Sunday, January 25, 2015
1915 It'll be 90 in the Shade for only 40 performances. The unpaid actors will refuse to go on in this musical with a Jerome Kern score and book by Guy Bolton. Richard Carle and Marie Ca…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMFriday, January 23, 2015
1922 It's booze, jazz and The National Anthem. J. Hartley Manners' work showcases his wife, Laurette Taylor, and Ralph Morgan. This drama will run at the Henry Miller Theatre for 114…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMThursday, January 22, 2015
1912 Stop in at the Liberty Theatre in New York and see just what it takes when you're Elevating a Husband. Edward Everett Horton, Conway Tearle and Jessie Carter are among the cast of t…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMWednesday, January 21, 2015
1903 Dorothy, The Scarecrow, the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion are first seen on Broadway today in the original musical The Wizard of Oz, with music by Paul Tietjens and book and lyrics by L…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSunday, January 18, 2015
1882 Birthday of A. A. Milne (1882-1956), best-known as creator of the Winnie-the-Pooh books, but also a prolific Broadway playwright, author of Mr. Pim Passes By, The Truth …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSaturday, January 17, 2015
1911 Love is never easy, especially when a woman is the object of affection for The Scarecrow. Percy MacKaye used "Feathertop," Nathaniel Hawthorne's tale as a starting point f…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMThursday, January 15, 2015
1622 Birthday of Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by the nom de plume Moliere (1622-1673), one of France's greatest playwrights, who will go on to write Tartuffe, School for Wives, …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMWednesday, January 14, 2015
1903 Opening night of The Little Princess, Frances Hodgson Burnett play about a child, much in the same vein as her The Secret Garden. Little Princess will run just 34 performances.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMTuesday, January 13, 2015
1925 Birthday of one of Broadway's all-time greatest leading ladies, Gwen Verdon (1925-2000). She was nominated for the Tony Award as Best Actress or Featured Actress in a Musica…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMMonday, January 12, 2015
1878 Hungarian playwright Ferenc Molnár (1878-1952) is born today in Budapest. He will write The Good Fairy, The Play's the Thing, The Guardsman, The Swan and Liliom, the latter of…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSunday, January 11, 2015
1899 "I would rather play Ibsen than eat — and that's often what it amounts to," said Eva Le Gallienne, born in London today. Her determination and drive will lead her to a s…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSaturday, January 10, 2015
1820 Birthday of Louisa Lane Drew, matriarch of the Drew and Barrymore acting dynasty that would eventually include John Drew, Ethel Barrymore, John Barrymore, Lionel Barrymore and today'…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:27AMThursday, January 8, 2015
1900 Blanche Bates, who will go on to play Cho-Cho San in Madame Butterfly, now stars in David Belasco's Naughty Anthony. Oliver Redpath co-stars in this comedy at the Herald Squ…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMTuesday, January 6, 2015
1768 Birthday of John Durang (1768-1816), identified by scholars as one of the first American-born professional dancers and actors. Known for his "Dwarf Dance," "Sailo…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSunday, January 4, 2015
1905 Quivery-voiced actor Sterling Holloway (1905-1992) is born today in Cedartown, GA. He will become a fixture of Broadway's The Garrick Gaieties revues of the 1920s and '3…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSaturday, January 3, 2015
1909 Birthday of Victor Borge (1909-2000), pianist and comedian whose 1953 Comedy in Music ran 888 performances, the longest run ever for a solo musical on Broadway. He followed it with …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMFriday, January 2, 2015
1910 American actress Agnes Booth dies today at age of 63. She was the wife of Junius Brutus Booth, Jr. and the sister-in-law of Edwin Booth.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMWednesday, December 31, 2014
1879 World premiere of W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in New York, with Alice Barnett as Ruth.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMThursday, December 25, 2014
1865 Birthday of Fay Templeton (1865-1939), durable musical comedy actress from the 1870s to the 1930s. Her appearances include Roberta, Forty-Five Minutes From Broadway and Fiddle&#…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMWednesday, December 24, 2014
1904 Lillian Russell, a.k.a Diamond Lil, stars in Lady Teazle, a musical based on The School for Scandal. John Kendrick Bangs and Roderic C. Penfield provide the music to a score by A. Baldw…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSunday, December 21, 2014
1889 Beatrice Cameron stars as Nora Helmer in the U.S. premiere of Henrik Ibsen's groundbreaking drama, A Doll's House at Palmer's Theatre.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSaturday, December 20, 2014
1912 Laurette Taylor stars in Peg O' My Heart, written and directed by her husband, J. Hartley Manners. This story of a winsome orphan becomes a vehicle for Taylor, and she will revive …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMFriday, December 19, 2014
1865 Birthday of Mary Augusta Davey, who acted under the names Minnie Maddern, Minnie Maddern Fiske and Mrs. Fiske (1865-1932). Performer, director and producer of many dramas before and…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMThursday, December 18, 2014
1907 Playwright Christopher Fry (1907-2005), author of Ring Round the Moon and The Lady's Not for Burning, is born, with the additional surname of Harris, in Bristol, England.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMWednesday, December 17, 2014
1906 Opening night for Lew Dockstader's Minstrels, the final Broadway appearance for one of the last of the great minstrel shows. It runs 26 performances at The New York Theatre.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMTuesday, December 16, 2014
1899 Noël Coward is born today. He authored plays such as Hay Fever, Design for Living and Private Lives, many of which he performed in; scripts for the films "Brief Encounter" an…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSunday, December 14, 2014
1885 Birthday of Brock Pemberton (1885-1950), producer of many Broadway plays and comedies during a 30-year career, including the original Harvey, Miss Lulu Bett, Six Characters in S…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSaturday, December 13, 2014
1925 Birthday in West Plains, MO, of actor Dick Van Dyke, who will appear on Broadway in Bye Bye Birdie and The Girls Against the Boys, and create memorable TV and film roles in "The Di…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:28AMFriday, December 12, 2014
1902 There will be two debuts in Everyman. Edith Wynne Matthison makes her American debut, and Charles Rann Kennedy makes his stage debut.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMThursday, December 11, 2014
1893 Oscar Wilde gets his second Broadway production in a year with the U.S. premiere of his play A Woman of No Importance at Miner's Fifth Avenue Theatre.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMWednesday, December 10, 2014
1901 Sadie Martinot, Guy Bates Post, and Junius Brutus Booth play The Marriage Game. This drama, adapted by Clyde Fitch from Emile Augier's Le Marriage d'Olympe, highlights what ruin…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM 
