A Day in the Life: NBC Universal Cable's Erica Conaty

Cable World, June 6, 2005

By Simon Applebaum

It's halfway through the cable industry's annual spring break week in New York, and for Erica Conaty, NBC Universal Cable's marketing VP, the best way to mark it is by taking in some musical theater.

The musical we're seeing this gorgeous May evening is Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, just up the block from the Marriott Marquis, where she's been spending most of the week.

I've known Conaty for more than half a decade, from her PR work on Summer Olympics coverage to her spearheading of the Bravo On With the Show campaign the last three years. This is the first time we've connected since she relocated to Chicago to be near her fiance. She comes back to New York once a month to meet and plan projects with her five-member NBC Universal marketing crew, always finding time for theater.

"As a kid, I always went to at least one show with my family each year," Conaty recalls. "Then I did a theater class in college. For me, theater became a total escape, so when I moved to New York from Washington, D.C., 10 years ago, I explored where to find it there and made it part of my life."

We meet for dinner before the show at the eclectic Blue Fin restaurant near the corner of Broadway and 47th. Over a speedy seafood dinner, Conaty talks about the Cable Positive board meeting she had attended that day. Another theater connection: She was approached by Cable Positive after she managed Bravo's sponsorship of the group's Kaitz Week Broadway events in 2003-04.

"I wanted to give additional time to something outside my job, and do so for an organization that focuses on saving lives," she says. "As a side benefit, you get to be with some of the most motivated people in the cable industry."

We hustle to the Imperial Theater, where, incidentally, Bravo On With the Show had its annual run. "It's the only Broadway theater where I really know my way around," Conaty says.

Before the lights dim, an announcer says, "At this performance, there will be no preshow announcement." The happy audience applauds.

The show, about two con men who make a bet over which one of them will be able to swindle a soap opera star, gets moving in easy fashion with star John Lithgow's rendition of "Give Them What They Want," a ditty establishing how a scam artist enjoys a life of luxury on the French Riviera. A quarter hour into the show, Conaty and I wonder when the pace will pick up. Finally, co-star Norbert Leo Butz rips into "Great Big Stuff," followed by his violent encounter with an extremely tough slice of jerky.

Lithgow and Butz's closing song, the brassy "Dirty Rotten Number," elicits a long ovation. No one, it seems, wants to be the first person to stop clapping.

Our instant review when the curtain comes down: The Scoundrels company makes the material move, instead of the other way around. Lithgow and Butz are a joy to watch, but the choreography is tired. We've seen these routines before, executed more inventively. "It's not on the top of my list--that goes to Wicked and The Producers," Conaty says. "But the acting and singing were great."

It was a dirty rotten wonderful night. Best of all, I've been invited by Conaty on another theater date, next time I land in Chicago.

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