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VIDEO: On This Day, May 27- Happy Birthday, Dee Dee Bridgewater!
Dee Dee was first introduced to audiences in her Tony-winning performance as Glinda the Good Witch in the original Broadway production of The Wiz.
By: A.A. Cristi May. 27, 2021
On this day, we're wishing a very Happy Birthday to Tony winner Dee Dee Bridgewater!
Bridgewater is a three-time Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter, as well as a Tony Award-winning stage actress. For 23 years, she was the host of National Public Radio's syndicated radio show JazzSet with Dee Dee Bridgewater. She is a United Nations Goodwill Ambassador for the Food and Agriculture Organization.
After establishing a career as a jazz singer in New York City, Bridgewater made her Broadway debut in The Wiz in 1975. For her role as Glinda the Good Witch she won a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress, and the musical also won the 1976 Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album.
She subsequently appeared in several other stage productions, including The 1940s Radio Hour on Broadway. After touring France in 1984 with the musical Sophisticated Ladies, she moved to Paris in 1986. The same year saw her in Lady Day, as Billie Holiday, for which role she was nominated for the Laurence Olivier Award, as well as recording the song "Precious Thing" with Ray Charles, featured on her album Victim of Love.
Below, watch as Dee Dee performs her big number "Believe in Yourself" as a part of BroadwayWorld Visits Oz, a special concert event at Joe's Pub in 2014 benefitting Broadway Cares/Equity Fights Aids.
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