Broadway stars and their real names

#1

Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 11:18am

Stage names and legal name changes are a part of show business. So let's see how many we know

Nathan Lane's real name is Joseph Lane. When he went to get his Actors Equity card, there was already a Joseph Lane registered. He changed his name to Nathan because he loves GUYS & DOLLS and had played Nathan Detroit... but mainly because he wanted to be unique

Bernadette Peters was born Bernadette Lazarra.

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"TO LOVE ANOTHER PERSON IS TO SEE THE FACE OF GOD"- LES MISERABLES--- "THERE'S A SPECIAL KIND OF PEOPLE KNOWN AS SHOW PEOPLE... WE'RE BORN EVERY NIGHT AT HALF HOUR CALL!"--- CURTAINS

Updated On: 6/25/06 at 11:18 AM

#2

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 11:20am

Idina Menzel-Indina Meitzel

#3

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 11:34am

Elaine Paige ---> Elaine Bickerstaff

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All the best performers bring to their role something more, something different than what the author put on paper. That's what makes theatre live. That's why it persists. - Stephen Sondheim

#4

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 11:35am

Idina Menzel was actually just Idina Mentzel

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"But now the air is filled with confusion. We replace care with illusion."

#5

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 11:42am

LaChanze is LaChanze Sapp-Gooding

#6

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 11:43am

Good to know she has a last name!

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...What happened next, was stranger still, a woman breathless and afraid, appeared out of the night, completely dressed in white. She had a secret she would tell, of one who had mistreated her. Her face and frightened gaze, my mind cannot erase...But then she ran from view. She looked so much like you...

#7

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 11:48am

I was going to say, Idina merely changed the spelling of her last name... Thank you, greenegirl87

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"TO LOVE ANOTHER PERSON IS TO SEE THE FACE OF GOD"- LES MISERABLES--- "THERE'S A SPECIAL KIND OF PEOPLE KNOWN AS SHOW PEOPLE... WE'RE BORN EVERY NIGHT AT HALF HOUR CALL!"--- CURTAINS

#8

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 11:56am

Ethel Merman was bron Ethel Zimmermann.

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I am a firm believer in serendipity- all the random pieces coming together in one wonderful moment, when suddenly you see what their purpose was all along.

#9

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 11:57am

Bernadette Peters' name is not from her mother's maiden name. Her name came from her father's first name, Peter Lazzara.

Her mother changed her name when she got her equity card so that she would not be typecast in only "Italian" roles. She also mentioned once that her mother thought her original name was too long to fit on a marquee...which is funny because her current name is only one letter shorter.

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"Let's admit one thing right upfront: With the possible exception of Bernadette Peters, not everyone stays young and cute forever." (NYPost 2/2/05)

Updated On: 6/25/06 at 11:57 AM

#10

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 12:02pm

Taye Diggs was Scott Diggs.

#11

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 12:04pm

Are there any reasons as to why they wanted to change their names?

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Back, he spurred like a madman, shrieking a curse to the sky. With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier brandished high! Blood-red were the spurs i' the golden noon; wine-red was his velvet coat, when they shot him down on the highway, down like a dog on the highway, and he lay in his blood on the highway, with the bunch of lace at his throat... (The Highwayman. Sung by: Loreena McKennitt)

#12

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 12:07pm

Helen Hayes was born Helen Hayes Brown.

Meryl Streep was born Mary Louise Streep.

EDIT: Usually it's one of three reasons why an actor changes his/her name:

1) It sounds "ordinary."
2) It sounds "funny" or "odd" to most people, or is easily mispronounced.
3) It sounds too similar to another actor or member of an acting union.

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"Jaws is the Citizen Kane of movies."

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blocked: logan2, Diamonds3, Hamilton22

Updated On: 6/25/06 at 12:07 PM

#13

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 12:09pm

GUH! *hangs head* Oops... I forgot my Bernie lore for a moment and mixed up info. Should have looked instead of going with what I had in my head

Thanks, azeller

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"TO LOVE ANOTHER PERSON IS TO SEE THE FACE OF GOD"- LES MISERABLES--- "THERE'S A SPECIAL KIND OF PEOPLE KNOWN AS SHOW PEOPLE... WE'RE BORN EVERY NIGHT AT HALF HOUR CALL!"--- CURTAINS

#14

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 12:15pm

isn't michael Ardens real name Michael Moore. I know he picked Arden because of As You Like It

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#15

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 12:35pm

I know the story behind the whole Scott to Taye transformation, and its funny, but slightly embarrassing and kinda like an episode of Good Times. Lets just say his family and friends still call him Scott.

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I got rid of my teeth at a young age because... I'm straight. Teeth are for gay people. That's why fairies come and get them

#16

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 1:04pm

I'm the only person who has my name. I used to hate it but now I like it cos it's so unique.

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Hartt School class of 2010 ;-)

#17

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 1:18pm

I think Bradd Wong changed his name to B.D. Wong for his role in M BUTTERFLY so as not to spoil the plot twist. After he won the Tony, I guess there was no turning back

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#18

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 1:23pm

If I ever get into Equity, I think I'm going to have to change my name. There already has to be someone with it- it's so ordinary.

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"This table, he is over one hundred years old. If I could, I would take an old gramophone needle and run it along the surface of the wood. To hear the music of the voices. All that was said." - Doug Wright, I Am My Own Wife

#19

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 1:23pm

I thought Lachanze's name was

Rhonda Lachanze Sapp?

#20

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 1:33pm

Can you imagine? Rhonda Sapp, star of "The Color Purple." It sounds so much more effective to say LaChanze.

...And Whoopi Goldberg's real name is... Caryn Elaine Johnson.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

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"Jaws is the Citizen Kane of movies."

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blocked: logan2, Diamonds3, Hamilton22

Updated On: 6/25/06 at 01:33 PM

#21

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 1:44pm

Ruthie Henshall's real name is: Valentine Ruth Henshall

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#22

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 1:48pm

Jai Rodriguez's real first name is David.

#23

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 2:59pm

Ruthie/Ruth Valentine would have been a cute stage name.

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Rosencrantz: "Be happy - if you're not even HAPPY what's so good about surviving? We'll be all right. I suppose we just go on." - from Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead

#24

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 3:52pm

I actually emailed Actor's Equity a few years ago to check if someone had taken my name yet. No one had, and I'm hoping that no one will!

#25

re: Broadway stars and their real names

Posted: 6/25/06 at 3:57pm

Maya Days' real name is Laura Dias (which was the name she went by while she was in Rent, back in the day).