Role as Zero Mostel Earns Outstanding Solo Performance Award

St. Francis College Alumnus and former member of the College’s Troupers acting club, Jim Brochu ’69 took home the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Solo Performance for his portrayal of Zero Mostel in Zero Hour Monday night, May 24.

“Tonight a dream came true,” said Brochu who received the award from former Saturday Night Live cast member Ana Gastayer. “As soon as I realized I had won, I ran down and a lady sitting in an aisle seat was applauding wildly and yelling "Bravo." She reached out to grab my hand as I passed and it was Angela Lansbury! God I am so grateful to be part of the business.”

Brochu’s win was the first in the category by an Off-Broadway show in 20 years.

Brochu visited his alma mater in January while the show was playing during its original Off-Broadway run at the Theatre at Saint Clement’s. (Watch the Jim Brochu lecture) It is now in an open-ended run at the DR2 theater at 103 East 15th Street.

A native of Brooklyn, Brochu produced his first show, a charity revue featuring Bay Ridge neighborhood kids, at the age of thirteen. After studying drama at Carnegie-Mellon University, he returned to New York to earn his Bachelor’s Degree in English from St. Francis College. He made his Broadway debut as Christopher Sly in "a very bad revival" of “The Taming Of The Shrew.”

The Drama Desk was founded in 1949 to explore key issues in the theater and to bring together critics and writers in an organization to support the ongoing development of theater in New York. The organization began presenting its awards in 1955, and it is the only critics organization to honor achievement in the theater with competition between Broadway, Off Broadway and Off-Off Broadway productions in the same categories.

St. Francis College, founded in 1859 by the Franciscan Brothers of Brooklyn, is located in Brooklyn Heights, N.Y. Since its founding, the College has pursued its Franciscan mission to provide an affordable, high-quality education to students from New York City’s five boroughs and beyond.
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St. Francis College, 180 Remsen Street, Brooklyn Heights, NY 11201
www.sfc.edu