Guy Reginald Bolton was an Anglo-American playwright and writer of musical comedies. Born in England and educated in France and the US, he trained as an architect but turned to writing. Bolton preferred working in collaboration with others, principally the English writers P. G. Wodehouse and Fred Thompson, with whom he wrote 21 and 14 shows respectively, and the American playwright George Middleton, with whom he wrote ten shows. Among his other collaborators in Britain were George Grossmith Jr., Ian Hay and Weston and Lee. In the US, he worked with George and Ira Gershwin, Kalmar and Ruby and Oscar Hammerstein II.
Girl Crazy is a 1930 musical by George Gershwin with lyrics by Ira Gershwin and book by Guy Bolton and John McGowan. Ethel Merman made her stage debut in the first production and co-lead Ginger Rogers became an overnight star. Rich in song, it follows the story of Danny Churchill who has been sent to fictional Custerville, Arizona, to manage his family's ranch. His father wants him there to focus on matters more serious than alcohol and women but Danny turns the place into a dude ranch, importing showgirls from Broadway and hiring Kate Forthergill as entertainer. Visitors come from both coasts and Danny falls in love with the local postmistress, Molly Gray.
The Gillian Lynne Theatre is a West End theatre located on the corner of Drury Lane and Parker Street in Covent Garden, in the London Borough of Camden. The Winter Garden Theatre formerly occupied the site until 1965. On 1 May 2018, the theatre was officially renamed the Gillian Lynne Theatre in honour of Gillian Lynne. It is the first theatre in the West End of London to be named after a non-royal woman.
Richard Jonathan Fleeshman is an English actor and singer. His television career began as a 12-year-old, playing Craig Harris for four years in Coronation Street before going on to become an established television, West End and Broadway performer.
Singin' in the Rain is a stage musical with story by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, lyrics by Arthur Freed, and music by Nacio Herb Brown. Adapted from the 1952 movie of the same name, the plot closely adheres to the original. Set in Hollywood in the waning days of the silent screen era, it focuses on romantic lead Don Lockwood, his sidekick Cosmo Brown, aspiring actress Kathy Selden, and Lockwood's leading lady Lina Lamont, whose less-than-dulcet vocal tones make her an unlikely candidate for stardom in talking pictures.
Hugh Wooldridge is an English theatre director, theatre and television producer and writer, and stage lighting designer. Wooldridge was born in Amersham, Bucks, the son of British composer John Wooldridge and actress Margaretta Scott. He is the brother of actress Susan Wooldridge. Wooldridge currently specialises in large productions, often at the Royal Albert Hall, London. He also teaches, gives master-classes and runs workshops.
A Damsel in Distress is a 1937 American English-themed Hollywood musical comedy film starring Fred Astaire, George Burns, Gracie Allen and Joan Fontaine. Loosely based upon P.G. Wodehouse's 1919 novel of the same name, and the 1928 stage play written by Wodehouse and Ian Hay, it has music and lyrics by George and Ira Gershwin, and was directed by George Stevens, the second Astaire musical directed by Stevens; the first was Swing Time.
A Damsel in Distress is a novel by P. G. Wodehouse, first published in the United States on 4 October 1919 by George H. Doran, New York, and in the United Kingdom by Herbert Jenkins, London, on 15 October 1919. It had previously been serialised in The Saturday Evening Post, between May and June of that year.
Rosalie is a musical with music by George Gershwin and Sigmund Romberg, lyrics by Ira Gershwin and P.G. Wodehouse, and book by William Anthony McGuire and Guy Bolton. The story tells of a princess from a faraway land who comes to America and falls in love with a West Point Lieutenant.
Summer Peta Vaigncourt-Strallen is an English actress who has performed various roles on stage and screen. Her most notable theatre credits include Meg Giry in the West End production of Love Never Dies and Maria von Trapp in Andrew Lloyd Webber's revival of The Sound of Music at the London Palladium.
George Grossmith Jr. was an English actor, theatre producer and manager, director, playwright and songwriter, best remembered for his work in and with Edwardian musical comedies. Grossmith was also an important innovator in bringing "cabaret" and "revues" to the London stage. Born in London, he took his first role on the musical stage at the age of 18 in Haste to the Wedding (1892), a West End collaboration between his famous songwriter and actor father and W. S. Gilbert.
Scarlett Aimee Vaigncourt-Strallen is an English stage actress, best known for her work in musical theatre productions in the West End and on Broadway. She has received two Olivier Award nominations, in 2006 for her portrayal of Josephine in an adaptation of H.M.S. Pinafore, performed at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre and in 2012 for her role in Singin' in the Rain. Strallen is also a former voice actress.
Rob Ashford is an American stage director and choreographer. He is a Tony Award, Olivier Award, Emmy Award, Drama Desk Award, and Outer Critics Circle Award winner.
Sally Ann Triplett is a British singer and actress. She participated in two editions of the Eurovision Song Contest and West End productions.
Richard Dempsey is an English actor.
Primrose is a musical in three acts with a book by Guy Bolton and George Grossmith Jr., lyrics by Desmond Carter and Ira Gershwin, and music by George Gershwin. It centres on a writer whose story-within-a-story forms the basis of the plot. It was written expressly for the London stage, where it ran for 255 performances in 1924 and 1925. The musical played in Australia, but it was not performed in the United States until more than half a century after it was written.
Alex Gaumond is a Canadian actor, singer, songwriter and filmmaker best known for his involvement in West End theatre. He plays series regular gendarme Caron, the chief of police in Sainte Victoire, in the Channel 5 television series The Madame Blanc Mysteries, starring Sally Lindsay.
Miss 1917 is a musical revue with a book by Guy Bolton and P. G. Wodehouse, music by Victor Herbert, Jerome Kern and others, and lyrics by Harry B. Smith, Otto Harbach, Henry Blossom and others. Made up of a string of vignettes, the show features songs from such musicals as The Wizard of Oz, Three Twins, Babes in Toyland, Ziegfeld Follies and The Belle of New York.
Sylphide Charity Vaigncourt-Strallen, known professionally as Zizi Strallen, is a British actress, singer and dancer best known for playing Mary Poppins in the Cameron Mackintosh theatrical production of Mary Poppins.
A Damsel in Distress is a silent romantic comedy film released in 1919, starring June Caprice and Creighton Hale. The film is based on the 1919 novel A Damsel in Distress by English humorist P. G. Wodehouse. The director was George Archainbaud. The same novel later inspired a 1937 film.
