1942 Gypsy Rose Lee and Bobby Clark are featured in Michael Todd's musical revue, Star and Garter, which opens a 609-performance run at the Music Box Theatre.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1927 Birthday of Robert Louis Fosse, better known as Bob Fosse (1927-1987), master director-choreographer known for his sexy hip-swiveling dances in shows including The Pajama Ga…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1920 Opening night of the starry Ziegfeld Follies of 1920 at the New Amsterdam Theatre, featuring performances by Fanny Brice, W.C. Fields and Moran & Mack; and music by Irving Berli…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:26AM1903 Caricaturist Al Hirschfeld (1903-2003) is born today. His distinctive looping line drawings will capture the essence of Broadway shows from the 1920s through the early 2000s. The Ma…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1905 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…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1939 Lee and J. J. Shubert collaborate with Hellzapoppin creators Ole Olsen and Chic Johnson to present The Streets of Paris on Broadway at the Broadhurst Theatre. The revue's stars inc…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1956 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 12:00AM1943 George Marion, Jr. and Thomas "Fats" Waller's Early to Bed — the first musical comedy of the 1943-1944 season — opens on Broadway at the Broadhurst Theatre. Descr…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1888 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…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1894 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, Kat…
SOURCE: Playbill at 01:00AM1929 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…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1963 Stage actor Howard Da Silva finds himself at the other end of the spectrum: as director of a Lewis John Carlino double bill. Shelley Winters and Jack Warden star in the two one acts, Sn…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1955 The American actor-manager Walter Hampden dies in Hollywood at age 75. In 1925 he leased the Colonial Theatre and played in revivals of Ibsen and Shakespeare. Cyrano de Bergerac was…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:19AM1922 Birthday of Frances Ethel Gumm, better known as Judy Garland (1922-1969), star of numerous Hollywood film musicals including "The Wizard of Oz." Her Broadway experience co…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1891 Birthday of composer Cole Porter (1891-1964), whose witty, urbane songs will grace five decades of musicals, including Anything Goes, Can-Can, Gay Divorce, Silk Stockings and hi…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1925 Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart make their lyric and songwriting debut in The Garrick Gaieties at Broadway's Garrick Theatre. In the cast are Sterling Holloway, Sanford Meisner, Phi…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1909 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 …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1954 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 12:00AM1939 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. Bo…
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1968 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 12:00AM1954 Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II's Carousel is revived for a ten-week run at the New York City Center. In the cast are Barbara Cook and Jo Sullivan.
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1914 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 01:00AM1946 Orson Welles circumnavigated the stage in Around The World, a musical he adapted from the Jules Verne novel, “Around the World in Eighty Days,” Cole Porter provided …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1868 Birthday of producer/director/manager Charles Dillingham (1868-1934), whose productions included As Good as New, The Last of Mrs. Cheyney, Sunny, Bulldog Drummond, The Red Mill and …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1951 Performer Fanny Brice dies today in Hollywood at age 60. She started in showbiz by winning a series of amateur nights at vaudeville theatres in Brooklyn, then graduated to Burlesque as …
SOURCE: Playbill at 12:00AM1940 Victor Moore, William Gaxton and Vera Zorina star in the Irving Berlin musical Louisiana Purchase, which runs 444 performances at the Imperial Theatre.
SOURCE: Playbill at 01:00AM1913 One hundred and twelve actors gather at the Pabst Grand Circle Hotel near Columbus Circle in New York City and vote to form Actors’ Equity Association, the union representing …
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 05:58PM1900 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 mod…
SOURCE: Playbill at 05:58PM1908 Actor Rex Harrison is born today. He will make his London debut in Florence Kilpatrick's Getting George Married. He will star in the London production of Noel Coward's Design for Living…
SOURCE: Playbill at 05:58PM1900 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 by Edwa…
SOURCE: Playbill at 05:58PM
