Robert Arters Herr
Died February 5, 2006
Bob Herr started off to become involved in medicine and that’s where he finally ended up. In between, he made it big on Broadway.
From Yale Bob went to the University of Pittsburgh Medical School, but after two years he decided it was not for him and moved to New York City. He earned a master’s in history from NYU in 1968 and was working on his Ph.D., but all the while was being pulled into the theater world.
Bob became business manager for Michael Bennett, the dancer and choreographer who in 1976 directed A Chorus Line and followed it up in 1982 with Dreamgirls. It was a fabulous time, touring the world with some of the most successful plays ever staged, but it ended in the 1980s when Bennett fell ill with AIDS.
Bennett moved to Arizona in search of an alternative cure and Bob went with him.
After Bennett died in 1987, Bob moved to Los Angeles and became director of the AIDS Healthcare Foundation Westside Clinic.
Bob was HIV positive but new drugs allowed him to keep working for nearly 20 more years. He died of AIDS on February 5, 2006.