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Terry Finn | |
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| Born | Teresa Jo Ann Bernadette Finn August 6, 1955 |
| Alma mater | Iona College (BA) |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Spouse | David L. Snyder (m. 1990) |
| Children | 1 |
Teresa Jo Ann Bernadette "Terry" Finn (born August 6, 1955) is an American actress best known for creating the role of Gussie Carnegie in the original Broadway cast of the Stephen Sondheim/Hal Prince/George Furth musical comedy Merrily We Roll Along and its Original Cast Album.
Terry was born in Long Island City, New York, the fifth child of Katherine (née Conley), an elementary school teacher, and Peter David Finn, a New York City fireman stationed in Brooklyn. Growing up on the Island, Finn attended St. Pius X Elementary School in Plainview. She made her stage debut at the age of 11 as a member of the Pius Players in the leading role of Flora in The Innocents. She attended high school at Queen of the Rosary Academy in Amityville where she studied to go on to a teaching career.
Finn began undergrad studies at Iona College in New Rochelle as a psychology major. Following an impromptu audition for Professor Roderick Nash, she was persuaded to switch her major to Communication Arts in the Theatre Department. As a member of the Iona Players, Finn appeared in a series of leading roles, from Blanche Du Bois in A Streetcar Named Desire [1] to Sally Bowles in Cabaret . Following her graduation, she was once again persuaded to return to Iona during post-grad summer session and was cast in the lead as Maria in West Side Story , this was her third Stephen Sondheim musical, which included roles as Marta in Company and Young Dolly in Follies .
Finn made her Broadway debut at the Morosco Theatre in Hugh Leonard's A Life as understudy to Dana Delany. [2] Following A Life, casting director Joanna Merlin chose Finn to create the role of Gussie Carnegie in Merrily We Roll Along . With music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, book by George Furth and direction by Hal Prince, this stage production is considered a musical theatre legend in spite of the fact that it closed after 52 previews and 16 performances. Despite a flurry of negative reviews, Clive Barnes raved in the New York Post that "A beautifully acrid comic skit is provided by Terry Finn as a producer's wife with even less morals than taste and a turn a phrase that would cause a viper to bite out its tongue in envy," and in the New York Daily News Douglas Watt wrote "There is also good work by Jason Alexander and his gushingly imperious wife Terry Finn." Following the brief run at the Alvin Theatre, the cast gathered at RCA Records Studio 'A' on November 29, 1981 — the day after the show closed — to record the original cast album. The album's popularity eventually led to a "Merrily We Roll Along Original Broadway Cast Reunion Concert" which was staged at the La Guardia Concert Hall in Lincoln Center on September 30, 2002. [3] [4] Following a search outlined in a Broadway.com article entitled "Finding Finn," Merrily director Lonny Price recalled, "Terry was dazzling in the role of Gussie ... I couldn't imagine doing [the reunion] without her and now I'm glad that I don't have to!" [3] Finn was reunited with her original cast mates in the one-night-only benefit that raised more than $200,000 for Musical Theatre Works. [4] Robert Simonson and Kenneth Jones of Playbill.com noted that the "inclusion of lesser-known songs considerably beefed up the role of Gussie, played by Terry Finn, who is barely present on the show's famous original cast album." [4] Finn is interviewed in Best Worst Thing That Ever Could Have Happened , a 2016 documentary film recalling the history of the show and the later lives of its actors, directed by Lonny Price.
Off Broadway, Finn appeared as Pearl Gordon in Clifford Odets's Paradise Lost at The Mirror Repertory Company under the direction of John Strasberg, as Kate Poplin in Big Maggie at the Douglas Fairbanks Theatre, [5] as Audrey in William Shakespeare's As You Like It with the New York Acting Unit and in regional theatre starred as Constanze Weber-Mozart in Peter Shaffer's play Amadeus in The Wells Theatre at The Virginia Stage Company. [6] The Navy News critic Janet Withers wrote that Finn's Constanze is "beautiful, talented and engagingly saucy." [7]
In addition to work in daytime soap operas in New York City, Finn has appeared in television movies, starring as Margie Moran in Seeds of Tragedy [8] for Fox Television Network, The Disappearance of Nora [9] for CBS Television and Shadow of Obsession [10] on NBC. In her television series debut, she guest starred as Mrs. Kitty Conley in an episode of Trial By Jury entitled 'Psychic Vision'. starring Raymond Burr. Produced by Dick Clark Productions and directed by Marty Passeta, Jr., it aired on September 15, 1989.
Finn's film debut was in Orion Pictures Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey (1991), followed by the 1993 Hollywood Pictures/Nintendo film Super Mario Bros. [11] Super Mario Bros. star Bob Hoskins invited Finn to co-star in a film project he was planning to star in and direct. This film was the 1995 fantasy Rainbow , with Finn in the leading role of Jackie Bailey and Hoskins as Frank Bailey, Jackie's father-in-law. [12] [13] Between Super Mario Bros. and Rainbow, Finn appeared as the Birthday Mom in Hollywood Pictures' Terminal Velocity (1994). In 2003, she appeared once again with Hoskins in Den of Lions . Finn will next be seen in the 2012 feature film Days of Wrath as Emily Conley.
Finn married motion picture production designer David L. Snyder on August 1, 1990, on Central Park West in New York City. They have a son Finn Henry Snyder who was born in Beverly Hills, California, on October 2, 1997. In 2005, they renewed their vows in the former offices of George Harrison's Handmade Films in Los Angeles, California, where they first met in January 1989.
Stephen Joshua Sondheim was an American composer and lyricist. Regarded as one of the most important figures in 20th-century musical theater, he is credited with reinventing the American musical. With his frequent collaborators Harold Prince and James Lapine, Sondheim's Broadway musicals tackled unexpected themes that ranged beyond the genre's traditional subjects, while addressing darker elements of the human experience. His music and lyrics are tinged with complexity, sophistication, and ambivalence about various aspects of life.
Amadeus is a play by Peter Shaffer which gives a fictional account of the lives of composers Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Antonio Salieri, imagining a rivalry between the two at the court of Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor. First performed in 1979, it was inspired by Alexander Pushkin's short 1830 play Mozart and Salieri, which Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov used in 1897 as the libretto for an opera of the same name.
James Elliot Lapine is an American stage director, playwright, screenwriter, and librettist. He has won the Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical three times, for Into the Woods, Falsettos, and Passion. He has frequently collaborated with Stephen Sondheim and William Finn.
By Jeeves, originally Jeeves, is a musical with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber, and lyrics and book by Alan Ayckbourn. It is based on the series of novels and short stories by P. G. Wodehouse that centre around the character of Bertie Wooster and his loyal valet, Jeeves.
Maria Friedman is a British actress and director, best known for her work in musical theatre.
Celia Keenan-Bolger is an American actress and singer. She won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for portraying Scout Finch in the play To Kill a Mockingbird (2018). She has also been Tony-nominated for her roles in The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (2005), Peter and the Starcatcher (2012), The Glass Menagerie (2014), and Mother Play (2024).
Tracie Bennett is an English singer and stage and television actress. She trained at the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts in Clapham, London. She played the role of Sharon Gaskell in Coronation Street from 1982 to 1984, returning to the role in 1999 and again in 2021.
Elizabeth Berridge is an American film and theatre actress. She is known for her roles as Amy Harper in the horror film The Funhouse (1981), Constanze Mozart in the period drama film Amadeus (1984), Charlotte in the TV sitcom The Powers that Be (1992–1993), and Officer Eve Eggers on The John Larroquette Show (1993–1996).
Liz Callaway is an American actress, singer and recording artist, who is best known for having provided the singing voices of many female characters in animated films, such as Anastasia in Anastasia, Odette in The Swan Princess, Jasmine in the Aladdin sequels The Return of Jafar and Aladdin and the King of Thieves, adult Kiara in The Lion King II: Simba's Pride, and a dancing napkin ring in Beauty and the Beast. She was also the original Ellen in the Broadway production of Miss Saigon.
Melissa Errico is an American actress, singer, recording artist and writer. She is known for her Broadway musical roles such as Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady and the title role in One Touch of Venus, as well as her recordings of musical theater classics, including albums of songs by Stephen Sondheim and Michel Legrand. In recent years she has become a contributing writer to The New York Times and served on the National Endowment for the Arts.
Merrily We Roll Along is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and a book by George Furth. It is based on the 1934 play of the same name by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart.
Lonny Price is an American director, actor, and writer, primarily in theatre. He is best known for his New York directing work, including Sunset Boulevard, Sweeney Todd, Company, and Sondheim! The Birthday Concert. As an actor, he is perhaps best known for his creation of the role of Charley Kringas in the Broadway musical Merrily We Roll Along, Neil Kellerman in Dirty Dancing, and Ronnie Crawford in The Muppets Take Manhattan.
Emily Skinner, also known as Emily Scott Skinner, is a Tony-nominated American actress and singer. She has played leading roles in 11 Broadway productions including New York, New York, Prince of Broadway, The Cher Show, Side Show, Jekyll & Hyde, James Joyce's The Dead, The Full Monty, Dinner at Eight, Billy Elliot, as well as the Actor's Fund Broadway concerts of Dreamgirls and The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. She has sung on concert stages around the world and on numerous recordings.
Mark Umbers is an English theatre, film and television actor.
Josefina Gabrielle Holmes, professionally known as Josefina Gabrielle, is a British actress and former ballet dancer, best known for her performances in West End musicals and plays.
Ann Morrison is an American actress, best known for her Broadway debut as Mary Flynn in the Stephen Sondheim/George Furth musical, Merrily We Roll Along directed by Harold Prince for which she won the 1982 Theatre World Award. Off-Broadway she played Lizzie in the highly acclaimed Polly Pen/Peggy Harmon musical Goblin Market which garnered her a 1986 Drama Desk Award Nomination as Best Actress in a Musical and a Best Plays Theatrical Yearbook Citation as Best Actress in a Musical.
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Jim Walton is an American actor, most notable for his leading performance in the original production of Stephen Sondheim's Merrily We Roll Along as Franklin Shephard.
Krystal Joy Brown is an American actress. She made her Broadway debut playing various roles in the musical revival of Hair (2009). She has since played Ornella Sturdevant in the musical Leap of Faith (2012), Josephine Bloom in Big Fish (2013), and Diana Ross in the jukebox musical Motown: The Musical (2014). She gained prominence and acclaim in a replacement role portraying Eliza Hamilton in the Lin-Manuel Miranda musical Hamilton, and as Gussie Carnegie in the Stephen Sondheim revival Merrily We Roll Along (2022–2024).
Best Worst Thing That Ever Could Have Happened is a 2016 American documentary film directed by Lonny Price and produced by Bruce David Klein with Price, Kitt Lavoie and Ted Schillinger. Scott Rudin and Eli Bush serve as executive producers. The film tells the story of the making of the original Broadway production of Merrily We Roll Along. The film is a production of Atlas Media Corp. in association with Allright Productions.
Terry Finn's portrayal of Blanche Du Bois, the illusionary princess of a world gone by, marks an impending destiny of distinction in her act. With diligence and the right breaks, she will prove a fine professional actor ... Finn adds grace and desperate hope, bringing the portrayal to its zenith.
For my money, the most surprising "new" interpretation is Terry Finn as Constanze Weber Mozart. The part has been heretofore been played largely as a bubble-headed libertine. Finn brings to it a fine mixture of earthy humor and eventual poignancy.
Constanza played by Terry Finn, is the wife of Mozart. She is beautiful, talented and engagingly saucy.
Photograph with caption. Director Bob Hoskins with actress Terry Finn prior to a visual-effects close-up of Finn's eye in the family fantasy Rainbow
Norbert Weisser as a German in Columbia, Conor O' Farrell as a bloodless betrayer, Lisa Lord as a would-be heroine, Gloria Hendry as a determined mother and Terry Finn as a victim help create a sense of impending doom.
