12 Days of Christmas with Charles Busch: Day 1- Judy Garland Sings a Standard!

Deck the halls, trim the tree, and spin the dreidel. BroadwayWorld is continuing our tradition of celebrating the holiday season with a Twelve Days of Christmas countdown. This year we've invited the great Charles Busch to share his favorite holiday performances. Check back daily to get in the holiday spirit in time for December 25 and to find out what else made his list!

Perhaps the most beloved Christmas standard is the legendary Judy Garland singing "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," but Judy sang another beautiful but less familiar holiday song in the movie "In The Good Old Summertime" called simply "Merry Christmas." If you're looking for an honest, tender, deeply human interpretation of a holiday song sung by an incomparable artist, this performance should be enough to convert any non-believer to "Judy-ism.".

Busch is the author and star of such plays as The Divine Sister, The Lady in Question, Red Scare on Sunset and Vampire Lesbians of Sodom, which ran five years and is one of the longest running plays in Off-Broadway history. His play The Tale of the Allergist's Wife ran for 777 performances on Broadway and won Mr. Busch the Outer Circle Critics John Gassner Award and received a Tony nomination for Best Play. He wrote and starred in the film versions of his plays, Psycho Beach Party and Die Mommie Die, the latter of which won him the Best Performance Award at the Sundance Film Festival. In 2003, Mr. Busch received a special Drama Desk Award for career achievement as both performer and playwright. Mr. Busch made his directorial debut with the film A Very Serious Person, which premiered at the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival, where it won an honorable mention. He is also the subject of the documentary film The Lady in Question is Charles Busch.

For more information, visit: http://www.charlesbusch.com