Today's Birthdays 6/26

[do_re_milla]

Posted: 6/25/05 at 8:27pm

Jeanne Eagels 06/26/1890 - Oct 3, 1929 performer, source mat'l - appeared w/Mr. & Mrs. George Arliss in the following 3 plays: 1917 The Professor's Love Story; Disraeli; Hamilton. Daddies (George Abbott - wouldn't I just loved to have seen Eagels & Abbott together!); Rain (Robert Kelly); Her Cardboard Lover (Leslie Howard); film's The Letter (Herbert Marshall); Jeanne Eagels (Kim Novak)

Pearl Buck 6/26/1892 - 3/6/1973 American Nobel Prize-winning author The Good Earth (193

Peter Lorre 6/26/1904 - 3/23/1964 Hungarian-born American film actor - film's The Maltese Falcon, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Casablanca, The Raven; Lorre's performance in the film "M" is still 1 of the most chilling I've ever seen.

Babe (Mildred) Didrikson Zaharias 6/26/1914 - 9/27/1956 “The outstanding female athlete of the first half-century.” [AP 1950]; International Women’s Sports Hall of Famer, Olympic Hall of Famer, World Golf Hall of Famer, LPGA Hall of Famer, National Track and Field Hall of Famer

Richard Maltby 6/26/1914 - 8/19/1991 father of dir/lyricist Richard Maltby, Jr. - bandleader: Theme from The Man with the Golden Arm, St. Louis Mambo

Eleanor Parker 6/26/1922 - performer - origs Brigadoon & Where's Charley; 1976 Pal Joey [replaced in previews); film's The Sound of Music, Of Human Bondage, Caged, The Man with the Golden Arm, Dead on the Money

Joyce Ebert 06/26/1933 performer; Wife of prod/dir Arvin Brown - 1965 Tartuffe (John Phillip Law, Hal Holbrook, Salome Jens, Laurence Luckinbill, Roy R. Scheider, Sada Thompson); The Shadow Box (Geraldine Fitzgerald, Mandy Patinkin); The National Health (Rita Moreno); Watch on the Rhine (Jill Eikenberry, Geo. Hearn, Jan Miner); Requiem for a Heavyweight (John Lithgow, Geo. Segal); 1987 All My Sons (Richard Kiley, Jayne Atkinson)

Patti Allison 06/26/1942 performer - 1989 Orpheus Descending (Vanessa Redgrave, Tammy Grimes); Angel [based on "Look Homeward Angel", m&l by Gary Geld & Peter Udell](Fred Gwynne, Frances Sternhagen). What happened to this musical? Anyone see it?

Joseph Kolinski 06/26/1953 performer - Dance a Little Closer; The Human Comedy; 1984 The Three Musketeers; Les Miz; Titanic; beautiful voice & great guy! we worked on the demo CD for Quilts by lyricist Jim Morgan & Michael Stockler

Chris O'Donnell 06/26/1970 performer - The Man Who Had All the Luck; Short Talks on the Universe; film's Kinsey; The Sisters (Mary Stuart Masterson, Erika ChristensenEric McCormack, Maria Bello); The Three Musketeers; Dead Poets Society; Scent of a Woman; Fried Green Tomatoes; Batman Forever; Batman & Robin; The Bachelor; loved his character in Circle of Friends

SHOWS THAT OPENED ON THIS DATE:

1911 Irving Berlin makes his Broadway debut with the fifth edition of the Ziegfeld Follies. His songs include "Woodman, Woodman, Spare That Tree" and "You've Built a Fire Down in My Heart."

Laura 06/26/1947 - Otto Kruger

1975 George C. Scott stars as Arthur Miller's tragic hero Willy Loman in a revival of Death of a Salesman at Circle in the Square on Broadway. The play, directed by Scott, also features Teresa Wright, Harvey Keitel and James Farentino as the Loman family.

1991 George Bernard Shaw's Getting Married is revived on Broadway at Circle in the Square. Stephen Porter directs a cast that includes Elizabeth Franz, Patrick Tull, Simon Jones, Madeleine Potter and Walter Bobbie. The production will play 70 performances and close Aug. 25.

ON THIS DAY IN:

1819 - The bicycle was patented by W.K. Clarkson, Jr. of New York City.

1919 The New York Daily News was first published.

1948 The Berlin Airlift began in earnest as the United States, Britain and France began ferrying supplies to the isolated western sector of Berlin after the Soviet Union cut off land and water routes.

1951 Amidst the red scare of the Cold War era, actor J. Edward Bromberg refuses to answer questions at a hearing before the House of Un-American Activities Committee. A member of the Group Theatre, Bromberg's acting credits include Both Your Houses and Men in White.

1959 - CBS journalist Edward R. Murrow interviewed his 500th -- and final -- guest on Person to Person: actress Lee Remick. Just hours before this final broadcast, Murrow had presented his last news broadcast on the CBS radio network. CBS-TV had reportedly made $20 million from Murrow’s Person to Person series.

On June 26, 1963, President Kennedy visited West Berlin, where he made his famous declaration: "Ich bin ein Berliner" (I am a Berliner).

1982 Theatre marries music as legendary stage and film director Elia Kazan ties the knot with Frances Rudge, former wife of the manager of The Rolling Stones. The controversial director's many credits include the original Broadway outings of Death of a Salesman and A Streetcar Named Desire, as well as such classic films as "On The Waterfront" and the film version of "Streetcar."

2002 Dolores Gray, sultry-voiced Tony-winning actress (Carnival in Flanders) who starred on Broadway in Two on the Aisle, Destry Rides Again and 42nd Street, dies today in New York. Her birth year has been variously reported as 1924 and 1930.

2003 The Supreme Court, in a 6-3 decision, struck down state bans on gay sex.

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

Milla