Nikki M. James
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Nikki M. James
Nikki Michelle James (born June 3, 1981) is an American actress and singer. James has performed in the popular stage musicals ''The Book of Mormon'' and ''Les Misérables'', her role in the former having earned her a Tony Award. Life and career James was born to immigrant parents, a Vincentian father and a Haitian mother who settled in New Jersey in pursuit of the American dream. James grew up in Livingston, New Jersey where she would graduate from Livingston High School. As a child, she sang and acted in church and in school performances. She was nominated for a Rising Star Award at Paper Mill Playhouse for her performance as Dolly Levi in high school. She later attended the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University. James made her Broadway debut in the ill-fated ''The Adventures of Tom Sawyer'', and starred as Ottilie in the New York City Center ''Encores!'' production of '' House of Flowers.'' She played Adela in the Off-Broadway run of Michael John LaChiusa's mu ...
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65th Tony Awards
The 65th Annual Tony Awards was held on June 12, 2011 to recognize achievement in Broadway productions during the 2010–2011 season. They were held at the Beacon Theatre, ending a fourteen-year tradition of holding the ceremony at Radio City Music Hall. The Awards ceremony was broadcast live on CBS and was hosted by Neil Patrick Harris. The award nominations were announced on May 3, 2011. The ceremony received extremely positive reviews from critics, with many citing it as a major improvement over the previous year. Numerous critics credited host Neil Patrick Harris with the success of the production, with one critic calling him "America's next great awards host." Eligibility Shows that opened during the 2010–11 Broadway season before April 28, 2011 were eligible. The category of "Lead Actress in a Musical" has only four nominees. According to Tony Award rules, "Because only six actresses are eligible for nomination in the Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in ...
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The Adventures Of Tom Sawyer (musical)
''The Adventures of Tom Sawyer'' is a musical comedy based on the 1876 novel by Mark Twain conceived and written by Ken Ludwig, with music and lyrics by Don Schlitz. The musical is the story of a fourteen-year-old boy growing up in the heartland of America. This Broadway musical version of Mark Twain's novel is set in 1840 in St. Petersburg, Missouri, a bustling town on the banks of the Mississippi River. In the course of the story, Tom matches wits with his stern Aunt Polly, falls in love with the beautiful, feisty Becky Thatcher, and goes on the adventure of his life with Becky and Huckleberry Finn. Along the way he meets a terrifying villain named Injun Joe, Tom's bratty half-brother Sid, and all the other boys and girls in the village. Productions ''The Adventures of Tom Sawyer'' opened on Broadway at the Minskoff Theater on April 26, 2001 and closed on May 13, 2001, after 21 performances and 34 previews. The musical was directed by Scott Ellis with choreography by David Marqu ...
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Lucky Stiff
''Lucky Stiff'' is a musical farce. It was the first collaboration for the team of Lynn Ahrens (book and lyrics) and Stephen Flaherty (music). The show is based on the 1983 novel ''The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo'' by Michael Butterworth. It was created and performed at Playwrights Horizons off-Broadway in 1988, and won the Richard Rodgers Award for that year. The musical was seen in London's West End in 1997 but has not had a Broadway production. A film version had a limited release in theatres in 2015 but received mostly negative reviews. Productions ''Lucky Stiff'' premiered off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons in April 1988, playing for 15 performances. Directed by Thommie Walsh, the show starred Stephen Stout as Harry, Julie White as Annabel, Stuart Zagnit as Vinnie and Mary Testa as Rita. The musical was produced at the Olney Theatre, Olney, Maryland, in May 1989, starring Evan Pappas as Harry. It won the 1990 Helen Hayes Award for Best Musical, and Pappas w ...
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Christopher Plummer
Arthur Christopher Orme Plummer (December 13, 1929 – February 5, 2021) was a Canadian actor. His career spanned seven decades, gaining him recognition for his performances in film, stage, and television. He received multiple accolades, including an Academy Award, two Tony Awards, two Primetime Emmy Awards and a Grammy Award nomination―making him the only Canadian recipient of the " Triple Crown of Acting" to also acquire a Grammy nomination. He made his Broadway debut in 1954 and continued to act in leading roles on stage, playing Cyrano de Bergerac in '' Cyrano'' (1974), Iago in '' Othello'', as well as playing the titular roles in '' Hamlet at Elsinore'' (1964), '' Macbeth'', ''King Lear'', and '' Barrymore''. Plummer performed in stage productions, including '' J.B.'', '' No Man's Land'', and '' Inherit the Wind''. Plummer was born in Toronto, Ontario, and grew up in Senneville, Quebec, a suburb of Montreal. After appearing on stage, he made his film debut in '' St ...
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Stratford Festival
The Stratford Festival is a theatre festival which runs from April to October in the city of Stratford, Ontario, Canada. Founded by local journalist Tom Patterson in 1952, the festival was formerly known as the Stratford Shakespearean Festival, the Shakespeare Festival and the Stratford Shakespeare Festival. The festival was one of the first arts festivals in Canada and continues to be one of its most prominent. It is recognized worldwide for its productions of Shakespearean plays. The festival's primary focus is to present productions of William Shakespeare's plays, but it has a range of theatre productions from Greek tragedy to Broadway musicals and contemporary works. In the early years of the festival, Shakespeare's works typically represented approximately one third of the offerings in the largest venue, the Festival Theatre. More recently, however, the festival's focus has shifted to encompass works by a more diverse range of playwrights. The success of the festival c ...
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Caesar And Cleopatra (play)
''Caesar and Cleopatra'' is a play written in 1898 by George Bernard Shaw that depicts a fictionalized account of the relationship between Julius Caesar and Cleopatra. It was first published with '' Captain Brassbound's Conversion'' and '' The Devil's Disciple'' in Shaw's 1901 collection '' Three Plays for Puritans''. It was first performed in a single staged reading at Newcastle upon Tyne on 15 March 1899, to secure the copyright. The play was produced in New York in 1906 and in London at the Savoy Theatre in 1907. Plot The play has a prologue and an "Alternative to the Prologue". The prologue consists of the Egyptian god Ra addressing the audience directly, as if he could see them in the theater (i.e., breaking the fourth wall). He says that Pompey represents the old Rome and Caesar represents the new Rome. The gods favored Caesar, according to Ra, because he "lived the life they had given him boldly". Ra recounts the conflict between Caesar and Pompey, their battle at P ...
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Romeo And Juliet
''Romeo and Juliet'' is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare early in his career about the romance between two Italian youths from feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular plays during his lifetime and, along with ''Hamlet'', is one of his most frequently performed plays. Today, the title characters are regarded as archetypal young lovers. ''Romeo and Juliet'' belongs to a tradition of tragic romances stretching back to antiquity. The plot is based on an Italian tale translated into verse as '' The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet'' by Arthur Brooke in 1562 and retold in prose in '' Palace of Pleasure'' by William Painter in 1567. Shakespeare borrowed heavily from both but expanded the plot by developing a number of supporting characters, particularly Mercutio and Paris. Believed to have been written between 1591 and 1595, the play was first published in a quarto version in 1597. The text of the first quarto version was of poor quality, however ...
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La Jolla Playhouse
La Jolla Playhouse is a not-for-profit, professional theatre on the campus of the University of California, San Diego. History La Jolla Playhouse was founded in 1947 by Gregory Peck, Dorothy McGuire, and Mel Ferrer. In 1983, it was revived under the leadership of Des McAnuff. Since then, the Playhouse's repertoire has included eighty-four world premieres, thirty-two West Coast premieres, and eight American premieres, and has won more than three hundred honors, including the 1993 Tony Award as America's Outstanding Regional Theatre. It is supported, in part, by grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the California Arts Council, the City of San Diego, and the County of San Diego. It was announced on April 10, 2007, that Christopher Ashley would succeed McAnuff as artistic director. Among the productions that originated at the Playhouse before finding success on Broadway are ''The Who's Tommy'', Matthew Broderick's revival of '' How to Succeed in Business Without Really ...
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The Wiz
''The Wiz: The Super Soul Musical "Wonderful Wizard of Oz"'' is a musical with music and lyrics by Charlie Smalls (and others) and book by William F. Brown. It is a retelling of L. Frank Baum's children's novel ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' (1900) in the context of contemporary African-American culture. It opened on October 21, 1974, at the Morris A. Mechanic Theatre in Baltimore, and moved to Broadway's Majestic Theatre with a new cast on January 5, 1975. The 1975 Broadway production won seven Tony Awards, including Best Musical. It was an early example of Broadway's mainstream acceptance of works with an all-Black cast. It has had revivals in New York, London, San Diego, and the Netherlands, and a limited-run revival was presented by ''Encores!'' at New York City Center in June 2009. A big-budget film adaptation of the same name was released in 1978, with Ted Ross and Mabel King reprising their roles. A live television production of the stage version, '' The Wiz Li ...
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All Shook Up (musical)
''All Shook Up'' is a 2004 American jukebox musical with music from the Elvis Presley songbook and with a book by Joe DiPietro. The musical premiered on Broadway in 2005. Production history The musical had a developmental staging at the Goodspeed Musicals May 13-June 6, 2004, with most of the Broadway cast, except for Manley Pope in the lead role of Chad. Christopher Ashley directed, with choreography by Jody Moccia. The musical had a tryout in Chicago at the Cadillac Palace from December 19, 2004, through January 23, 2005.Jones, Kenneth" 'All Shook Up', the Musical, Gets Its Inspiration from Shakespeare and Elvis"Playbill, December 6, 2004 After the tryout, changes were made to the finale and to add "a more specific instrumental and vocal voice" for Chad.Jones, Kenneth playbill.com, April 8, 2004 and Jones, Kennet playbill.com, February 20, 2005 The characters and plot twists in the musical were inspired by William Shakespeare's ''Much Ado About Nothing'', ''Twelfth Night'', '' A ...
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Bernarda Alba
''The House of Bernarda Alba'' ( es, La casa de Bernarda Alba) is a play by the Spanish dramatist Federico García Lorca. Commentators have often grouped it with '' Blood Wedding'' and '' Yerma'' as a "rural trilogy". Garcia Lorca did not include it in his plan for a "trilogy of the Spanish land" (which remained unfinished at the time of his murder). Garcia Lorca described the play in its subtitle as ''a drama of women in the villages of Spain''. ''The House of Bernarda Alba'' was Garcia Lorca's last play, completed on 19 June 1936, two months before Garcia Lorca's death during the Spanish Civil War. The play was first performed on 8 March 1945 at the Avenida Theatre in Buenos Aires. The play centers on the events of a house in Andalusia during a period of mourning, in which Bernarda Alba (aged 60) wields total control over her five daughters Angustias (39 years old), Magdalena (30), Amelia (27), Martirio (24), and Adela (20). The housekeeper (La Poncia) and Bernarda's elderly m ...
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Michael John LaChiusa
Michael John LaChiusa (born July 24, 1962) is an American musical theatre and opera composer, lyricist, and librettist. He is best known for musically esoteric shows such as '' Hello Again'', '' Marie Christine'', '' The Wild Party'', and '' See What I Wanna See''. He was nominated for four Tony Awards in 2000 for his score and book for both ''Marie Christine'' and ''The Wild Party'' and received another nomination in 1996 for his work on the libretto for ''Chronicle of a Death Foretold''. Biography LaChiusa grew up in Chautauqua, New York, the eldest of three boys in an Italian Catholic family. His parents had a " ry mentally abusive" relationship; Michael was not close to his father, but was encouraged by his mother to pursue his interest in music.Green, Jesse."So Many Musicals to Write, So Little Time" The New York Times, 2006-03-05. Retrieved on 2008-02-29. He taught himself to play piano at the age of seven and had little formal music training. LaChiusa was influenced ...
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