Today's Birthdays 3/4

[do_re_milla]

Posted: 3/4/05 at 4:10pm

Antonio Vivaldi 3/4/1678 - 7/28/1741 Italian composer and violinist; The 4 Seasons

John Garfield 03/04/1913 - May 21, 1952 Father of Julie Garfield, performer - Lost Boy; Awake & Sing; Johnny Johnson; orig & 1952 Golden Boy; film's Destination Tokyo, Gentlemen’s Agreement, The Postman Always Rings Twice

Joan Greenwood 3/4/1921 - 2/27/1987 performer - The Confidential Clerk (Claude Rains, Ina Claire); film's Little Dorritt series, The Hound of the Baskervilles, Tom Jones, Importance of Being Earnest, Kind Hearts and Coronets, Frenzy

Paula Prentiss 03/04/1939 performer, wife of Richard Benjamin (1961 - present) - The Norman Conquests: Table Manners, Round & Round, Living Together; film's What’s New Pussycat; Last of the Red Hot Lovers, Where the Boys Are, Man’s Favorite Sport, He & She

Adrian Zmed 03/04/1954 performer, husband of Susan Wood - replacements in: Grease, Falsettos, Blood Brothers; Eating Raoul (Hot Monkey Love!)(Eddie Korbich); tv's & film's Improper Conduct, Eyewitness to Murder, Bachelor Party, The Final Terror, Grease 2, For the Love of It, T.J. Hooker, Goodtime Girls, Flatbush; TV host: Dance Fever

Steven Weber 03/04/1961 performer - Home Front; Loot; replacement in Producers

SHOWS THAT OPENED ON THIS DATE:

1933 Jimmy Durante and Lupe Velez star in the musical revue Strike Me Pink, which opens a 105-performance run today at the Majestic Theatre. The show has music and lyrics by Lew Henderson and Ray Brown.

1969 Guess there wasn't a right way to fix The Wrong Way Light Bulb, opening tonight. This play by Leonard Spigelglass (author of the recently-revived A Majority of One) will close at the John Golden Theatre after only seven performances. Barnard Hughes, Miriam Colon and Claudia McNeil starred.

1993 Marvin Hamlisch and David Zippel team up to create The Goodbye Girl, which opens at Broadway's Marquis Theatre. The musical, based on the 1977 Neil Simon screenplay, stars Martin Short and Bernadette Peters, who six years later will open at the same theatre with...

1999 ...a revival of Annie Get Your Gun, which hits the Broadway bullseye. Bernadette Peters stars with Tom Wopat in this Irving Berlin musical, directed by Graciela Daniele. The show's original book, written by Herbert and Dorothy Fields, has been updated by Peter Stone, with the politically incorrect songs "I'm An Indian, Too" and "I'm A Bad, Bad Man" excised. The show opens tonight at the Marquis Theatre.

2002 Mary Zimmerman's Metamorphoses, based on Ovid's tales, makes a splash on Broadway at its opening night, performed in and around a pool of water that takes up most of the stage at the Circle in the Square Theatre. It goes on to earn a Tony nomination as Best Play.

ON THIS DAY IN:

1922 Comedian and song-writer Bert Williams, 46, dies today in New York. Along with George Walker they formed a popular vaudeville team in 1895. In 1902, Williams wrote and produced In Dahomey, the first full-length Broadway musical written and performed by African Americans. After Walker died, Williams joined the Ziegfeld Follies.

1937 - Actor/producer/writer/composer/comedian and this night’s host, George Jessel, welcomed the glamorous crowd to the Biltmore Hotel in Los Angeles, the setting for the 9th Annual Academy Awards show. Which film was which, you ask? The envelope, if you please... For the films of 1936: Outstanding Production/Best Picture: The Great Ziegfeld (from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer); Best Director: Frank Capra for Mr. Deeds Goes To Town; Actor: Paul Muni (The Story Of Louis Pasteur); Actor in a Supporting Role: Walter Brennan (Come and Get It); Best Actress: Luise Rainer (The Great Ziegfeld); Actress in a Supporting Role: Gale Sondergaard (Anthony Adverse); Best Song: Dorothy Fields & Jerome Kern for The Way You Look Tonight from the movie, Swing Time.

1943 - The 15th Academy Awards presentation drew Hollywood luminaries to the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles to celebrate the great work done during the year 1942. Everybody seemed to like Mrs. Miniver (from Metro-Goldwyn- Mayer) better than any other movie that year. That movie was so good that it won William Wyler the Best Director Oscar; Greer Garson the Best Actress statuette; Teresa Wright the Best Actress in a Supporting Role prize; Joseph Ruttenberg the Cinematography/black-and-white Oscar; and George Froeschel, James Hilton, Claudine West and Arthur Wimperis the Writing/Screenplay award. Ah, but there was more to celebrate on that March night in 1943: James Cagney was presented the Best Actor Oscar for Yankee Doodle Dandy and Van Heflin was voted Best Actor in a Supporting Role for Johnny Eager. And one other award is worth mentioning: a guy named Irving Berlin picked up the Best Song Oscar for a little ditty he had written for the film, Holiday Inn: White Christmas.

1981 - Lyricist E.Y. ‘Yip’ Harburg died in an auto accident in Hollywood, CA at the age of 82. Two of his most successful hits were Over the Rainbow from The Wizard of Oz and It’s Only a Paper Moon, popularized by Nat King Cole and many others.

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

Milla

[DestinyBeckoned]

Posted: 3/4/05 at 4:30pm

My black boots turned 6 months old today!