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Jill Martin (actress)
Jill Martin (25 April 1938 – 24 December 2016) was an English actress and singer who made her career in West End theatre from the 1950 to the 2000s. Born in Redruth, Cornwall, she was educated at The Lawn School at St Austell and a song teacher at the school believed her to have an opera singer's voice. Martin debuted in the theatre in 1950 and was an understudy to several actresses. She was the only actor to appear in all three runs of ''My Fair Lady'' and produced a studio cast recording in 1966''.'' Other musicals that Martin portrayed characters in were ''Fiddler on the Roof,'' ''Side by Side by Sondheim'', ''The Baker's Wife,'' ''Les Misérables'' and ''Allegro''. Biography Jill Martin was born in Redruth, Cornwall, on 25 April 1938. When she was six, her father was killed in Second World War action and she found consolation in songs from musicals and danced on the window ledge in her mother's public house. Martin was educated at The Lawn School at St Austell. While Mar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Redruth
Redruth ( , kw, Resrudh) is a town and civil parishes in Cornwall, civil parish in Cornwall, England. The population of Redruth was 14,018 at the 2011 census. In the same year the population of the Camborne-Redruth urban area, which also includes Carn Brea, Redruth, Carn Brea, Illogan and several satellite villages, stood at 55,400 making it the largest conurbation in Cornwall. Redruth lies approximately at the junction of the Great Britain road numbering scheme, A393 and A3047 roads, on the route of the old London to Land's End trunk road (now the A30 road, A30), and is approximately west of Truro, east of St Ives, Cornwall, St Ives, north east of Penzance, Cornwall, Penzance and north west of Falmouth, Cornwall, Falmouth. Camborne and Redruth together form the largest urban area in Cornwall and before local government reorganisation were an Urban district (Great Britain and Ireland), urban district. Toponymy The name Redruth derives from its older Cornish name, ''Rhy ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Formby
George Formby, (born George Hoy Booth; 26 May 1904 – 6 March 1961) was an English actor, singer-songwriter and comedian who became known to a worldwide audience through his films of the 1930s and 1940s. On stage, screen and record he sang light, Novelty song, comic songs, usually playing the ukulele or banjolele, and became the UK's highest-paid entertainer. Born in Wigan, Lancashire, he was the son of George Formby Sr, from whom he later took his stage name. After an early career as a stable boy and jockey, Formby took to the music hall stage after the early death of his father in 1921. His early performances were taken exclusively from his father's act, including the same songs, jokes and characters. In 1923 he made two career-changing decisions – he purchased a ukulele, and married Beryl Ingham, a fellow performer who became his manager and transformed his act. She insisted that he appear on stage formally dressed, and introduced the ukulele to his performance. He ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Chappell (dancer)
William Chappell (27 September 19071 January 1994) was a British dancer, ballet designer and director. He is most noted for his designs for more than 40 ballets or revues, including many of the early works of Sir Frederick Ashton and Dame Ninette de Valois. Early life Chappell was born in Wolverhampton, the son of theatrical manager Archibald Chappell and his wife Edith Eva Clara Black (''née'' Edith Blair-Staples). Edith, the daughter of an army officer, was raised in Ceylon and India; in pursuing a career in repertory acting, she moved away from her upper-middle-class roots and married twice to fellow actors, by the first of whom she had a daughter, Hermina, the second time being to Archibald Chappell, by whom she had two daughters, Dorothea and Honor, followed by Billy. Chappell was acutely aware of his 'déclassé origins': whereas his mother's brother had maintained a conventional upper-middle-class life, being a tea-planter in Ceylon and able to provide his son, Patrick (w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
French Without Tears
''French Without Tears'' is a comic play written by a 25-year-old Terence Rattigan in 1936. Setting It takes place in a cram school for adults needing to acquire French for business reasons. Scattered throughout are Franglais phrases and schoolboy misunderstandings of the French language. The play was inspired by a 1933 visit to a village called Marxzell in the Black Forest, where young English gentlemen went to cram German. Reception The play was a success on its London debut, establishing Rattigan as a dramatist. Critics thought it "gay, witty, thoroughly contemporary... with a touch of lovable truth behind all its satire." It ran for over 1,000 performances in London, and over 100 in New York. It also established Rex Harrison as a major star. Original production The play, directed by Harold French, opened on 6 November 1936 at the Criterion Theatre, London, with the following cast: *Alan Howard - Rex Harrison *Brian Curtis - Guy Middleton *Commander Bill Rogers - Ro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roberta D'Esti
''Roberta'' is a musical from 1933 with music by Jerome Kern, and lyrics and book by Otto Harbach. The musical is based on the novel ''Gowns by Roberta'' by Alice Duer Miller. It features the songs " Yesterdays", "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes", "Let's Begin", "You're Devastating", "Something Had To Happen", "The Touch of Your Hand" and "I'll Be Hard to Handle". Productions The original Broadway production opened at the New Amsterdam Theatre on November 18, 1933, and ran for 295 performances closing on 21 July 1934. It starred Tamara Drasin (billed as Tamara), Bob Hope, George Murphy, Lyda Roberti, Fred MacMurray, Fay Templeton, Ray Middleton (billed as Raymond E. Middleton), Allan Jones, and Sydney Greenstreet. Hope, Murphy, MacMurray and Greenstreet were not yet the Hollywood stars they would soon be, and Middleton was not the Broadway leading man he would become after '' Annie Get Your Gun''. An Australian production opened at His Majesty's Theatre in Melbourne on December 22, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Her Majesty's Theatre
Her Majesty's Theatre is a West End theatre situated on Haymarket, London, Haymarket in the City of Westminster, London. The present building was designed by Charles J. Phipps and was constructed in 1897 for actor-manager Herbert Beerbohm Tree, who established the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art at the theatre. In the early decades of the 20th century, Tree produced spectacular productions of William Shakespeare, Shakespeare and other classical works, and the theatre hosted premieres by major playwrights such as George Bernard Shaw, J. M. Synge, Noël Coward and J. B. Priestley. Since the First World War, the wide stage has made the theatre suitable for large-scale musical productions, and the theatre has accordingly specialised in hosting musical theatre, musicals. The theatre has been home to record-setting musical theatre runs, notably the First World War sensation ''Chu Chin Chow''Larkin, Colin (ed). ''Guinness Who's Who of Stage Musicals'' (Guinness Publishing, 1994) and the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
West Side Story
''West Side Story'' is a musical conceived by Jerome Robbins with music by Leonard Bernstein, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, and a book by Arthur Laurents. Inspired by William Shakespeare's play ''Romeo and Juliet'', the story is set in the mid-1950s in the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City, then a multiracial, blue-collar neighborhood. The musical explores the rivalry between the Jets and the Sharks, two teenage street gangs of different ethnic backgrounds. The Sharks, who are immigrants from Puerto Rico, and the Jets, who are white, vie for dominance of the neighborhood, and the police try to keep order. The young protagonist, Tony, a former member of the Jets and best friend of the gang's leader, Riff, falls in love with Maria, the sister of Bernardo, the leader of the Sharks. The dark theme, sophisticated music, extended dance scenes, tragic love story, and focus on social problems marked a turning point in musical theatre. The original 1957 Broadway production, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Theatre Royal, Drury Lane
The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, commonly known as Drury Lane, is a West End theatre and Grade I listed building in Covent Garden, London, England. The building faces Catherine Street (earlier named Bridges or Brydges Street) and backs onto Drury Lane. The building is the most recent in a line of four theatres which were built at the same location, the earliest of which dated back to 1663, making it the oldest theatre site in London still in use. According to the author Peter Thomson, for its first two centuries, Drury Lane could "reasonably have claimed to be London's leading theatre". For most of that time, it was one of a handful of patent theatres, granted monopoly rights to the production of "legitimate" drama in London (meaning spoken plays, rather than opera, dance, concerts, or plays with music). The first theatre on the site was built at the behest of Thomas Killigrew in the early 1660s, when theatres were allowed to reopen during the English Restoration. Initially ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eliza Doolittle
Eliza Doolittle is a fictional character and the protagonist in George Bernard Shaw's play ''Pygmalion'' (1913) and its 1956 musical adaptation, ''My Fair Lady''. Eliza (from Lisson Grove, London) is a Cockney flower woman, who comes to Professor Henry Higgins asking for elocution lessons, after a chance encounter at Covent Garden. Higgins goes along with it for the purposes of a wager: That he can turn her into the toast of elite London society. Her Cockney dialect includes words that are common among working class Londoners, such as ain't; "I ain't done nothing wrong by speaking to the gentleman" said Doolittle. Doolittle receives voice coaching and learns the rules of etiquette. The outcome of these attentions varies between the original play and the various adaptations (see the ''Pygmalion'' article). History The character of Eliza Doolittle was likely inspired by the real story of Eliza Sheffield (1856–1942), a barmaid in London who rose through the ranks of societ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Julie Andrews
Dame Julie Andrews (born Julia Elizabeth Wells; 1 October 1935) is an English actress, singer, and author. She has garnered numerous accolades throughout her career spanning over seven decades, including an Academy Award, a British Academy Film Award, two Primetime Emmy Awards, three Grammy Awards and six Golden Globe Awards. She has also received three Tony Award nominations. Andrews was made a Disney Legend in 1991, and has been honoured with an Honorary Golden Lion, the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award in 2007, and the AFI Life Achievement Award in 2022. In 2000, Andrews was made a dame by Queen Elizabeth II for services to the performing arts. Andrews, a child actress and singer, appeared in the West End in 1948 and made her Broadway debut in '' The Boy Friend'' (1954). Billed as "Britain's youngest prima donna", she rose to prominence starring in Broadway musicals such as ''My Fair Lady'' (1956) playing Eliza Doolittle and ''Camelot'' (1960) playing Quee ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Where's Charley?
''Where's Charley?'' is a musical with music and lyrics by Frank Loesser and book by George Abbott. The story was based on the 1892 play ''Charley's Aunt'' by Brandon Thomas. The musical debuted on Broadway in 1948 and was revived on Broadway and in the West End. Ray Bolger starred, and sang the popular song "Once In Love With Amy". Plot ;Act I The setting is Oxford University in the year 1892 where a group of college seniors are bidding farewell to the years gone by ("The Years Before Us"). In his dorm room, graduating Jack Chesney is excitedly talking with his butler, Brassett, making sure that luncheon will be ready for later that afternoon. He is so excited because his roommate, Charley Wykeham, has gone to the train station to meet his aunt, Donna Lucia D'Alvadorez, who is coming in from Brazil for a visit. Having Charley's aunt there as chaperone will make it quite easy for their two girl friends, Kitty Verdun and Amy Spettigue, to come for a visit. Charley does return â ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Binkie Beaumont
Hugh "Binkie" Beaumont (27 March 190822 March 1973) was a British theatre manager and producer, sometimes referred to as the "éminence grise" of the West End theatre. Though he shunned the spotlight so that his name was not known widely among the general public, he was one of the most successful and influential manager-producers in the West End during the middle of the 20th century. Beaumont was brought up in Cardiff, where he joined the staff of a local theatre at the age of fifteen. From there he built a career in theatrical management. His company, H. M. Tennent, which he co-founded in 1936, was based at the old Globe Theatre (now the Gielgud Theatre) in Shaftesbury Avenue, London. His success was based on lavish productions, starry casts and plays calculated to appeal to a West End audience. Among those with whom he was closely associated were Noël Coward and John Gielgud. His successes included new plays, revivals of classics, and musicals. With the rise of state-sub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
