Dan's Papers - March 21, 2008 - Kathleen Russo

After the devastating loss of her husband, Spalding Gray, in January of 2004, Kathleen Russo gathered excerpts from his journals and monologues and decided to craft them into a show. "Stories Left to Tell," the play Russo directed, ran at the Minetta Lane Theater in Manhattan from February through July of 2007.

There were guest appearances from many of their friends, including Richard Gere, John C. Reilly, Debra Winger and Whoopee Goldberg, who is now in the process of making a film from the script. Russo said this show took up two years of her life and kept her occupied after Spalding died.

Russo had also been running her own talent agency, Washington Square Arts, for 12 years, while commuting between the couple's Sag Harbor home and the city. There, she booked appearances and live tours for writers and performers at theaters and colleges around the country. Her many notable clients included David Sedaris, Dave Eggers, Eric Bogosian and Judith Ivy.

"But after Spalding died it was harder for me to commute into the city, since I was raising our three kids in our new North Haven home," said Russo, sitting in the spacious kitchen of their 19th century white captain's home with blue shutters, where they had moved from downtown Sag Harbor in 2001. "So when 'Stories' closed last July, I took the summer off to sort of rethink my life. I thought it would be great if I could find a job in the Hamptons, so I could be out here more with my children."

It was through her friend Mitchell Kriegman, owner of Wainscott Studios and producer of children's shows for PBS, that she was urged to meet Wally Smith, General Manager of WLIU Radio Station, which is located on the campus of Stonybrook Southampton College.

"They were looking for someone to book guests, come up with themes for the shows and plan the roundtable discussions each Friday," said Russo. Since her talent booking experience was so similar and she already had numerous contacts, Russo became the station's Associate Producer last November.

At WLIU, 88.3 FM, Russo schedules appearances for "In the Morning with Bonnie Grice," which airs from 8-10 a.m. She also books guests and creates themes for the roundtable discussions "The Round Heads," which airs on Fridays from 9-10 a.m.

On March 14, the theme was "Standing By Your Man," in tune with Women's History Month. The female guests discussed Silda Spitzer and Hillary Clinton, and reacted to the husbands' infidelities. The panelists included Nada Marjanovich of Long Island Pulse Magazine, Annette Hinckle of The Sag Harbor Express, and author Lorraine Dusky.

The next Round Table will be held on April 4, the 40th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s death, and the participants will be Dennis Wallington, Ginny Booth, Brenda Simmons and Bonnie Cannon.

Russo and her team, which includes Executive Producer Bonnie Grice and Engineer Kyle Lynch, also produce a nationally syndicated radio show, "The Song is You," taped in both Southampton and Manhattan. Grice interviews guests, who play their ten favorite songs and talk about how they relate to their lives. The show is based on songs, memories and interviews, and airs Fridays at 7 p.m. and Saturdays at noon. This week's guest will be Cliff Robertson.

"I love my job, since it's a new challenge, and I enjoy working behind the scenes with Bonnie Grice, who is open to new ideas, and is a really smart and articulate host. I can throw anything her way and she just rolls with it - I've never seen her get stumped."

Russo said she also loves her new hours of 7 a.m. to 2 p.m., which give her more time with her children - Marissa, 21, Forrest, 15 and Theo, 11. Marissa is studying writing at Sarah Lawrence College, Forrest is a lead guitarist in a band called Too Busy Being Bored, which is making its mark touring the New York area, and Theo is obsessed with baseball.

"My kids helped me get through the death of my husband, and also the community helped enormously. In times of tragedy you see how people here come out of the woodwork to help those in need. My own family also helped me," she explained, reaching down to pet her mini-Australian shepherd named Bowie.

She also has found a new love, Davo Olson, an interior designer and musician who manages Forrest's band and teaches Rock n' Roll 101 at The Ross School, where Forrest is a student.

Russo established a grant through the Ross School in Spalding Gray's name that allows students to submit mini-monologues. They are awarded prizes in his memory. Other grants in his honor are at the UCLA Theater, Walker Art Center in Minneapolis and P.S. 122 in New York City. They give a $10,000 grant to an emerging artist or group each year.

And Russo is still immortalizing her late author-husband with an upcoming documentary film on his life. She is collaborating with Steven Soderbergh, who won an Academy Award for Traffic, and did Oceans 11, 12 and 13, and Sex, Lies and Videotape.

"Steven is a friend of ours who produced the movie Grey's Anatomy with us," said Russo. "Spalding was also in his movie King of the Hill."

Russo's life has taken many twists and turns since she first studied photography at Rochester Institute of Technology, and then worked at a theater there where Spalding performed. "I first met him when I picked him up at the airport. He looked disheveled, and like he didn't want to be there," she recalled. "I was 29 and he was 49 when we first met." She later moved to New York City, and she and her husband eventually married and moved from New York to Sag Harbor in 1996.

But there was still the question of Russo's photography training in Rochester. When asked if she has ever pursued that interest, she smiled. "I take pictures of my kids."