Great Hollywood Actors Daring To Tread The Hallow Broadway Boards?

[Phantom of London]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 9:55am

With the great Al Pacino returning to Broadway this fall to star in Glengarry Glen Ross, what other great Hollywood greats have starred on Broadway?

What were they like? How were they critically received? Were they a big box office draw?

[aasjb4ever]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 9:57am

GIVE THE TONYS BACK TO BROADWAY!

[Wynbish]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 10:04am

You act like almost every season does not have some Hollywood star

[best12bars]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 10:12am

Wynbish is right. Almost every season going back decades has had "Hollywood" actors who have graced the boards.

Some of them actually started in theatre (perhaps not Broadway), and some landed there because of their film or TV resumes and their desire to give it a shot.

Too many to name, but Google is your friend.

EDIT: At the beginning of "talking pictures," many of the movie stars came from Broadway, and a lot of them would go back and forth between the two. Katharine Hepburn had it written into her studio contracts that she could appear on Broadway as well.

Updated On: 8/29/12 at 10:12 AM

[Playbilly]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 10:39am

Phantom, just wait for anothere SAG strike. Broadway will be Hollywood East.

[Wynbish]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 10:46am

I've been listening to a lot of Cecil B. Demille Lux Radio productions lately, and many of the stars played a role on Broadway that they later played on film.

Also, look at last season. Ricky Martin, Matthew Broderick, Cynthia Nixon, James Earl Jones, Judith Light - and those are just from the opening of the Tony's

[castlestreet]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 10:47am

best12 is right on the mark- most "theater" people forget just how many of the current legends of the silver screen got their start on the boards. This is nothing new and will continue as long as actors and actresses wish to either return to their roots or simply try their hand at one of the purest forms of acting that there is: stage work.

Watch Glenn Close on Inside The Actors Studio, she gives some wonderful insight as to just how stage work is so much more fulfilling and challenging.

[Midnight Radio]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 11:08am

I misread this at first and was expecting a discussion of when actors post on the BWW Boards... that sounded far more promising

Updated On: 8/29/12 at 11:08 AM

[iluvtheatertrash]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 11:12am

As did I, Midnight Radio...

[newintown]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 11:29am

1) "Hallow" is a verb. "Hallowed" is the adjective for which you sought in vain.

2) "...great Hollywood greats" is redundant, unless you feel that there are mediocre Hollywood greats, or great Hollywood nobodies, or something...

[darquegk]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 12:08pm

Oh, there are definitely great Hollywood nobodies and mediocre Hollywood greats.

Brilliant screenwriter and character actor Jim Rash is a non-entity in the performing world, only known for his supporting role on Community (which is another great non-entity, sadly), but is an award-winner despite no one really taking him seriously.

[Wynbish]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 12:11pm

Most people probably know him because he's "oh yeah! that leg guy!"

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 11:22pm

Vanessa Redgrave, Laurence Olivier, Stockard Channing, Laurence Fishburne Vivien Leigh, Charles Boyer, Frances McDormand, Angela Lansbury, Hugh Jackman, Lauren Bacall, Kathleen Turner, Kurt Douglas, Leiv Schreiber, Denzel Washington, Jose Ferrer, Rex Harrison, Basil Rathbone, Anne Bancroft, Henry Fonda. Paul Muni, Fredric March, Rosalind Russell, Ralph Bellamy, Claude Raines, Jessica Lange, Edward G. Robinson, Michael Redgrave, Geoffrey Rush, Margaret Leighton, Bette Davis, Boris Karloff, Ralph Richardson, Richard Burton, Susan Sarandon, Hugh Griffith, Laura Linney, Jack Lemmon, Viola Davis, Laurence Olivier. Julie Harris, Shirley Booth, Alec Guinness, Eileen Heckart, Walter Matthau, Janet McTeer, Melvyn Douglas. Glenn Close, Anthony Quinn, Ingrid Bergman, Fredric March, Bert Lahr, Celeste Hollm, Wendy Hlller, Richard Burton, Jason Robards, Albert Finney, John Gielgud, George C. Scott, Dustin Hoffman, Al Pacino, Frank Langella, Alan Bates, Mary Stuart Masterson, Mary Louise Parker, Edie Falco, Jeremy Irons, Thelma Ritter, Jennifer Ehle, Alan Rickman, Helen Hayes, Audrey Hepburn, Ellen Burstyn, Ian McKellan, Max von Sydow, Geraldine Page, Elizabeth Ashley, Estelle Parsons, Ralph Fiennes, Katharine Hepburn, Alfred Molina, Anthony LaPaglia, Mia Farrow, Dianne Wiest, Kevin Spacey, Sam Waterson, Ellen Barkin, Gabriel Byrne, James Earl Jones, Gary Sinese, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Antonio Banderas, Angela Bassett, Jill Clayburgh, Raul Julia, Stanley Tucci, Blair Brown, Jude Lawe, John Lithgow, Claudette Colbert, Maureen Stapleton, Joan Allen, Yvonne de Carlo, Alexis Smith, Sandy Dennis, Edith Evans, Jane Alexander, Liv Ullmann, Glenda Jackson, Joan Allen, Kate Nelligan, Lynn Redgrave, Helen Mirren, Juliette Binoche, Mercedes Ruehl, Liza Minnelli, Margaret Sullivan, Louis Jordain, June Allyson and Jane Fonda.













Updated On: 8/30/12 at 11:22 PM

[MrMidwest]

Posted: 8/29/12 at 11:36pm

It's interesting the way star's careers intersected with Broadway back in the 60s and 70s. You had Streisand making a name for herself on stage, Liza moving back and forth between stage and screen, Lansbury finding her groove on stage, and Bacall making her Broadway musical debut at 45.