Today's Birthdays 5/26

[do_re_milla]

Today's Birthdays 5/26#0

Posted: 5/25/04 at 10:52pm

Aleksandr Pushkin 5/26/1799 - 1/29/1837 Russian poet, novelist, dramatist and short-story writer; The most famous of all the Blacks in Russian history. Pushkin was descended on his mother's side from Major-General Ibrahim Petrovich Hannibal--an Ethiopian prince who became a favorite of Tsar Peter I (1682-1725). Hannibal impressed Czar Peter "so well that he became a confidant and favorite, was revered at the court, and began the aristocratic Pushkin lineage. In an unfinished work, The Negro of Peter the Great, Alexander Pushkin pays homage to his illustrious ancestor." Mortally wounded in a duel - Eugene Onegin, The Bronze Horseman, Ruslan and Lyudmila, Southern Verse Tales; playwright: Boris Godunov; novelist: Tales of Belkin, The Captain’s Daughter

Isadora Duncan 5/26/1877 - 9/14/1927 American dancer, source mat'l

Paul Lukas 05/26/1887 - Aug 15, 1971 performer - 1937 A Doll's House; Watch on the Rhine (Anne Blyth, George Coulouris, Lucile Watson); Call Me Madam; Flight Into Egypt (Zero Mostel, Jo Van Fleet); The Wayward Saint (Dennis Patrick)

Al Jolson 5/26/1886 - 10/23/1950 American stage and film singer and comedian - film's The Jazz Singer, Rhapsody in Blue, Rose of Washington Square

John Wayne 5/26/1907 - 6/11/1979 performer - film's 7 Sinners; Reap the Wild Wind; Angel And The Badman; Tycoon; Three Godfathers; Donovan's Reef; Teh Alamo; film's Academy Award-winning actor: True Grit; my fav Stage Coach [read the short story it's based on "Boule de suif"!]

Robert Morley 5/26/1908 - 6/3/1992 English performer, director and playwright - film's Marie Antoinette, Around the World in 80 Days, The African Queen, War and Remembrance, Of Human Bondage, Istanbul

Peggy Lee 5/26/1920 - Jan 21, 2002 Lyricist, Writer, Performer - Peg; film's Mister Music, The Jazz Singer, Pete Kelley’s Blues, Is That All There Is?; sang for: Lady and the Tramp

James Arness 5/26/1923 - performer film's & tv's The Thing; Gunsmoke, How the West was Won, Hondo, The Alamo: Thirteen Days to Glory; Minneapolis, MN radio newscaster; brother of Peter Graves

Ron Holgate 05/26/1937 performer; husband of Dorothy Collins (1966 - ?) divorced; Anny De Gange; - origs Milk and Honey; A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum; 1776; Saturday Sunday Monday (Jan Miner, Sada Thompson, Eli Wallach); The Grand Tour (Joel Grey, Mark Waldrop); Musical Chairs (Scott Ellis); Lend Me A Tenor (J. Smith-Cameron)

Teresa Stratas 05/26/1938 performer - 1 of the great singing actresses/opera singers; Rags; film's Traviata

Philip Michael Thomas 05/26/1949 performer - No Place to Be Somebody (Mary Alice); The Selling of the President; Reggae; tv's Miami Vice

SHOWS THAT OPENED ON THIS DATE:

Mlle. Modiste 05/26/1913

1919 La, La, Lucille is notable more for being George Gershwin's first full Broadway score than its plot of a young dentist setting up an adulterous scene so he can divorce his wife. The New York Times will call it "The incarnation of jazz." There will be 104 performances at Broadway's Henry Miller Theatre.

1964 Following on the success of her Once Upon a Mattress, Carol Burnett stars Fade Out -- Fade In, an original musical written for her, and ever so slightly inspried by an incident in her early life , by Jule Styne, Betty Comden and Adolph Green. The show will run just 271 performances and Burnett will not appear in another Broadway show for more than 30 years.

1971 Cliff Gorman embodies comedian Lenny Bruce on stage in Lenny, on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre. Tom O'Horgan directs the production with his music and Julian Barry's words. The cast also features Joe Silver and Erica Yohn.

1983 Sam Shepard directs his Fool For Love, about a chance meeting between two former lovers at a seedy motel near the Mojave Desert. The Circle Repertory Company production opens Off Broadway and wins the 5 Obie Awards for the Best New American Play, for stars Ed Harris, Kathy Baker and Will Patton, as well as Shepard's direction.

ON THIS DAY IN:

1805 Napoleon Bonaparte was crowned king of Italy.

On May 26, 1868, the Senate impeachment trial of President Andrew Johnson ended with his acquittal as the Senate fell one vote short of the two-thirds majority required for conviction.

1913 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 American stage performers. Comedian Francis Wilson is elected Equity's first president.

1924 American composer and conductor Victor Herbert died in New York today. He is best known for his operettas Babes in Toyland and Naughty Marietta.

1940 The evacuation of Allied troops from Dunkirk, France, began during World War II.

1969 - Dick Cavett began a prime time summer TV series three nights a week on ABC. The critics said, “It’s two nights and three quarters of one too much for Cavett.” Within two years, ABC decided that Cavett would be the star of its late night offering five nights a week against Johnny Carson. Guess who kept his job? Oh, how I wish Cavett was on TV now!

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

Milla Updated On: 5/26/04 at 10:52 PM