David Powers, a press agent who represented dozens of Broadway shows over a 40-year period, died Oct. 4, 2009, at the Actors Home in Englewood, New Jersey, his friend Bob Ullman said. Among the famous shows for which Mr. Powers culled ink in the dailies were Barnum, Promises, Promises, Marat/Sade and Annie, his biggest hit. He also handled press for the Off-Broadway phenomenon The Fantasticks from the day it opened to the day it closed, several decades later. According to Ullman, "He never made a nickel on that. They paid him a dime a week."

Ullman said Mr. Powers could always be counted on to say a positive word about the productions he represented, no matter what the public reception. "I never knew anyone who was less objective about any show," he said. "David would never say a bad word about any show he was associated with."

"He was gifted with a devastating sense of humor, a strong commitment to his work and an enduring respect and affection for the remarkable stage persons he encountered along his way," said former press agent Merle Debuskey, a contemporary of Mr. Powers. "The theatre was his life."

Born in the South, and retaining that region's accent all his life, and was always dressed in a full suit, usually purchased at Brooks Brothers or Paul Stuart. So conscientious about his job, he was known to whisper on the phone, not wishing rival press agents to know what machinations he was putting into play for his clients.

Mr. Powers worked at the Liberty Music Shop on Madison Avenue when first moving to New York. He began his career as a press agent in 1948, working under Marian Graham on a show called Red Gloves. Five years later, he assisted Marian Byram and Phyllis Perlman on the musical Wonderful Town and several shows thereafter.

He began working under Harvey Sabinson in the mid-50s, laboring over shows like The Dark at the Top of the Stairs, The Tenth Man, Carnival and Oh, Captain! Sometime in the early '60s, he and Sabinson teamed up with Lee Solters. Together, they banged the drum for Peter Brook's Marat/Sade, 110 in the Shade and Luther, as well as the infamous flop Breakfast at Tiffany's.

By the 1970s, he was acting as lead publicist on enormous hits like Annie, for which he handled the Broadway production and all the road companies, and The Gin Game. There were fewer successes in the 1980s, though the decade did end for Mr. Powers with the smash play A Few Good Men. His final Broadway credit was 1991's The Speed of Darkness.

Throughout his career, he remained in the New York area, rarely traveling outside the theatre district. He moved into the Actors Home two years ago