Today's Birthdays 3/30

[do_re_milla]

Posted: 3/29/05 at 10:19pm

Francisco de Goya 3/30/1746 - 4/16/1828 Spanish painter; depicted political tyranny in his works; The Caprices, The Family of Charles IV, The 2nd of May, The 3rd of May; my fav the Majas & Girl at the Window

Vincent van Gogh 3/30/1853 - 7/29/1890 Dutch Post-Impressionist painter; The Potato Eaters, Sunflowers, The Night Cafe; Stary Stary Night

DeWolf Hopper 03/30/1858 - 9/23/1935 Husband of Hedda Hopper (1913 - 1922) divorced; performer - vaudeville comedian and musical comedy star, who was featured in Wang, Hoity-Toity and many early Gilbert & Sullivan productions. His signature bit was a dramatic recitation of "Casey at the Bat," which he reported did more than 10,000 times.

Sean O'Casey 03/30/1880 - 9/18/1964 playwright, source mat'l - Harvest Festival, The Plough and the Stars, Juno and the Paycock, Shadow of a Gunman, The Plough and the Stars; Juno

Richard A. Dysart 03/30/1929 performer - All in Good Time; 1967 The Little Foxes (Margaret Leighton, Anne Bancroft, E.G. Marshall); That Championship Season; tv's & film's L.A. Law, Wall Street, Back to the Future 3, The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, The Day of the Locust, Pale Rider, The Terminal Man, Wall Street

John Astin 03/30/1930 performer, Husband of Patty Duke (1972 - 1985) divorced; 2 sons - Sean Astin and Mackenzie Astin - 1954 Threepenny Opera; 1956 Major Barbara (Glynis Johns, Charles Laughton, Burgess Meredith, Cornelia Otis Skinner, Eli Wallach); tv's & film's The Addams Family, The Pruitts of Southampton, Operation Petticoat, Night Court, I’m Dickens, He’s Fenster, The Adventures of Brisco County Jr., National Lampoon’s European Vacation

Rex Robbins 03/30/1935 - Sep 23, 2003 performer - 1 Flew Over the Cukoo's Nest; The Changing Room; 1974 Gypsy (Angela Lansbury, Mary Louis Wilson, Zan Charisse); Comedians; Play Memory (Donald Moffat); 1987 All My Sons (Richard Kiley, Jayne Atkinson)

Warren Beatty 03/30/1937 performer, Kennedy Center Award Winner, brother of Shirley MacLaine, husband of Annette Benning (March 12, 1992 - present) - A Loss of Roses (Betty Field, Carol Haney); film's Splendor in the Grass, The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone, Bonnie and Clyde, McCabe & Mrs. Miller, The Parallax View, Shampoo, Heaven Can Wait, Reds, Dick Tracy, Bulworth, Town and Country; Academy Award-winning director: Reds [1981]; Heaven Can Wait, Dick Tracy, Bulworth; Irving G. Thalberg Memorial [Academy] Award [2000]

SHOWS THAT OPENED ON THIS DATE:

1946 Although protested by some cast members over demeaning stereotypes, St. Louis Woman will run 113 performances. Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer collaborate on this all-black musical. The powerhouse cast includes the Nicholas Brothers, Pearl Bailey in her Broadway debut, and Juanita Hall.

1970 Lauren Bacall hears the Applause. Betty Comden and Adolph Green adapt the film "All About Eve" at the Palace on Broadway. This musical is directed and choreographed by Ron Field. The show became one of the hardest tickets to get on the Great White Way. Critics called Bacall “a sensation.” The play, at the Palace Theatre, was an adaptation of the film, All About Eve. It will win a Tony Award for Best Musical.

1978 Christopher Durang makes his Broadway debut today with A History of the American Film, which manages to spoof dozens of film classics.

1980 Mark Medoff's Children of a Lesser God, which tells the story of a romance betwee a deaf woman and a hearing man, opens today en route to an 887-performance run and a Tony Award as Best Play. Lead Phyllis Freilich, who is deaf in real life, will win the Tony as Best Actress in a Play.

1982 John Pielmeier's Agnes of God takes over the Music Box Theatre on Broadway. Geraldine Page, Elizabeth Ashley, and Amanda Plummer are the threesome in this drama that unfolds over the body of a murdered baby. Plummer will go on to win the Tony Award.

2000 Susan Stroman's dance piece, Contact opens today at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre. It will run 1010 performances and win the Tony Award as Best Musical despite the fact that it has no original score and no musicians (dances are performed to taped tracks of pop and classical pieces).

2003 British comedians Sean Foley and Hamish McColl pay wacky tribute to forebears Morecambe and Wise in the imported hit The Play What I Wrote, a silly bit of clowning with an unusual gimmick: a different "Mystery Guest Star" each night. Among MGSs during the show's run: Nathan Lane, Kevin Kline and Roger Moore.

ON THIS DAY IN:

1942 From this day on, surgery would no longer painful -- at least, while it was being performed. Dr. Crawford W. Long performed the first operation while a patient was anesthetized by ether on this day in 1842 as he removed a tumor from the neck of a boy. Crawford had been observing several party-goers under the influence of nitrous oxide and sulfuric ether. Those folks were feeling no pain. And Crawford’s patient literally felt no pain as the good doctor removed a tumor from the man’s neck using the party concoction.

On March 30, 1981, President Reagan was shot and seriously injured outside a Washington, D.C., hotel by John W. Hinckley Jr. Also wounded were White House news secretary James Brady, a Secret Service agent and a District of Columbia police officer.

1986 Actor James Cagney died at age 86.

1987 - Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers brought $39.85 million -- more than triple the record for an auctioned painting. The sale was on the 134th anniversary of the birth of the artist. Singer Don McLean wrote and sang a musical tribute to this artistic genius, titled Vincent, in April of 1972.

1987 - The 59th Annual Academy Awards extravaganza emanated from the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion of the Los Angeles Music Center. Chevy Chase, Goldie Hawn and Paul ‘Crocodile Dundee’ Hogan hosted. (Hogan was also an Oscar nominee for Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen with Ken Shadie and John Cornell for Crocodile Dundee.) Now let’s get right to the good part: Best Picture: Platoon (Arnold Kopelson, producer); Best Director: Oliver Stone for Platoon; Best Actor: Paul Newman for The Color of Money; Best Actress: Marlee Matlin for Children of a Lesser God; Best Supporting Actor: Michael Caine for Hannah and Her Sisters; Best Supporting Actress: Dianne Wiest for Hannah and Her Sisters. And HBO (Home Box Office) earned its first Oscar as Down and Out in America tied for Best Documentary feature. The cable-TV film played in a Los Angeles movie theatre for one week to qualify for the Academy Award.

1992 - The 64th annual Academy Awards statuette-passing-out-party was thrown at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles. Funny man and actor/producer/writer/director Billy Crystal was host as that creepy The Silence of the Lambs (Edward Saxon, Kenneth Utt, Ronald M. Bozman, producers) won the prize for Best Picture of 1991. Silence also won the Best Director Oscar for Jonathan Demme; Best Writing/Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium for Ted Tally; Best Actor for the Anthony Hopkins and Best Actress for Jodie Foster. Jack Palance won Best Supporting Actor for playing Curly in City Slickers and the Best Supporting Actress Oscar was claimed by Mercedes Ruehl for The Fisher King. Best Music/Song: Alan Menken (music), Howard Ashman (lyrics) for Beauty and the Beast from, you guessed it, Beauty and the Beast.

(sources: IBDB, NYT's ON THIS DAY, 440.com’s Those Were The Days, Playbill.com)

Milla
Updated On: 3/29/05 at 10:19 PM