User:Pittstar/Marilyn Pittman

 Marilyn Pittman 

Bio
Marilyn Pittman is an American broadcaster, actor, comedian, and narrator. She narrated Debra Chasnoff's 1992 Academy-Award winning documentary, “Deadly Deception: General Electric, Nuclear Weapons, and Our Environment.”

After she started her career in rock radio in 1976 in Albuquerque, New Mexico, she went on to produce her own ideas for radio. By 1980, she received a grant from the state to produce a series of radio programs on artists and playwrights, and her own original comedy and on-the-street interviews at the NPR affliate, KUNM.

In 1981, she spent a year as a TV news anchor for an independent station that doesn’t exist any more. Then, she wrote another grant, this time to NPR, and spent a year producing “By A Woman Writ,” a 6-part series on American women playwrights. From there, she went on to create and produce RFA’s “New Music Alternative Top 10” for over 300 college radio stations in ’83-84. After that, she was a copywriter for Rick Johnson Advertising and a rock jock, but she yearned for a bigger life as a stand-up comedian.

In 1985, she moved to San Francisco where she worked as a radio writer and producer for The University of California Office of The President. This would be her last full-time job. She then free-lanced for KQED and KALW, and began her career as a radio trainer at Western Public Radio.

Broadcast and New Media Talent Coach
By 1990, she developed her Talk Better Radio workshops and went national, consulting, training, and coaching radio talent at NPR stations nationally. Since 1990, she has been the leading talent coach and consultant for NPR stations nationally, working with hundreds of anchors, hosts, and reporters. She also consults on management and programming.

Her workshops and presentations have been featured at many industry conferences and conventions, including The Public Radio News Directors Inc. (PRNDI), The National Federation of Community Broadcasters, The Radio-Television News Directors Association (now RTDNA), UNITY, and The Broadcast Education Association.

Since the early 90’s, she has been a guest lecturer at UC Berkeley’s Journalism School, and since 2000, she has been a performance workshop leader for The Knight Digital Media Center.

Comedy
Marilyn started doing openly gay comedy in 1987, but, lacking a San Francisco venue that would book ‘out’ comedians, it wasn’t until 1991 when Josie’s Cabaret and Juice Joint opened in the Castro that she could develop her act fully. From there, she went on to do two solo shows, “Thank You For Sharing,” and “Enough About You,” and headlined on the gay circuit. She was featured in two books during the early 90’s, “A Funny Time To Be Gay,” and “Revolutionary Laughter.”

She currently co-hosts and co-produces “Out In The Bay,” a weekly interview show on LGBT issues, people, and culture on KALW, San Francisco.