or more dedicated theatre and dance professionals throughout the school year. Mentors include Kathleen Chalfant

Kathleen Chalfant

-Life and career:Chalfant was born as in San Francisco, California and raised in her parents' boarding house in Oakland. Her father, William Bishop, was an officer in the Coast Guard...

, Kirsten Childs, Graciela Daniele

Graciela Daniele

Graciela Daniele is an Argentine-American dancer, choreographer, and theatre director.-Biography:Born at Buenos Aires, Daniele began her dance training at the age of seven at Teatro Colón, Argentina's equivalent of Moscow's Bolshoi Theatre...

, Scott Ellis

Scott Ellis

Scott Ellis is an American stage director and television director.-Biography:Ellis has directed numerous Off-Broadway and Broadway productions, including the New York City Opera Company revivals at the New York State Theatre: A Little Night Music and 110 in the Shade up to his current show, the...

, William Finn

William Finn

William Alan Finn is an American composer and lyricist of musicals. His musical Falsettos received the 1992 Tony Awards for Best Music and Lyrics and for Best Book.-Biography:...

, David Henry Hwang

David Henry Hwang

David Henry Hwang is an American playwright who has risen to prominence as the preeminent Asian American dramatist in the U.S.He was born in Los Angeles, California and was educated at the Yale School of Drama and Stanford University...

, James Lapine

James Lapine

James Lapine is an American stage director and librettist. He has won the Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical three times, for Into the Woods, Falsettos, and Passion. He has frequently collaborated with Stephen Sondheim and William Finn.-Biography:Lapine was born in Mansfield, Ohio and graduated...

, Lar Lubovitch

Lar Lubovitch

Lar Lubovitch is an American choreographer and founded his own dance company, the Lar Lubovitch Dance Company in 1968. Based in New York City, he and the company have toured worldwide....

, Frank Rich

Frank Rich

Frank Rich is an American essayist and op-ed columnist who wrote for The New York Times from 1980, when he was appointed its chief theatre critic, until 2011...

 and Mo Rocca

Mo Rocca

Maurice Alberto "Mo" Rocca is an American writer, comedian and political satirist.-Early life and work:...

.

Residency Arts Project (RAP)

Residency Arts Project (RAP), is TDF’s intensive playwriting program that brings teaching artists into the classroom to guide students in writing original scenes and plays. The students' work is then given a public staged reading by professional actors at the end of the school year. This year, RAP served 400 students in 6 New York City high schools.

Play by Play

Play by Play, is New York City’s only theatre magazine written by teens, for teens. Students write features, reviews and interviews about what’s hot on and Off Broadway. It is published quarterly and is distributed free of charge to students, teachers and the arts-in-education and theatre communities. Play by Play’s circulation has reached over 60,000 per issue. It is distributed throughout New York City, New Jersey and select locations throughout the United States and available online at www.playbyplayonline.orghttp://www.playbyplayonline.org.

Ticketing Programs

TDF's discount ticket services are at the core of everything they do—making theatre, music and dance affordable and accessible to more than 2 million people each year.

TKTS Discount Booths

TKTS

TKTS

The TKTS ticket booths in New York and London sell Broadway and Off-Broadway shows, music and dance events and West End theatre tickets, respectively, at discounts of 25–50% off the face value.-New York:...

 Discount Booths offer tickets to Broadway and Off Broadway musicals and plays at discounts up to 50% off full price tickets. Since the opening of the original Times Square TKTS Booth on June 25, 1973, over 51 million tickets have been sold representing $1.38 billion dollars in revenue returned to thousands of theatre, dance and music productions. This past October, TDF opened its new TKTS booth, “under the red glass steps” in the revitalized Father Duffy Square

Duffy Square

Duffy Square is the northern triangle of Times Square in Manhattan, New York City. It is located between 45th and 47th Streets, Broadway and Seventh Avenue and is well known for the TKTS reduced-price theater tickets booth located there....

. TDF operates satellite TKTS booths at the South Street Seaport

South Street Seaport

The South Street Seaport is a historic area in the New York City borough of Manhattan, located where Fulton Street meets the East River, and adjacent to the Financial District. The Seaport is a designated historic district, distinct from the neighboring Financial District...

 and in Downtown Brooklyn

Downtown Brooklyn

Downtown Brooklyn is the third largest central business district in New York City , and is located in the northwestern section of the borough of Brooklyn...

.

TDF Membership Program

TDF Membership Program maintains a growing list of over 80,000 qualified theatre lovers who enjoy discounts of up to 70% on admissions to hundreds of Broadway, Off Broadway, music and dance productions each year. To qualify for TDF membership, members must belong to one of the following groups: full-time students, full-time teachers, union members, retirees, civil service employees, staff members of not-for-profit organizations, performing arts professionals, and members of the armed forces or clergy. In the 2007-2008 season, TDF membership performance admissions reached over 530,000 annually and returned over $13 million to New York City productions.

Performing Arts Vouchers

TDF Performing Arts Vouchers are TDF’s principal means of assisting off-Off Broadway theatre, music and dance groups by helping them build their audiences, as well as introducing thousands of students to the joy of live performance. The TDF Voucher serves as an open ticket for admissions, allowing adventurous theatregoers the flexibility to attend the performance of their choice at smaller, more experimental theatres. Last season, a total of 57,862 admissions were given to 145 different productions returning more than $300,000 to the productions.

Theatre and Dance Subsidy programs

TDF Theatre and Dance Subsidy programs are central to TDF’s mission, as they marry the goals of supporting productions of merit and bringing audiences to the theatre that might not otherwise be able to attend. The Theatre Subsidy program has subsidized over 900 productions since 1968, including 30 play that went on to win the Pulitzer Prize

Pulitzer Prize

The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...

-for drama. Last season, admissions to subsidy productions reached 63,997 for theatre and 20,217 for dance. Over $2.5 million was returned to theatre productions and $663,000 to dance productions.

Costume Collection

TDF Costume Collection houses over 65,000 costumes and accessories providing professionally designed costumes to not-for-profit organizations at affordable prices. Their reasonable prices not only allow emerging companies to mount more professional-looking shows, they also help theatres to produce a greater number of new works by keeping production costs down. Last season, TDF’s costume collection served 440 performing arts companies in 29 states -- colleges and universities, middle and high schools, and community and charitable groups -- who mounted 848 productions with low-cost costume rentals from the TDF Costume Collection.

Irene Sharaff/Robert L.B. Tobin Awards

TDF’s Irene Sharaff/Robert L.B. Tobin Awards were founded in 1993 to pay tribute to the art of costume design. Since then, the annual award presentation has become an occasion for the costume design community to come together to honor its own. TDF’s Irene Sharaff

Irene Sharaff

Irene Sharaff was an American costume designer for stage and screen. Her work earned her five Academy Awards and a Tony Award.- Background :...

/Robert L.B. Tobin Awards honor excellence by presenting five awards: Lifetime Achievement Award, Artisan Award, Young Master Award, Posthumous Award and the Robert L.B. Tobin Award for Lifetime Achievement in Theatrical Design.