,
Jessie Bonstelle,
Rachel Crothers,
Elizabeth Tyree, May Budeley,
Eleanor Gates Stage Women's War Relief Stage Women's War Relief was founded in 1917 to organize charitable giving in support of the war effort. Its founders, led by playwright and director
Rachel Crothers, included the actress and playwright
Louise Closser Hale and actresses
Dorothy Donnelly,
Josephine Hull,
Minnie Dupree,
Elizabeth Tyree and
Louise Drew. The organization established workrooms for sewing uniforms and other garments (with total output totaling 1,863,645 articles), set up clothing and food collection centers, sold
Liberty Bonds, and opened a canteen on Broadway for servicemen. It also presented benefit performances to raise money, including some held in a temporary "Liberty Theater" built outside the
New York Public Library. In total, the group raised nearly $7,000,000 for the war effort.
The American Theatre Wing of the Allied War Relief Shortly after the beginning of
World War II in 1939,
Rachel Crothers re-established the Stage Women's War Relief as a branch of the
British War Relief Society in January 1940; this time adopting the name the American Theatre Wing (ATW). The revived organization's first and founding members included
Mary Antoinette "Toni" Perry,
Josephine Hull,
Gertrude Lawrence,
Theresa Helburn, and
Vera Allen; with
Louise Heims Beck serving as the organization's first vice president. They began fundraising and organizing clothing donations to send overseas to the British people and to provide relief for European refugees in America. The organization initially worked from two rooms located inside
30 Rockefeller Plaza. In its first few months of operations they successfully lobbied businesses to donate supplies, with donations to the British people from American businessman including 1,000 coats for women and children and of coffee in addition to medical supplies and other clothing and materials. The first canteen was in the basement of the
44th Street Theatre, and similar entertainment and dining venues were established in Los Angeles, Boston, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, Cleveland, Newark, and San Francisco, as well as abroad in London and Paris. In the US canteens, servicewomen were denied entry, although this was not the case in the European locations.
Lauren Bacall worked as a hostess in the New York Stage Door Canteen, and later recalled seeing
Alfred Lunt and
Lynn Fontanne washing dishes and serving coffee there.
The Andrews Sisters were frequent performers. The Stage Door Canteen made its way into national popular culture with a 1942 weekly radio show and a 1943 movie called
Stage Door Canteen. It is Tony's equivalent to the
Motion Picture Academy's Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.
Sondra Gilman succeeded Stevenson as chair and Doug Leeds served as president from 2004 to 2008. When they completed their four-year terms, Theodore S. (Ted) Chapin assumed both roles from 2008 to 2012. In 2012, Tony Award-winning costume designer
William Ivey Long became chair of the board until 2016 when current board chair, the
Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright
David Henry Hwang, assumed his duties.
Angela Lansbury currently serves as honorary chairman and Heather A. Hitchens is president and CEO of the American Theatre Wing. Besides the Tonys, ATW operates an array of programs to support its goals, including: • The long-running "
Working in the Theatre" series of televised seminars with top practitioners in the field; • A free audio and video archive of theatrical seminars and discussions on the American Theatre Wing YouTube channel; • The
Jonathan Larson Grants, supporting emerging creators of Musical Theatre • National Theatre Company Grants, aiding theatre companies and organizations who have articulated a distinctive mission, cultivated an audience and nurtured a community of artists in ways that strengthen the quality, diversity, and dynamism of American theatre. • SpringboardNYC, a college to career boot camp for actors • The Theatre Intern Network; a social and professional networking organization for Theatre Interns in New York City ==References==