Today's Birthdays 8/22

[do_re_milla]

Posted: 8/23/04 at 12:36pm

Claude Debussy 8/22/1862 - 3/25/1918 - French composer: Clair de Lune [featured in FRANKIE & JOHNNY], Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun, La Mer, Nocturnes, String Quartet in G minor; For me, his most gorgeous songs are "C'est l'extase langoureuse" (tr. "It is langorous ecstasy") fr the "Ariettes Oubliées", poetry by Paul Verlaine, and "La Cheveleur" (tr." The Tresses") fr. "Chansons de Bilitis" poetry by Pierre Louys. Without a doubt, 1 of the all-time great composers.

Dorothy Parker (Rothschild) 08/22/1893 - Jun 7, 1967 Lyricist, Composer, Source Material, Writer, Performer; author: News Item: Men seldom make passes/At girls who wear glasses; Enough Rope, Sunset Gun, Death and Taxes, Here Lies; New Yorker columnist - CANDIDE (Barbara Cook, Ira Petina); AFTER SUCH PLEASURES (Shirley Boothe); THE LADIES OF THE CORRIDOR (Walter Matthau, Vera Allen, Edna Best)

Francine Larrimore 08/22/1898 - Mar 7, 1975 performer - SPRING SONG (Garson Kanin, Morris Strassberg); film's John Meade's Women (Edward Arnold, Gail Patrick, Geo. Bancroft)

Mary Hay 08/22/1901 - Jun 4, 1957 wife of Richard Barthelmess - SUNNY (Marilynn Miller, Clifton Webb); SALLY (Marilynn Miller); film's DW Griffith's Way Down East (Richard Barthelmess); New Toys (Clifton Webb);

Joe Marr 08/22/1916 - Apr 1998 performer - orig THE ICE MAN COMETH (James Barton, Jeanne Cagney (Jimmy's sis)); MR. ROBERTS (Henry Fonda, David Wayne)

Ray Bradbury 8/22/1920 writer, source material - Fahrenheit 451, The Toynbee Convector, Martian Chronicles

James Kirkwood 8/22/1924 - 4/21/1989 American librettist, performer, playwright - Dance Me A Song; Auntie Mame [replaced in rehearsals]; P.S. Your Cat Is Dead!; A Chorus Line

Theoni V. Aldredge 08/22/1932 designer, wife of Tom Aldredge - SWEET BIRD OF YOUTH (Geraldine Page, Paul Newman); THE BEST MAN (Melvyn Douglas, Lee Tracy, Frank Lovejoy, Leora Dana); MARY, MARY (Barbara Bel Geddes, Betsy Von Furstenberg, Michael Rennie, Barry Nelson); I CAN GET IT FOR YOU WHOLESALE; ANYONE CAN WHISTLE; ILYA DARLING (Hal Linden, Melena Mercouri, Loukas Skipitaris); 2 GENTLEMEN FR VERONA; DANCE OF DEATH (Zoe Caldwell!, Robert Shaw!); BARNUM; orig 42ND ST.; 2000 BEST MAN; 2001 FOLLIES

Diana Sands 08/22/1934 - Sep 21, 1973 performer - A RAISIN IN THE SUN; BLUES FOR MR. CHARLIE (Joe Don Baker, David Baldwin, Pat Hingle, Rip Torn); THE OWL & THE PUSSYCAT (Alan Alda); TIGER AT THE GATES (Philip Bosco, Bruce Davison, M'el Dowd); WE BOMBED IN NEW HAVEN (Jason Robards, Ron Liebman); THE GINGHAM DOG (George Grizzard, Karen Grassle)

Valerie Harper 08/22/1940 performer, love this gal! - Li'l Abner; TAKE ME ALONG; Wildcat; SUBWAYS ARE FOR SLEEPING (Sidney Chaplin, Orson Bean, Carol Lawrence, Michael Bennett); OVID'S METAMORPHOSES (Lewis Arquette, Paula Kelly, Dick Libertini); TALE OF THE ALLERGIST'S WIFE; tv's & film's Li'l Abner; Freebie and the Bean; Emmy Award-winning actress: Rhoda, The Mary Tyler Moore Show; City, Valerie; Radio City Rockette. While spending her nights on stage, she attended Hunter College and the New School for Social Research, supporting herself between dancing gigs as a telephone canvasser and hat-check girl. Extremely active in prosocial causes off-camera, Valerie Harper was co-founder of an anti-hunger organization called LIFE (Love Is Feeding Everyone). When she's in town, she still goes to Luigi's for dance class.

SHOWS THAT OPENED ON THIS DATE:

1983 Cicely Tyson stars with Peter Gallagher as a tutor in rural Wales in a revival of Emlyn Williams' The Corn Is Green at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre.

1989 A.R. Gurney's play, LOVE LETTERS, opens today at the Promenade Theatre off Broadway. A series of love letters between one Andrew Makepeace Ladd III and one Melissa Gardner from the time of their childhood up to her death, the play transfers to the Edison Theatre on Broadway. This first week, John Rubinstein is Andrew and Stockard Channing is Melissa. Other pairings are George Segal & Dana Ivey, Treat Williams & Kate Nelligan, Timothy Hutton & Elizabeth McGovern, & Jason Robards & Elaine Stritch.

1989 PRIVATES ON PARADE opens: A British Military Entertainment troupe circa the late 1940s parks into the Roundabout Theatre for a 64-performance. The cast includes Jim Dale, Donna Murphy and a female impersonator.

1996 Al Pacino directs himself in Eugene O'Neill's HUGHIE at the Circle in the Square Theatre.

ON THIS DAY IN:

1485 England's King Richard III was killed in the Battle of Bosworth Field, ending the War of the Roses.

Leonardo da Vinci’s painting, Mona Lisa, was stolen from the Louvre Museum in Paris on this night in 1911. In a little over two weeks time, the French police arrested gothic poet Guillaume Apollinaire. He was charged with receipt of stolen property. But the space on the wall of the Louvre remained empty for at least two more years. Then, on December 13, 1913, Mona Lisa was found, undamaged, in the city of its origin. It seems that another Florence artist, this one of the 20th century, Vincenzo Perugia, had been arrested for stealing the painting. Vincenzo allegedly tried to sell the painting to an antique dealer.

1991 Actress Colleen Dewhurst dies today of cancer at age of 67. The thespian of stage & screen starred in such productions as Great Day in the Morning, The Ballad of the Sad Café, More Stately Mansions, All Over, Mourning Becomes Electra, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, All the Way Home and A Moon for the Misbegotten, winning Tony Awards for the latter two.

1994 The first day of business at Playbill On-Line, it will "go live" Nov. 22, 1994.

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

Milla