Monday, June 25, 2012
1887 Birthday of legendary director George Abbott (1887-1995) whose long life (107 years) and colossal catalog (more than 110 Broadway shows, sometimes also as producer, writer or even actor…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMWednesday, June 20, 2012
1905 Birthday of playwright Lillian Hellman (1905-1984), who will go on to write The Children's Hour, The Little Foxes, Another Part of the Forest, Watch on the Rhine and the book to Can…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMMonday, June 18, 2012
1956 The Stratford Shakespeare Festival in Ontario kicks off its season with productions of Henry V, The Merry Wives of Windsor, and Benjamin Britten's The Rape of Lucretia. Also include…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSaturday, June 16, 2012
1888 Birthday of Broadway comedian Bobby Clark (1888-1960), best known for his drawn-on eyeglasses and slapstick comedy style, often in tandem with sidekick Paul McCullough. Clark's resu…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMFriday, June 15, 2012
1894 Birthday of Robert Russell Bennett (1894-1981), orchestrator of Broadway classics including the original Sunny; Show Boat; Anything Goes; Oklahoma!; Annie Get Your Gun; Kiss Me, Kate; T…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMThursday, June 14, 2012
1929 Birthday of Broadway composer Cy Coleman, (1929-2004) whose multidextrous scores for shows like Sweet Charity, I Love My Wife, On the Twentieth Century, The Will Rogers Follies, The Lif…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMThursday, June 7, 2012
1909 Birthday of Broadway star Jessica Tandy (1909-1994), who created many landmark roles including Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire, Agnes in A Delicate Balance and Fonsia in The …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMWednesday, June 6, 2012
1954 Playwright and actor Harvey Fierstein is born today. Fierstein will win Tony Awards for writing and performing in his play Torch Song Trilogy, as well as for his book for the musical La…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMTuesday, June 5, 2012
1939 Actor James Barton, a star of the Broadway hit Tobacco Road, returns to the show today after having been fired the previous February after quarreling with his co-stars backstage. Box of…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMMonday, June 4, 2012
1968 Stage and screen actress Dorothy Gish dies today in Rapallo, Italy. Her first New York stage appearance was in 1903 in East Lynne. She began her film career in 1912, but resumed her sta…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSunday, June 3, 2012
1866 Birthday of playwright and producer George Broadhurst (1866-1952), responsible for dozens of plays and musicals, including the first stage adaptation of Tarzan of the Apes. Also, namesa…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMFriday, June 1, 2012
1914 The Ziegfeld Follies of 1914 stars Ed Wynn. Leon Errol dances and co-directs with Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr. There will be 112 performances at the New Amsterdam Theatre in New York.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSunday, May 27, 2012
1953 John Mills is The Uninvited Guest at London's St. James's Theatre. Written by his wife, Mary Hayley Bell, and co-starring Cathleen Nesbitt and Joan Greenwood, this story of a ma…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMTuesday, May 22, 2012
1907 Birthday of Laurence Olivier (1907-1989), preeminent British actor of his generation. His dozens of notable appearances included Romeo and Juliet, The Entertainer, Becket, Private Lives…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMFriday, May 18, 2012
1923 Sweet Nell of Old Drury runs beyond the season at the 48th Street Theatre in New York. Alfred Lunt stars as Charles II and Laurette Taylor is his mistress Nell Gwynne. Lynn Fontanne and…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMTuesday, May 15, 2012
1922 Father and son playwriting team J.C. and Elliott Nugent come up with Kempy. They also star in this comedy of mixed-up lovers, staged by Augustin Duncan. Performances will run at Broadwa…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMMonday, May 14, 2012
All data provided by The Broadway League
View Broadway Grosses in a sortable table or view by show at the Playbill Vault
SOURCE: Playbill at 04:07PMSunday, May 13, 2012
1907 Writer-playwright Daphne du Maurier is born to actor Gerald and actress Muriel du Maurier. Daphne will later adapt her novel Rebecca into a play.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMFriday, May 11, 2012
1903 In The Runaways with a book by Addison Brukhardt and a score by Raymond Hubbell, the hero is transported to a tropical island and will be made a king. The catch? He must marry the queen…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMWednesday, May 9, 2012
1860 Birthday of James M. Barrie (1860-1937), British author and playwright whose creations will include What Every Woman Knows, The Little Minister, The Admirable Crichton and the work that…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMTuesday, May 8, 2012
1892 Birthday of opera singer Ezio Pinza (1892-1957) who made two memorable Broadway appearances, in Fanny and South Pacific, the latter creating the role of Emile deBecque and singing "…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMMonday, May 7, 2012
1915 Among the dead after the sinking of the Lusitania are producer-manager Charles Frohman and playwright Charles Klein. Frohman's first success was Shenandoah. In 1893 he opened the Em…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSunday, May 6, 2012
1912 Richard Le Gallienne's Orestes stars Edyth Olive and Rathmel Wilson. It plays at London's Boudoir Theatre.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMFriday, May 4, 2012
1859 Birthday of A.L. Erlanger (1859-1930), who, as half of the team of Klaw and Erlanger, produced dozens of Broadway shows during the first three decades of the 20th century, including Dra…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMWednesday, May 2, 2012
1887 Birthday of Vernon Castle who, with wife and dancing partner Irene Castle, would redefine not just what dancing represented on Broadway, but the kind of music used for that dancing. He …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMTuesday, May 1, 2012
1922 Comedy team Potash and Perlmutter are Partners Again. The show plays 31 weeks at the Selwyn Theatre.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMMonday, April 30, 2012
1924 Birthday of Sheldon Harnick, who will go on to write lyrics to musicals including Fiorello!, She Loves Me, The Apple Tree and Fiddler on the Roof.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMSaturday, April 28, 2012
1900 Cho-Cho San and her passionate and tragic love illuminate David Belasco's adaptation of John Luther Long's story, Madame Butterfly. It is oddly paired on a double bill at The Duke of Y…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMFriday, April 27, 2012
1903 The Cohan family is Running for Office. Son George M. wrote the book and the music at the 14th Street Theatre. It will run for six weeks.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMThursday, April 26, 2012
1926 Sex. It's a comedy. Mae West plays a Canadian woman with no time for those mountees; it's the British navy for her. It runs through one season, but the following it is raided as…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AMWednesday, April 25, 2012
1927 When a woman loves sailors so much she follows them all around the world, it's time to Hit the Deck. Vincent Youmans provides the score for Herbert Fields' book adapted from the…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM 
