Happy Birthday Videos & Multimedia

BWW TV: South African Cast of JERSEY BOYS Sings 'Happy Birthday' to Frankie Valli

Today, Friday May 3, marks the 79th birthday of the original Jersey Boy, Frankie Valli. To celebrate, the cast of the South African production of the hit musical recorded a very special musical greeting to Mr. Valli. Check it out below! (more...)

MEGA STAGE TUBE: Happy Birthday to Patti LuPone!

Happy Birthday to Patti LuPone! Click below to watch highlights from her prolific career! (more...)

MEGA STAGE TUBE: Happy Birthday, Megan Hilty!

Happy Birthday, Megan Hilty! Hilty is best known for her for role on Smash and her portrayal of Lorelei Lee, the diamond-loving blonde made famous by Carol Channing, in the New York City Center Encores! production of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes; Doralee Rhodes in Broadway's 9 to 5: The Musical (earning nominations for Lead Actress in a Musical from the Drama Desk Awards, among others); and more. She made her Broadway debut as Glinda in Wicked, and went on to perform the role in a national tour and in Los Angeles. She just released her first solo album, titled 'It Happens All the Time.' (more...)

MEGA STAGE TUBE: A Look Back at Glenn Close on Broadway!

Happy Birthday, Glenn Close! Close made her professional theater and Broadway debut in Love for Love. Other early stage credits include The Crucifer of Blood and The Singular Life of Albert Nobbs, for which she won an Obie Award. Close's first Tony Award nomination came for her role in the musical Barnum, and she subsequently won Tony Awards for her performances in The Real Thing and Death and the Maiden. For her portrayal of Norma Desmond in Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical Sunset Boulevard, Close won a Tony Award, a Drama Desk Award, a Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award and a Dramalogue Award. She would later reteam with the show's director, Trevor Nunn, in London for his Royal National Theatre revival of A Streetcar Named Desire. (more...)

MEGA STAGE TUBE: On This Day 3/18- Sutton Foster

Happy Birthday, Sutton Foster! Foster's portrayal of Reno Sweeney in Roundabout Theatre Company's production of Anythng Goes earned her the 2011 Tony Award Best Leading Actress in a Musical. Sutton also starred on Broadway as Princess Fiona in Shrek: The Musical, for which she was honored with Tony and Drama Desk nominations, and the Outer Critics Circle Award. Prior to that, Sutton was Inga in the Mel Brooks musical, Young Frankenstein, Janet Van De Graaff in The Drowsy Chaperone (2006 Tony and Drama Desk Award nominations, LA Ovation Award) and Jo March in Little Women: The Musical (2005 Tony, Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle Award nominations). She is the recipient of the 2002 Tony, Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle, and Astaire Awards for her performance as Millie Dillmount in Thoroughly Modern Millie, a role she created in the 2000 La Jolla Playhouse premiere. (more...)

STAGE TUBE: Happy Birthday, Liza Minnelli!

Happy Birthday, Liza Minnelli! Minnelli was born in Los Angeles into show business royalty. With her mother Judy Garland and her father the Award winning director Vincent Minnelli, her's is the only family where both parents and child have won an Oscar. Her god parents were Ira Gershwin and Kay Thompson. Liza made her screen debut in 1949 as a toddler with her mother in the MGM movie musical In the Good Old Summertime. (more...)

MEGA STAGE TUBE: On This Day 2/28- Bernadette Peters

Happy Birthday, Bernadette Peters! Over the course of a career that has spanned five decades, she has starred in musical theatre, films and television, as well as performing in solo concerts and recordings. She is one of the most critically acclaimed Broadway performers, having received nominations for seven Tony Awards, winning two (plus an honorary award), and nine Drama Desk Awards, winning three. Four of the Broadway cast albums on which she has starred have won Grammy Awards. Regarded by many as the foremost interpreter of the works of Stephen Sondheim, Peters is particularly noted for her roles on the Broadway stage, including in the musicals Mack and Mabel, Sunday in the Park with George, Song and Dance, Into the Woods, Annie Get Your Gun and Gypsy. (more...)

MEGA STAGE TUBE: Happy Birthday, John Travolta!

Happy Birthday, John Travolta! Travolta made his Broadway debut as a replacement in GREASE and also starred in OVER HERE! He is well known for his work in such films as 'Saturday Night Fever,' 'Hairspray,' and 'Pulp Fiction,' and the television series 'Welcome Back, Kotter.' (more...)

MEGA STAGE TUBE: Happy Birthday, Norbert Leo Butz!

Happy Birthday Norbert Leo Butz! Butz made his Broadway debut as Adam Pascal's replacement as Roger Davis in Rent in 1996. Additional Broadway credits include Thou Shalt Not (Camille Raquin, 2001-2002), for which he received a Tony Award nomination; Wicked (the original Fiyero, 2003) and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (Freddy) for which he received the Tony Award for Best Leading Actor in a Musical, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Musical, a Drama League Award, and an Outer Critics Circle Award. His Off-Broadway credits include The Last Five Years (Jamie), Songs for a New World (Lead Male 2), Saved (Fred), and Juno and the Paycock (Jerry Devine). Most recently, Butz originated the role of Carl Hanratty in the new musical Catch Me If You Can. For this role he won his second Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Musical and his second Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical. He most recently starred in Dead Accounts opposite Katie Holmes. (more...)

STAGE TUBE: On This Day 1/23- Chita Rivera

Happy Birthday, Chita Rivera! A two-time Tony Award winner, Rivera made her Broadway debut in 1953 in Can-Can, launching one of the most celebrated and long-lasting Broadway careers. Her electric performance as Anita in the Broadway premiere of West Side Storybrought her stardom. This season, she's getting rave reviews starring as Princess Puffer in the Roundabout Theatre Company's celebrated Broadway revival The Mystery of Edwin Drood. (more...)

STAGE TUBE: Maria Tallchief, Born January 24, 1925

Maria Tallchief, the first Native American to win acclaim as a prima ballerina, was born on January 24, 1925. While she worked with many companies and choreographers, she is most renowned for her collaboration with George Balanchine, first at the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo and then, most importantly and famously, at the New York City Ballet. She was married to Balanchine from 1946 until 1952, when the marriage was annulled. Despite this interruption in their private lives they continued their professional association. (more...)

STAGE TUBE: On This Day 1/16- Lin-Manuel Miranda

Happy Birthday, Lin-Manuel Miranda! Miranda is most famous for writing and starring as 'Usnavi' in the Broadway musical In the Heights, which opened on Broadway at the Richard Rodgers Theatre in 2008, and for which he won the Tony Award as composer and lyricist. He also wrote Spanish language dialogue and worked with Stephen Sondheim to translate into Spanish song lyrics for the revival of West Side Story, which opened on Broadway in March 2009. Most recently, Miranda worked on the musical theatre version of Broadway's Bring It On, inspired by the 2000 cheerleader comedy film of the same name. (more...)

STAGE TUBE: On This Day 1/2- Renee Elise Goldsberry

Happy Birthday, Reneé Elise Goldsberry! Goldsberry played Nala in the Broadway production of The Lion King and was nominated for a Drama League Award for 'Distinguished Performance' and won a New York magazine Best of 2005 Award for her performance as Silvia in the 2005 New York City Shakespeare in the Park revival of Two Gentlemen of Verona. She later originated the role of Nettie in The Color Purple, the Broadway musical adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning 1982 novel of the same name from November 2005 to mid-January 2006. On June 16, 2008, Goldsberry was the last actress to play the role of Mimi Marquez in the Broadway musical Rent. (more...)

STAGE TUBE: On This Day 12/16- Adam Guettel

Happy Birthday, Adam Guettel! Adam Guettel is an American composer-lyricist of musical theater and opera. He is best known for the musical "The Light in the Piazza," for which he won two Tony Awards for Best Score and Best Orchestrations, and two Drama Desk Awards for Best Music and Best Orchestrations. His early works include 1996's "Floyd Collins," "Love's Fire," and "Saturn Returns." Guettel's songs have been recorded by such artists as Audra McDonald and Brian d'Arcy James. He also contributed original scores to several documentary films, including "Arguing the World and Jack: The Last Kennedy Film." In 1999, he performed a concert evening of his own work at New York's Town Hall. (more...)

STAGE TUBE: On This Day 12/14- Tammy Blanchard

Happy Birthday, Tammy Blanchard! Blanchard was nominated for a Tony Award in 2012 for her performance in HOW TO SUCCEED IN BUSINESS WITHOUT REALLY TRYING and is best known for her portrayal of the young Judy Garland in "Life With Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows" (Emmy Award, Golden Globe and AFI nominations). Her Broadway credits include Gypsy (Tony nomination, Theatre World Award). She was most recently seen in the film Moneyball. Blanchard's other film credits include The Good Shepherd, Bella, Cadillac Records and Rabbit Hole, and she recently completed The Music Never Stopped, Certainty, Union Square and Burning Blue. Her television credits include "A Gifted Man", "We Were the Mulvaneys," "Sybil," "Living Proof," "Amish Grace," "The Good Wife," "Law & Order: SVU", "Guiding Light", and the original Lifetime TV movie, "Of Two Minds." (more...)

STAGE TUBE: On This Day 12/9- Mario Cantone

Happy Birthday, Mario Cantone! He made his Broadway debut in 1995 as replacement for the role of Buzz in the Tony Award-winning play, Love! Valour! Compassion!. Later that year, he returned to Broadway again in the revival of The Tempest. In 2004, Cantone starred in the Stephen Sondheim musical Assassins as Samuel Byck. His latest Broadway credit was in his second one-man show, Laugh Whore, which he also wrote. Laugh Whore ran from October 24, 2004, to January 2, 2005, at the Cort Theatre and received a Tony Award nomination for Best Special Theatrical Event. (more...)

STAGE TUBE: On This Day 12/8- Graciela Daniele

Happy Birthday, Graciela Daniele! As a performer, Daniele made her Broadway debut in What Makes Sammy Run? in 1964. She studied with Martha Graham and Merce Cunningham while working with such luminaries as Bob Fosse, Agnes de Mille, and Michael Bennett, who hired her to assist him with Follies in 1971. Her first credit as a full-fledged choreographer was the 1979 revival of The Most Happy Fella. She has directed and/or choreographed several musicals of Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty, including, most recently, The Glorious Ones (2007) and Dessa Rose (2005) at the Off-Broadway Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater at Lincoln Center. She has directed and/or choreographed several musicals of Michael John LaChiusa Off-Broadway, most recently Bernarda Alba (2006) and Little Fish (2003). (more...)

STAGE TUBE: On This Day 12/7- Stephanie D'Abruzzo

Happy Birthday, Stephanie D'Abruzzo! Though D'Abruzzo has spent most of her career performing as a puppeteer in children's television, she is best known for originating the roles of single schoolteacher Kate Monster and sultry chanteuse Lucy the Slut in the Broadway musical Avenue Q. D'Abruzzo earned widespread acclaim for her performance of the dual role, including a nomination for the 2004 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical, a Drama Desk nomination, the Theatre World Award, and the Outer Critics Circle Special Ensemble Award. Her other stage credits include I Love You Because (off-Broadway), If You Give A Mouse A Cookie (TheaterworksUSA), Carnival (for City Center Encores!), Kiss and Makeup (New York City Fringe Festival), and Austentatious (New York Musical Theatre Festival). (more...)

STAGE TUBE: On This Day 12/6- Ira Gershwin

Happy Birthday, Ira Gershwin! A lyricist, Gershwin collaborated with his younger brother, composer George Gershwin, to create some of the most memorable songs of the 20th century. With George he wrote more than a dozen Broadway shows, featuring songs such as 'I Got Rhythm', 'Embraceable You', 'The Man I Love' and 'Someone to Watch Over Me'. He was also responsible, along with DuBose Heyward, for the libretto to George's opera Porgy and Bess. The success the brothers had with their collaborative works has often overshadowed the creative role that Ira played. However, his mastery of songwriting continued after the early death of George. He wrote additional hit songs with composers Jerome Kern ('Long Ago (and Far Away)'), Kurt Weill and Harold Arlen. (more...)

VIDEO: On This Day 12/6 - Happy Birthday to NORTHERN EXPOSURE's Janine Turner

On December 6, 1962, American actress Janine Turner was born. Turner is best known for her role as Maggie O'Connell in the 1990 - 1995 television series NORTHERN EXPOSURE. Below, check out a clip from Season 2 in which Maggie and Joel's (Rob Morrow) libidoes run amok while waiting for the ice to break! (more...)