producer

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Jim Russek began his career working for four seasons as a weekend production assistant on The Ed Sullivan Show and later as a full time political consultant. He was co-chair of Students for Kennedy at NYU in 1968, Chief Advance for Rep. Richard Ottinger’s 1970 US Senate campaign, national political advance for Senator Edmund Muskie in 1972, chief political advance Rep. Roman Pucinski for US Senate (Illinois) and consulted on numerous local New York campaigns.

 

Jim joined Case & McGrath Advertising after hiring the agency to create political advertising.  Along with Gene Case, Jim managed political ad campaigns for, among others, mayoral candidate Bella Abzug and Gov. Francis Sargent (MA).  Together, they won the account of The New York Shakespeare Festival and helped launch A Chorus Line on Broadway.

 

After a short but significant stint with advertising Hall of Famer Julian Koenig, Jim started his own ad agency with illustrator Paul Davis with whom he helped create six years of breakthrough advertising campaigns for the New York Shakespeare Festival. Davis & Russek became Russek Advertising and Jim began 29 years of campaigns for Lincoln Center Theater including Anything Goes, Six Degrees of Separation, The Sisters Rosensweig, Carousel, The Hieress, Contact, The Light In The Piazza, South Pacific, War Horse, Golden Boy, The Nance and Act One.

 

As a producer, Jim conceived and co-produced the critically acclaimed musical revue Bush Wars.  He co-produced John Guare’s Bosoms and Neglect in Boston, Rob Bartlett’s Have A Nice Life and the News In Revue in Stamford, CT.  With Bill “Spaceman” Lee, Jim founded and ran The New England Grey Sox, a barnstorming team of former Boston Red Sox players touring New England in the 1990s.

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