Fitzgerald Wins Drama Desk Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical for RAINBOW!

Christopher Fitzgerald is this year's recipient of the 2010 Drama Desk Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical for FINIAN'S RAINBOW.

Fitzgerald's Broadway credits include Young Frankenstein (Tony, Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle Award nominations), Wicked, Amour (Drama Desk nomination). Off-Broadway: Gutenberg! The Musical! (Actor's Playhouse), Stairway to Paradise, Babes in Arms and Broadway Bash (Encores!), Observe the Sons of Ulster Marching Towards the Somme (Lincoln Center), Fully Committed (Cherry Lane), Saturday Night (Second Stage, Drama Desk nomination), Wise Guys (NYTW), Corpus Christi (Manhattan Theatre Club) and The Cripple of Inishmaan (Public). Regional: The Beauty Queen of Lennane (Steppenwolf, Joseph Jefferson nomination), Springtime for Henry (Huntington Theater, IRNE Award), Ahmanson Theater, ACT and 10 seasons with The Williamstown Theater Festival. TV: Twins, The Electric Company. Film: Dedication, Brooks Project.

With a sparkling score of beloved standards and a whimsical story that dances between romance, satire, and fairy tale, Finian's Rainbow is a musical theater treasure. Set in the mythical southern state of Missitucky, Finian's Rainbow pits a charming Irish dreamer and his headstrong daughter against the host of complications that await them in their newly adopted land: a bigoted southern Senator, a credit crisis, a pesky leprechaun, and, of course, a complicated love affair that gives birth to some of the most witty, charming and heartfelt songs ever written for the stage.

The musical's score boasts such classic songs as "Old Devil Moon," "How Are Things in Glocca Morra?," "When I'm Not Near the Girl I Love (I Love the Girl I'm Near)," "Look to the Rainbow," and "If This Isn't Love."

The production stared Jim Norton (Finian), Kate Baldwin (Sharon), Cheyenne Jackson (Woody), Christopher Fitzgerald (Og), and Chuck Cooper (Bill).

Finian's Rainbow has a book by Yip Harburg and Fred Saidy; lyrics by Yip Harburg; music by Burton Lane; with book adaptation by Arthur Perlman and original adaptation for New York City Center Encores! by David Ives. It is directed and choreographed by Warren Carlyle; musical direction is by Rob Berman.

The musical's score boasts such classic songs as "Old Devil Moon," "How Are Things in Glocca Morra?," "When I'm Not Near the Girl I Love (I Love the Girl I'm Near)," Look to the Rainbow," and "If This Isn't Love."

Finian's Rainbow plays the ST. James Theatre, 246 West 44 Street.

Photo Credit: Walter McBride/Retna Ltd.