Verity Hunt-Ballard is an Australian actress and singer, best known for roles in musical theatre.
Hunt-Ballard was born in Mt Gambier, South Australia and raised in Largs Bay. [1] Her Northern Ireland-born father was a social worker and music therapist, and her mother a primary school teacher. [2]
She studied at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts, graduating in 2003. Early roles include the casts of the musicals Eureka (2004), Jersey Boys and Metro Street (2009). [2]
Hunt-Ballard is best known for performing the title roles in the original Australian cast of Mary Poppins (2010) and the Hayes Theatre revival of Sweet Charity (2014). For each role, she received the Helpmann Award for Best Female Actor in a Musical.
She has a daughter Emmy-Lou with a partner, actor Scott Johnson. [2]
Sweet Charity is a musical with music by Cy Coleman, lyrics by Dorothy Fields and book by Neil Simon. It was directed and choreographed for Broadway by Bob Fosse starring his wife and muse Gwen Verdon alongside John McMartin. It is based on the screenplay for the 1957 Italian film Nights of Cabiria. However, whereas Federico Fellini's black-and-white film concerns the romantic ups-and-downs of an ever-hopeful prostitute, in the musical the central character is a dancer-for-hire at a Times Square dance hall. The musical premiered on Broadway in 1966, where it was nominated for nine Tony Awards, winning the Tony Award for Best Choreography. The production also ran in the West End as well as having revivals and international productions.
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Sharon Millerchip is an Australian actress, dancer, director, and choreographer, best known for her performances in major musical theatre productions.
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