Michael Mayer (director)
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Michael Mayer (director)
Michael Mayer (born June 27, 1960) is an American theatre director, filmmaker, and playwright. He won the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical in 2007 for directing ''Spring Awakening (musical), Spring Awakening''. Biography Mayer was born in Bethesda, Maryland, to Jewish parents Jerry and Louise Mayer (born 1936). For his bar mitzvah, he asked his parents for a movie camera and received a Super 8 single lens with a zoom. His first film was a dramatization of "The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia, The Night the Lights Went out in Georgia". After graduating from Charles W. Woodward High School, he studied at the University of Wisconsin before transferring to study acting at New York University (NYU)'s Tisch School of the Arts#Graduate Acting Program, Graduate Acting Program at the Tisch School of the Arts, where he earned an MFA in Theater in 1983. He began performing onstage in New York City, performing in plays such as Tony Kushner's ''A Bright Room Called Day,'' but by ...
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Bethesda, Maryland
Bethesda () is an unincorporated, census-designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland. It is located just northwest of Washington, D.C. It takes its name from a local church, the Bethesda Meeting House (1820, rebuilt 1849), which in turn took its name from Jerusalem's Pool of Bethesda. The National Institutes of Health's main campus and the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center are in Bethesda, in addition to a number of corporate and government headquarters. As an unincorporated community, Bethesda has no official boundaries. According to the 2020 U.S. census, the community had a total population of 68,056. History Bethesda is located in a region that was populated by the Piscataway and Nacotchtank tribes at the time of European colonization. Fur trader Henry Fleet became the first European to visit the area, reaching it by sailing up the Potomac River. He stayed with the Piscataway tribe from 1623 to 1627, either as a guest or prisoner (historical accounts ...
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Musical Theatre
Musical theatre is a form of theatrical performance that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance. The story and emotional content of a musical – humor, pathos, love, anger – are communicated through words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an integrated whole. Although musical theatre overlaps with other theatrical forms like opera and dance, it may be distinguished by the equal importance given to the music as compared with the dialogue, movement and other elements. Since the early 20th century, musical theatre stage works have generally been called, simply, musicals. Although music has been a part of dramatic presentations since ancient times, modern Western musical theatre emerged during the 19th century, with many structural elements established by the works of Gilbert and Sullivan in Britain and those of Harrigan and Hart in America. These were followed by the numerous Edwardian musical comedies and the musical theatre w ...
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Betty Buckley
Betty Lynn Buckley (born July 3, 1947) is an American actress and singer. Buckley is the winner of a Tony Award, and was nominated for two Daytime Emmy Awards, two Grammy Awards, and an Olivier Award. In 2012, she was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame. Buckley won the 1983 Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical for her role as Grizabella in the original Broadway production of '' Cats''. She went on to play Norma Desmond in ''Sunset Boulevard'' (1994–96) in both London and New York, receiving a 1995 Olivier Award nomination for Best Actress in a Musical, and was nominated for the 1997 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical for '' Triumph of Love''. Her other Broadway credits include ''1776'' (1969), ''Pippin'' (1973), and ''The Mystery of Edwin Drood'' (1985). From September 2018-August 2019 she starred as the title role in the U.S. national tour of '' Hello, Dolly''. Buckley starred in the TV series ''Eight Is Enough'' from 1977 to 1981 and played g ...
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Triumph Of Love (musical)
''Triumph of Love'' is a musical with a book by James Magruder, lyrics by Susan Birkenhead, and music by Jeffrey Stock. Overview Resembling a chamber musical more than a traditional book musical, it is based on the 1732 Pierre de Marivaux commedia dell'arte play '' Le Triomphe de l'Amour'' and centers on Spartan princess Léonide, whose love for Agis is complicated by the fact her throne was wrongfully wrested by her family from the object of her affection. Agis has been raised an educated man ruled by reason rather than passion by his uncle Hermocrates and his aunt Hesione. The princess, conspiring with her servant Corine, disguises herself as Phocion in order to infiltrate the guarded "men-only" palace compound occupied by Agis, who is plotting her assassination. Complications ensue when both Agis and Hermocrates separately guess her secret, and she tells the former she's Cécile, on the lam from an undesirable paramour, and to the latter claims to be Aspasie, who wishes to stud ...
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Brittany Murphy
Brittany Anne Murphy-Monjack (; November 10, 1977 – December 20, 2009) was an American actress and singer. Born in Atlanta, Murphy moved to Los Angeles as a teenager and pursued a career in acting. Her breakthrough role was as Tai Frasier in ''Clueless'' (1995), followed by supporting roles in independent films such as ''Freeway'' (1996) and '' Bongwater'' (1998). She made her stage debut in a Broadway production of Arthur Miller's ''A View from the Bridge'' in 1997 before appearing as Daisy Randone in '' Girl, Interrupted'' (1999) and as Lisa Swenson in '' Drop Dead Gorgeous'' (1999). In the 2000s, Murphy appeared in ''Don't Say a Word'' (2001) alongside Michael Douglas, and alongside Eminem in '' 8 Mile'' (2002), for which she gained critical recognition. Her later roles included ''Riding in Cars with Boys'' (2001), ''Spun'' (2002), ''Just Married'' (2003), ''Uptown Girls'' (2003), ''Sin City'' (2005), and ''Happy Feet'' (2006). Murphy also voiced Luanne Platter on th ...
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Anthony LaPaglia
Anthony LaPaglia (, ; born 31 January 1959) is an Australian actor. He is best known for his role as Jack Malone in the television drama ''Without a Trace'' (2002–2009), for which he received a Golden Globe Award in 2004. LaPaglia won a Primetime Emmy Award for his role as Simon Moon in the television sitcom ''Frasier'' (2000–2004). He has also appeared in films such as ''Betsy's Wedding'' (1990), ''Empire Records'' (1995), '' Autumn in New York'' (2000), ''Lantana'' (2001), ''Balibo'' (2009), '' Holding the Man'' (2015), '' Annabelle: Creation'' (2017), and ''Nitram'' (2021), the lattermost of which earned him an AACTA Award. Early life LaPaglia was born in Adelaide, South Australia, the son of Maria Johannes (née Brendel), a secretary and model, and Gedio "Eddie" LaPaglia (deceased), an auto mechanic and car dealer.Stated on ''Inside the Actors Studio'', 2009 LaPaglia's mother was Dutch, and his father emigrated from Bovalino, Calabria, Italy, at the age of eighteen. Hi ...
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A View From The Bridge
''A View from the Bridge'' is a play by American playwright Arthur Miller. It was first staged on September 29, 1955, as a one-act verse drama with ''A Memory of Two Mondays'' at the Coronet Theatre on Broadway. The run was unsuccessful, and Miller subsequently revised and extended the play to contain two acts; this version is the one with which audiences are most familiar. The two-act version premiered in the New Watergate theatre club in London's West End under the direction of Peter Brook on October 11, 1956. The play is set in 1950s America, in an Italian-American neighborhood near the Brooklyn Bridge in New York. It employs a chorus and narrator in the character of Alfieri. Eddie, the tragic protagonist, has an improper love of, and almost obsession with Catherine, his wife Beatrice's orphaned niece, so he does not approve of her courtship of Beatrice's cousin Rodolpho. Miller's interest in writing about the world of the New York docks originated with an unproduced s ...
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Arthur Miller
Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are '' All My Sons'' (1947), ''Death of a Salesman'' (1949), ''The Crucible'' (1953), and '' A View from the Bridge'' (1955). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on '' The Misfits'' (1961). The drama ''Death of a Salesman'' is considered one of the best American plays of the 20th century. Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, '50s and early '60s. During this time, he received a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, he received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, the Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, and the Dorothy and ...
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Side Man
''Side Man'' is a memory play by Warren Leight. His inspiration was his father Donald, who worked as a sideman, in jazz parlance a musician for hire who can blend in with the band or star as a solo performer, according to what is required by the gig. Plot The play starts in the 1950s and follows the family through the next 35 years. The play's narrator is Clifford Glimmer, the only son of Gene, a talented but self-absorbed jazz trumpeter, and his alcoholic wife Terry, who describes the tumultuous relationship his parents shared and the haphazard career journey Gene followed over the course of three decades. Dedicated more to his music than his family, he refuses to accept a regular job to support them, and their home life gradually unravels. Clifford eventually assumes the role of breadwinner his father has forsaken and offers his mother the emotional support Gene cannot. Scenes alternate between the family's Spartan New York City apartment and the smoke-filled nightclubs and cabar ...
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You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown
''You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown'' is a 1967 musical with music and lyrics by Clark Gesner and (in a 1999 revision) Andrew Lippa. It is based on the characters created by cartoonist Charles M. Schulz in his comic strip ''Peanuts''. The musical has been a popular choice for amateur theatre productions because of its small cast and simple staging. Background John Gordon was credited with the book of the show, but according to Gesner's foreword in the published script, "John Gordon" is a collective pseudonym that covers Gesner, the cast members, and the production staff, all of whom worked together to assemble the script. ''The Guide to Musical Theatre'' notes that "John Gordon is a pseudonym for the staff and cast of the show. The original cast included Bob Balaban, Gary Burghoff, Bill Hinnant, Skip Hinnant, Karen Johnson (producer), Karen Johnson and Reva Rose." History During the early 1960s, Gesner had begun writing songs based on Charles Schulz's '' Peanuts'' characters, ...
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The Lion In Winter
''The Lion in Winter'' is a 1966 play by James Goldman, depicting the personal and political conflicts of Henry II of England, his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine, their children and their guests during Christmas 1183. It premiered on Broadway at the Ambassador Theatre on March 3, 1966, starring Robert Preston and Rosemary Harris, who won a Tony Award for her portrayal of Eleanor. It was adapted by Goldman into an Academy Award-winning 1968 film of the same name, starring Peter O'Toole and Katharine Hepburn. The play has been produced numerous times, including Broadway and West End revivals. Synopsis Set during Christmas 1183 at Henry II of England's castle in Chinon, Anjou, Angevin Empire, the play opens with the arrival of Henry's wife Eleanor of Aquitaine, whom he has had imprisoned since 1173. The story concerns the gamesmanship between Henry, Eleanor, their three surviving sons Richard, Geoffrey, and John, and their Christmas Court guest, the King of France, Philip II ''A ...
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Broadway Theatre
Broadway theatre,Although ''theater'' is generally the spelling for this common noun in the United States (see American and British English spelling differences), 130 of the 144 extant and extinct Broadway venues use (used) the spelling ''Theatre'' as the proper noun in their names (12 others used neither), with many performers and trade groups for live dramatic presentations also using the spelling ''theatre''. or Broadway, are the theatrical performances presented in the 41 professional theatres, each with 500 or more seats, located in the Theater District and the Lincoln Center along Broadway, in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Broadway and London's West End together represent the highest commercial level of live theater in the English-speaking world. While the thoroughfare is eponymous with the district and its collection of 41 theaters, and it is also closely identified with Times Square, only three of the theaters are located on Broadway itself (namely the Broadwa ...
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