The Broadway Green Alliance has awarded Broadway producer David Stone (the upcoming War Paint) with the 2017 Green Broadway Award, which honors an individual or organization in the Broadway community committed to making the industry more environmentally friendly.
Stone received the award on January 30 at the Broadway League’s Biennial Conference in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. He is the second recipient of the honor; in 2015, the inaugural prize went to Jujamcyn Theatres.
In 2008, Stone organized a town hall at the Gershwin Theatre—the Broadway home of his musical Wicked—with over 250 theatre owners and fellow producers. It was through this meeting that the BGA was formed. Among the green initiatives in place at Wicked under Stone’s leadership are using rechargeable batteries and a water filtration system, as well as implementing an on-demand Playbill insert printing system.
“The size of the carbon footprint of Broadway and touring Broadway is, of course, relatively small, but our impact is large—or it could be,” Stone said in a statement. “When the [National Resources Defense Council] first started advising the Broadway Green Alliance, there was a two-fold mission. One, to reduce our carbon footprint substantially, which we’ve done. And two, to use our enormous influence with our fans to communicate how vitally important, and how easy, it is to join us in reducing their carbon footprint. So I implore all of you to work with the BGA to rededicate ourselves, to reach out to the wider world, to our audiences, and to ask them to join us. Before it is too late.”
