1922 Arthur Wing Pinero's The Enchanted Cottage constructs the story of a couple who find themselves transformed by their love for one another. Owen Nares and Laura Cowie are the lucky p…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1894 Birthday of playwright Ben Hecht (1894-1964) , author or co-author of The Front Page, Twentieth Century, Jumbo, The Egoist and The Great Magoo.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1848 English actress Ellen Terry is born today. She will make her American debut in 1883 with Henry Irving's company. She will go on to star in classic and contemporary works. The Terry …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1911 Chicago's Columbia Theatre opens its doors today. Architect J.E.O. Pridmore designed this house which seats 1,550. In 1923 it will become the Adelphi. In 1974 its doors will close f…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:19AM1900 Birthday of legendary Broadway producer and director Jed Harris (1900-1979), who will present The Royal Family, Broadway, Our Town, The Heiress and The Crucible. Also said to be the…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1876 Birthday of Broadway comedian Victor Moore (1876-1962), who starred or co-starred in the original casts of many musical comedies, notably Of Thee I Sing, Anything Goes, Louisian…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1960 The Dublin Gate Theatre will hear Chimes at Midnight. Orson Welles directs his adaptation of Shakespeare and Holinshead.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1930 Birthday of Marni Nixon, singer whose voice will be dubbed into the mouths of better-known performers, including Natalie Wood in the film of West Side Story. She will make her Broad…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1879 John Wellington Wells deals his magic and spells for the first time on Broadway with the American premiere of W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan's The Sorcerer at the old Broadway Th…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1893 Birthday of playwright and producer Russel Crouse (1893-1966), whose prodigious output of scripts, many in partnership with Howard Lindsay, includes State of the Union and The Great…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1900 A week-long engagement at Dublin's Gaiety Theatre by the Irish Literary Theatre does not cause much of a stir. The company stages The Bending of the Bough by George Moore, Maeve…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1859 Sholem Yakov Rabinowitz is born in Ukraine. Under the pen name Sholem Aleichem (1859-1916) he will write many stories in Yiddish, several of which will be adapted as plays, most not…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1902 Joseph Hart's popular musical Foxy Grandpa opens a 120-performance run today at the 14th Street Theatre.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1898 Birthday of Broadway leading lady and producer Katharine Cornell (1898-1974), who starred in and/or produced A Bill of Divorcement, The Age of Innocence, The Barretts of Wimpole Str…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1905 Birthday of composer Harold Arlen (1905-1986) a cantor's son who cut his musical teeth in 1920s Harlem, and went on to write music for Broadway shows, Star and Garter, Jamaica, …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1882 Birthday of John Barrymore (1882-1942), actor in the grand style, and scion of the Barrymore acting clan. Though he began as a light comedian, he became identified with the classics…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:18AM1904 Future set and costume designer Oliver Messel is born today in London.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1903 Birthday of Broadway leading man Todd Duncan (1903-1998), who will create the role of Porgy in Porgy and Bess, and star in the original productions of Lost in the Stars and Cabin in…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1901 A man marries his fiancee On the Quiet because his parents want him to finish Yale. Playwright Augustus Thomas based this comedy on a real incident. It unfolds at the Madison Square The…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1893 Birthday of Jimmy "Schnozzola" Durante (1893-1980), big-nosed comedian who would star on Broadway in Show Girl, The New Yorkers and Strike Me Pink. Catchphrases includ…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1865 Birthday of actress Beatrice Stella Tanner, better known by her stage name, Mrs. Patrick Campbell (1865-1940). She had a long correspondence with playwright George Bernard Shaw, and…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1907 Ray Middleton is born in Chicago, Illinois today. In 1946 he will star opposite Ethel Merman in Annie Get Your Gun, and in 1965 be featured in Man of La Mancha.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1812 Birthday of author Charles Dickens (1812-1870), whose "A Christmas Carol" has been adapted to the stage dozens of times and provides a durable annuity for theatre troupes …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1946 Mary Martin and Yul Brynner play a Chinese couple who separate when the husband goes off on a quest in Lute Song. Raymond Scott composed the score, and Sidney Howard and Will Irwin wrot…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:14AM1900 The scandalous Sapho [sic] is staged at Wallack's Theatre in New York. Based on Alphonse Daudet's novel, it stars Olga Nethersole as an evil woman who seduces a pure young man t…
SOURCE: Playbill at 11:59PM1938 Thornton Wilder turns the spotlight on the simple trials and tribulations of Our Town. Martha Scott and Frank Craven are among the cast at the Henry Miller Theatre. The production will …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1912 Birthday of composer Burton Lane (1912-1997), who will go on to write On a Clear Day You Can See Forever, Hold on to Your Hats, Laffing Room Only and his great hit, Finian's Ra…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:28AM1859 Birthday of Victor Herbert (1859-1924), Broadway's operetta king, composer of Babes in Toyland, The Red Mill, Mlle. Modiste, Naughty Marietta, Sweethearts and numerous editions …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1903 Future actress Tallulah Bankhead, who can count two U.S. Senators and a Congressman in her family, is born today.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1911 Hugh Herbert Hipple is born today in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. After dropping two H's, he will become suave actor Hugh Marlowe. In 1940 he will appear in Elmer Rice's Flight T…
SOURCE: Playbill at 11:59PM1860 Birthday of Anton Chekhov (1860-1904), one of the fathers of modern drama, whose comparatively small oeuvre includes classics The Cherry Orchard, The Three Sisters, The Seagull and …
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