Ahhhh …. That’s what listeners feel when they hear the opening lines of any book Stefan narrates. They know they are in safe hands; here is a story-teller extraordinaire whom they can trust with their ears and hearts. Authors also breathe a sigh of relief when Stefan spins their tales. Yes, he has a fabulous baritone instrument, but it’s what he does with the tone, the characters, the accents, the drama, the facts.

“From West Berlin to Rome to the Congo, in love scenes or in clandestine meetings, Rudnicki makes it all real.”

The Secret Lovers by Charles McCarry
S.J.H., AudioFile Magazine

As an audio narrator and/or producer who has recorded over 3,500 audio books, he has been responsible for a number of pioneering innovations, among them several third-person multiple-reader formats and the AudioMovie. He has received numerous awards, including two GRAMMY Awards (Best Children’s Album, 1999 for The Children’s Shakespeare and Best Spoken Word Album, 2013 for Society’s Child), two HUGO Awards for Co-Producing Lightspeed Magazine, a Bram Stoker Award (I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream), a Ray Bradbury Award (The NPR dramatic series 2000X), more than a dozen Audie Awards (including recognition for his solo narration of Lost Boys by Orson Scott Card and Hubris by Michael Isikoff and David Corn), and numerous Earphones Awards from AudioFile Magazine for projects like the unabridged production and narration of Orson Scott Card’s best-loved novels Ender’s Game, Speaker for the Dead and Songmaster, and for his solo narration of The Secret Lovers by Charles McCarry, The Attack by Yasmina Khadra, Adam Resurrected by Yoram Kaniuk, The Ten-Cent Plague by David Hajdu, Genghis by Conn Iggulden, The Warsaw Anagrams by Richard Zimler, Burn Me Deadly and Dark Jenny by Alex Bledsoe, Cry Dance by Kirk Mitchell and Speak Memory by Vladimir Nabokov. His narration of Louis L’Amour stories titled Big Country was a 2008 Audie finalist, and his reading of Tim Weiner’s Legacy of Ashes was named one of the six best audio books of 2007 by Publishers Weekly.

“I love recording audiobooks. I didn’t know that I would.”

–Stefan Rudnicki

In live and recorded radio drama performances, he has been heard with Robin Williams, Val Kilmer, Amy Irving, Edward Herrmann, Arte Johnson and David Carradine.

Stefan has been seen in 80 stage productions on both coasts and abroad (Yale Repertory Theatre, Circle In the Square, The Knightsbridge Theatre, the Edinburgh International Festival, etc.) and over a dozen motion pictures, including Loving, Awakenings, Last Exit to Brooklyn, Road To Revenge, Rejuvenator, and Higher Learning.

As a co-producer and director for Audible.com’s “A-List Collection”, he has worked with Dustin Hoffman on Being There, Diane Keaton on Slouching Towards Bethlehem, Hilary Swank on Pack of Two and Annette Bening on Mrs. Dalloway.

Stefan won another GRAMMY as producer of Janis Ian’s Society’s Child recorded at Skyboat Media for Audible.com. In 2009, Stefan was a Grammy finalist for Through the Looking Glass, read by Harlan Ellison. Stefan has also directed over 150 stage productions and two feature films.  In 2016, he was nominated for another Grammy for directing and co-producing Patience and Sarah, narrated by Jean Smart and Janis Ian. Busy guy.

Stefan produced The Delivery, a short film about audiobooks and the imagination written and directed by Gabrielle de Cuir and starring Michael York, John Rubinstein and Harlan Ellison. The Delivery took first place in Fantasy at the DragonCon Independent Short Film Festival in Atlanta.

He has a dozen published books to his name, including The Actor’s Book of Monologues for Women, with more than 200 stunning selections; The Actor’s Book of Classical Monologues, a challenging, wide-ranging collection of the greatest dramatic works; Wilde, a novelization of the 1997 motion picture; a bestselling adaptation of Sun Tzu’s The Art of War (Winner of an Audie for Best Business Audio book); and Imaginings: An Anthology of Visionary Literature, introduced by Harlan Ellison.  

Stefan recording a tough guy in Max Allan Collins’ QUARRY series:

Stefan was born in Krakow, Poland, and has lived in Stockholm, Montreal, New York City and Los Angeles. He was educated principally at Columbia University and the Yale School of Drama, and has taught at New York University, Dartmouth College, The University of Rochester and Long Island University. His original production company, with writer Judith Cummings, is Skyboat Road Company, Inc.

Stefan again in his natural habitat, the studio, this time recording his legendary performance as Colonel Graff in Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game Alive!