Today's Birthdays 6/14

[do_re_milla]

Posted: 6/14/04 at 12:11pm

Harriet Beecher Stowe 6/14/1811 - 7/1/1896 writer, source mat'l - Uncle Tom's Cabin; 1933 Uncle Tom's Cabin (Pedro De Cordoba, Otis Skinner); Sweet River (Walter Price)

John McCormack 6/14/1884 - 9/16/1945 Irish tenor, 1 of the sweetest voices ever; there's a legendary story that 1 day, Johnny Mac (as his friends & admirers called him) was leaving the old Met after rehearsals, as Enrico Caruso was entering. McCormack said to Caruso something like "And how is the world's greatest tenor today." To which Caruso replied, "I don't know, how are you today, Johnny?"

Burl Ives 06/14/1909 - 4/14/1995 performer - origs The Boys from Syracuse; Heavenly Express (John Garfield, Harry Carey, Russell Collins; dir. Robert Lewis); Sing Out Sweet Land (Alfred Drake, Juanita Hall); Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (Ben Gazzara, Barbara Bel Geddes, Pat Hingle); film's The Big Country; Cat on a Hot Tin Roof; Summer Magic (Hayley Mills); The Day of the Outlaw; East of Eden; Our Man In Havana (Noel Coward, Alec Guinnes, Ernie Kovacs, Maureen O'Hara); Rudolph, The Red-Nosed Reindeer

Dorothy McGuire 06/14/1918 - Sep 13, 2001 performer - orig Our Town [replaced Martha Scott]; 1940 Kind Lady (Melchor Ferrer); Legend of Lovers (Richard Burton); Winesburg, Ohio (James Whitmore); 1976 The Night of the Iguana (Richard Chamberlain, Sylvia Miles); tv's & film's The Young & The Restless; Swiss Family Robinson; A Tree Grows in Bklyn; The Enchanted Cottage; A Gentleman's Agreement; Friendly Persuasion; The Spiral Staircase; I still cry when I watch Old Yeller

Gene Barry 6/14/1919 (1 source give the yr as 1921) performer - Rosalinda (Shelley Winter, Jose Limon); 1943 The Merry Widow (Jan Kiepura, Marta Eggert, David Wayne); Catherine Was Great (Mae West; prod. Michael Todd); Happy as Larry (Burgess Meredith); Bless You All (Pearl Bailey, Bertram Ross, Jules Munshin); The Perfect Setup (Jan Sterling, Angie Dickinson); La Cage aux Folles; tv's & film's The War of the Worlds; Soldier of Fortune; Bat Masterson

Sam Wanamaker 06/14/1919 - Dec 18, 1993 father of Zoe Wanamaker; Producer, Director, Performer - orig Cafe Crown; The Gentleman From Athens (Anthony Quinn); 1950 Arms and the Man (Lee Grant, Anne Jackson, Francis Lederer); A Far Country (Steven Hill, Kim Stanley, Patrick O'Neal); A Case of Libel (Van Heflin, Sidney Blackmer); A Murderer Among Us (Tom Bosley); film's Sinbad & the Eye of the Tiger; The Competition; Superman IV: The Quest for Peace; Private Benjamin; Give Us This Day

Che Guevara 6/14/1928 - 10/9/1967 Argentine communist tactician of guerrilla warfare, source mat'l - Evita

Cy Coleman 6/14/1929 Producer, Lyricist, Composer, Writer, Arranger, Musical Director, Musician, Creative Consultant - composer of multidextrous scores for shows like Sweet Charity, I Love My Wife, On the Twentieth Century, The Will Rogers Follies, The Life and City of Angels will show him to be equally adept with jazz, operetta, Big Band, country and R&B. There was a story at Juilliard that "With Every Breath I Take" (fr City of Angels) was based on a Bach piece that Adele Marcus (piano teacher w/whom Coleman studied at Juilliard) used to assign to all her students. I'd love to know which one, because this is 1 of my very favorite songs. Anyone know the answer to this question.

Jerzy Kosinski 6/14/1933 - 5/3/1991 Polish-born American writer, performer - film's Being There; Reds

Donald J. Trump 06/14/1946 producer (yes, producer); Husband of Ivana Trump (1977-1990) divorced; 3 children, Marla Maples (1993-1999) divorced; 1 daughter, Tiffany - Paris is Out! (Sam Levene, Molly Picon, Zina Jasper); tv's The Apprentice

Gerry Burkhardt 06/14/1946 performer, stage mgr - Her First Roman; The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas; Crazy For You; Best Little Whorehouse Goes Public; film's Everyone Says I Love You

Eddie Mekka 06/14/1952 performer, husband of DeLee Lively (? - ?) divorced - origs Jumpers; The Lieutenant; tv's played "Carmine" on Laverne and Shirley

George O'Dowd 06/14/1961 Lyricist, Composer, Source Material, Performer - Taboo

Jere Shea 06/14/1965 performer - Passion

SHOWS THAT OPENED ON THIS DATE:

1956 The revue New Faces of 1956 showcases the talents of future stars Maggie Smith, Jane Connell, Tiger Haynes, Viginia Martin, Bill McCutcheon and Inga Swenson. The show offers sketches by Neil and Danny Simon, Paul Lynde and Louis Botto, and songs by Marshall Barer and Ronny Graham, among others.

1979 Flowers for Algernon, a new musical by Charles Strouse and David Rodgers, opens at London's Queen's Theatre. Based on the novel by Daniel Keyes, the show stars a pre-Phantom Michael Crawford as mentally handicapped Charlie Gordon, the same role that won Cliff Robertson an Oscar for "Charly," the film version of the novel. Cheryl Kennedy co-stars in the musical, which will run 28 performances and spawn an ill-fated Broadway production.

1979 Film star Al Pacino (already a household name thanks to the "Godfather" films and "Dog Day Afternoon") returns to his Broadway roots as the title role in Richard III. The production of the Shakespearean tragedy, staged at the Cort Theater, does not garner strong reviews for its leading man, whose persona is deemed unsuitable for the role.

ON THIS DAY IN:

1940 German troops entered Paris during World War II.

1940 The Nazis opened a concentration camp at Auschwitz in German-occupied Poland.

1943 The Supreme Court ruled schoolchildren could not be compelled to salute the flag of the United States if doing so would conflict with their religious beliefs.

1954 President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed an order adding the words "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance.

1986 Alan Jay Lerner, lyricist and librettist of a number of musicals, dies today at the age of 67. Frederick Loewe, his long-time collaborator, and he produced such shows as Brigadoon, Paint Your Wagon, My Fair Lady, Camelot and Gigi.

1988 Director José Quintero helms a revival of Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey Into Night at Broadway's Neil Simon Theatre. Jason Robards stars as James Tyrone and Colleen Dewhurst as his wife Mary in the production that runs in repertory with another O'Neill play, Ah, Wilderness.

1989 Actress Zsa Zsa Gabor was arrested for slapping a Beverly Hills police officer.

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

Milla Updated On: 6/14/04 at 12:11 PM