Harvey Forbes Fierstein is an American actor, playwright and screenwriter. He is best known for his theater work in Torch Song Trilogy and Hairspray and movie roles in Mrs. Doubtfire, Independence Day, and as the voice of Yao in Mulan and Mulan II. Fierstein won two Tony Awards, Best Actor in a Play and Best Play, for Torch Song Trilogy. He received his third Tony Award, Best Book of a Musical, for the musical La Cage aux Folles and his fourth, the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical, for playing Edna Turnblad in Hairspray. Fierstein also wrote the book for the Tony Award-winning musicals Kinky Boots, Newsies, and A Catered Affair. He was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 2007.
Cabaret is a 1966 musical with music by John Kander, lyrics by Fred Ebb, and book by Joe Masteroff. The musical was based on John Van Druten's 1951 play I Am a Camera which was adapted from Goodbye to Berlin (1939), a semi-autobiographical novel by Anglo-American writer Christopher Isherwood which drew upon his experiences in the poverty-stricken Weimar Republic and his relationship with nineteen-year-old cabaret singer Jean Ross.
Show Boat is a musical with music by Jerome Kern and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II. It is based on Edna Ferber's best-selling 1926 novel of the same name. The musical follows the lives of the performers, stagehands and dock workers on the Cotton Blossom, a Mississippi River show boat, over 40 years from 1887 to 1927. Its themes include racial prejudice and tragic, enduring love. The musical contributed such classic songs as "Ol' Man River", "Make Believe", and "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man".
Streamers is a play by David Rabe.
The Drury Lane Theatres were a group of six theatres in the Chicago area founded by Tony DeSantis. The playhouses were named after the historic Theatre Royal Drury Lane, built in London in the 17th century. The five suburban locations all provided affordable dinner theatre that was appropriate for families.
Richard Greenberg is an American playwright and television writer known for his subversively humorous depictions of middle-class American life. He has had more than 25 plays premiere on and off-broadway in New York City and eight at the South Coast Repertory Theatre, including The Violet Hour, Everett Beekin, and Hurrah at Last.
Theresa Rebeck is an American playwright, television writer, and novelist. Her work has appeared on the Broadway and Off-Broadway stage, in film, and on television. Among her awards are the Mystery Writers of America's Edgar Award. In 2012, she received the Athena Film Festival Award for Excellence as a Playwright and Author of Films, Books, and Television. She is a 2009 recipient of the Alex Awards. Her works have influenced American playwrights by bringing a feminist edge in her old works.
Craig Wright is a playwright, television producer and writer. He is known for writing for shows including Six Feet Under and Lost and creating the television series Dirty Sexy Money and Greenleaf. He also was the screenwriter for the movie Mr. Peabody & Sherman, released March 7, 2014.
Julie K. White is an American actress of film, stage and television. She is a Tony Award winner for the play The Little Dog Laughed. She may be best known for her role as Nadine Swoboda in the television series Grace Under Fire and for her role as Judy Witwicky in the Transformers film series.
Regina Annette Taylor is an American actress and playwright. She has won several awards throughout her career, including a Golden Globe Award and NAACP Image Award. In July 2017, Taylor was announced as the new Denzel Washington Endowed Chair in Theatre at Fordham University's theatre program.
Steven Dietz is an American playwright and theatre director. Called "the most ubiquitous American playwright whose name you may never have heard", Dietz has long been one of America's most prolific and widely produced playwrights. In 2019, Dietz was again named one of the 20 most-produced playwrights in America.
John Marriott was an American actor of the stage, film and screen, whose career spanned five decades. His acting career began on the stage in Cleveland, prior to his moving to New York City, where he was a regular performer on the Broadway stage. In the 1940s he also began to perform in films, when he reprised his role from the hit Broadway play, The Little Foxes, in the William Wyler movie of the same name, starring Bette Davis. While he appeared infrequently in films, he was quite active in theater, both on Broadway and in regional productions. His final performance was on-screen, in the Al Pacino film, Dog Day Afternoon.
John Dossett is an American actor and singer.
Anthony DeSantis, KStJ was an American entrepreneur and theater owner in Chicago, Illinois. He is most well known for the foundation of the area's Drury Lane theatres. During DeSantis' lifetime, his empire included six separate theaters.
A Texas Trilogy is a set of three plays written by Preston Jones. The three plays are set in a mythical West Texas town and employ idiosyncratic language and characters that present an evocative depiction of small-town Texas life. The plays in this trilogy are The Oldest Living Graduate, The Last Meeting of the Knights of the White Magnolia, and Lu Ann Hampton Laverty Oberlander.
The Oldest Living Graduate is the third and final play in the series A Texas Trilogy by Preston Jones.
Preston Jones was an American playwright best known for A Texas Trilogy, a set of three plays.
Clybourne Park is a 2010 play by Bruce Norris written as a spin-off to Lorraine Hansberry's play A Raisin in the Sun (1959). It portrays fictional events set during and after the Hansberry play, and is loosely based on historical events that took place in the city of Chicago. It premiered in February 2010 at Playwrights Horizons in New York. The play received its UK premiere at the Royal Court Theatre in London in a production directed by Dominic Cooke. The play received its Chicago premiere at Steppenwolf Theatre Company in a production directed by Steppenwolf ensemble member Amy Morton. As described by The Washington Post, the play "applies a modern twist to the issues of race and housing and aspirations for a better life." Clybourne Park was awarded the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 2012 Tony Award for Best Play.
Jessica Ruth Mueller is an American actress and singer. She started her acting career in Chicago and won two Joseph Jefferson Awards in 2008 and 2011 for her roles as Carrie Pipperidge in Carousel and Amalia Balash in She Loves Me. In 2011, she moved to New York City to star in a Broadway revival of musical On a Clear Day You Can See Forever, for which she was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical. She won the 2014 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role in a Musical for her performance as Carole King in Beautiful: The Carole King Musical. She went on to receive two additional Best Actress in a Musical Tony Award nominations for her leading roles in Waitress (2016) and the Broadway revival of Carousel (2018).
Daniel Therriault is an American playwright, screenwriter and actor. He wrote the stage play Battery and the HBO films First Time Felon and Witness Protection.
