MICHAEL BENNETT(Conception, Original Director/Choreographer) choreographed Promises, Promises; Coco;Company; Follies (which he co-directed with Harold Prince) and Seesaw (which he also wrote and directed). In 1973 he made his debut as a dramatic director with Twigs, which starred Sada Thompson. A Chorus Line, which he conceived, choreographed and directed, won nine Tony Awards. In 1976 he and the other authors of A Chorus Line were awarded the Pulitzer Prize for drama. In 1979 he produced, directed and choreographed Ballroom, which was nominated for eight Tony Awards and won Mr. Bennett his sixth Tony. He won his seventh Tony Award for 1981’s Dreamgirls, and directed its acclaimed 1985 Broadway revival. The film adaptation of Dreamgirls was released in December 2006..
BOB AVIAN(Director and Original Co-Choreographer) began his career as a dancer and was in more than a dozen Broadway shows including West Side Story and Funny Girl. He then became an integral part of every Michael Bennett production for the next 20 years, working as associate choreographer and/or assistant director on productions including Company, Follies, Twigs, Seesaw and God’s Favorite. In 1976 he received a Tony Award as co-choreographer of A Chorus Line. He then went on to win his second Tony Award for choreographing Ballroom as well as serving as co-producer. He was also a producer of the original and national companies of Dreamgirls, the highly acclaimed musical which won six Tony Awards. He choreographed the London production of Stephen Sondheim's Follies and then created the musical staging for Miss Saigon. He did the musical staging for the London and Broadway productions of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Sunset Boulevard, receiving his sixth Tony nomination. Next came the Boublil & Schonberg musical Martin Guerre for which he won the Olivier Award for choreography. Bob also choreographed Stephen Sondheim's Putting It Together off-Broadway starring Julie Andrews and on Broadway starring Carol Burnett. Returning once again to London, he choreographed The Witches of Eastwick for Cameron Mackintosh.(Top)
JAMES KIRKWOOD(Book) was born in California to theatrical parents. His mother was actress Lila Lee, a leading lady in over 90 films, making the transition from silents to talkies and his father, James Kirkwood, Sr., acted on the stage and in pictures and also directed films including many with Mary Pickford. Before taking up a writing career Mr. Kirkwood was one half of the comedy team Jim Kirkwood and Lee Goodman. They played engagements in New York and London as well as making regular appearance on “The Garry Moore Show, ” “The Ed Sullivan Show,” and had a radio show on WOR for several years. In addition to numerous television appearances, Mr. Kirkwood appeared on the late CBS-TV daytime soap Valiant Lady for four years. He was also featured on Broadway in Small Wonder and played opposite Tallulah Bankhead in Welcome Darlings. Mr. Kirkwood’s novels include There Must Be a Pony! which he dramatized for the stage starring Myrna Loy, and the made-for-TV movie version starring Elizabeth Taylor and Robert Wagner; Good Times/Bad Times; P.S. Your Cat is Dead! which was also adapted for the stage with Keir Dullea and Tony Musante and made into a motion picture by Steve Guttenberg; Some Kind of Hero, which was made into a motion picture starring Richard Pryor; and Hit Me With A Rainbow. In addition, he wrote a nonfiction book, American Grotesque. As co-author with Nicholas Dante of A Chorus Line, he won a Pulitzer Prize and a Tony Award, among other honors. His play U.T.B.U. (Unhealthy to be Unpleasant) starred Tony Randall, Thelma Ritter and Alan Webb on Broadway. His last non-fiction book, Diary of a Mad Playwright: Perilous Adventures on the Road with Mary Martin and Carol Channing was about the road tour of his play Legends which is currently on tour starring Joan Collins and Linda Evans. Mr. Kirkwood was nearly finished with the first draft of a new novel, I Teach Flying, when he passed away in 1989.
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NICHOLAS DANTE(Book) Real name: Conrado Morales. He danced in the choruses of Applause and other Broadway shows as well as various TV shows and nightclubs while pursuing his dream of becoming a writer when Michael Bennett, a friend, called and asked him to collaborate on the first draft of the book for A Chorus Line. The final result earned him a Pulitzer Prize, a Tony Award and many other honors. He also authored a screenplay, Fake Lady, and a musical based on the life of Al Jolson entitled Jolson Tonite.(Top)
MARVIN HAMLISCH(Music) is the composer of the Broadway musicals They're Playing Our Song and Sweet Smell of Success and shared the Pulitzer Prize for his score of A Chorus Line. He is the composer of more than 40 motion picture scores including his Oscar-winning score and song for The Way We Were and his adaptation of Scott Joplin's music for The Sting, for which he received a third Oscar. Hamlisch holds the position of principal pops conductor with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, DC. Mr. Hamlisch is a graduate of both the Juilliard School of Music and Queens College.(Top)
EDWARD KLEBAN(1939-1987) (Lyrics) won the 1975 Tony, Drama Desk and Olivier Awards and The Pulitzer Prize for his lyrics for A Chorus Line. Joseph Papp produced a workshop of his musical, Gallery, at The Public Theatre in 1980. He wrote lyrics for songs included in the movies The Hindenberg (music by David Shire) and Brighton Beach Memoirs (music by Michael Small), and music and lyrics for the song “Let’s Hear It For Babies”, sung by Mel Brooks, in the acclaimed television special “Free To Be You And Me.”Mr. Kleban was a member of Lehman Engel’s BMI Musical Theatre Workshop for over twenty years. During the 1960’s, Mr. Kleban was a record producer at Columbia Records, where he produced many original cast albums including Hallelujah, Baby! and Jacques Brel Is Alive And Well And Living In Paris. He was a graduate of The High School of Music and Art and Columbia College, where he wrote music for the 1960 Varsity Show with a book by Terrence McNally. He died in 1987 at the age of 48. The musical, A Class Act, produced on Broadway in 2001, is a musical biography that tells his life story with a score comprised of Kleban’s own music and lyrics. Mr. Kleban posthumously won an Obie for his score for A Class Act, and he was nominated for a Tony and A Drama Desk Award. The Kleban Foundation, created according to his Will, awards grants to aspiring theater lyricists and bookwriters, so that they may carry on the tradition of the American musical theatre which he loved so dearly. Over the past 18 years, The Kleban Foundation has awarded grants totaling more than one million dollars.(Top)
BAAYORK LEE(Choreography Re-Staging). Directing credits include: The King & I (2004-5 tour), R&H’s Cinderella at NY City Opera, Barnum for Cy Coleman in Sydney, Australia, Porgy and Bess and Jesus Christ Superstar’s European Tours. The Kennedy Center’s Carmen Jones (Vanessa Williams) conducted by Placido Domingo, Gypsy (Signature Theater-Arlington, Virginia) and William Finn’s A New Brain. She was Associate Director for Barbara Cook: A Broadway Evening. Credits as resident choreographer for the Washington Opera at the Kennedy Center include the World Premiere of Goya (Placido Domingo) and Sly (Jose Carreras), as well as The Merry Widow, Eugene Onegin, Amahl and the Night Visitors, The Pearl Fishers, La Rondine, Christopher Columbus, and The Ballad of Baby Doe. Opera credits include: Aida (Michigan Opera), La Gioconda (Baltimore Opera), Spring Parade (Trieste Festival, Italy) The Nose and The Cunning Little Vixen (Spoleto Festival, Italy). For the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., Baayork has choreographed Damn Yankees, Camelot, Coconuts, Animal Crackers (Helen Hayes Nomination) and South Pacific (Helen Hayes Nomination). In Italy, she choreographed La Cage Aux Folles, Cabaret, A Funny Thing Happened on the Wayto the Forum and Singin’ in the Rain. An original cast member in a dozen Broadway shows, Baayork created the role of Connie in A Chorus Line. She was Associate Choreographer for Tommy Tune’s My One and Only and Assistant Choreographer for Michael Bennett and has directed over 35 companies of A Chorus Line. Ms. Lee is the co-author of On the Line: The Creation of A Chorus Line published by William Morrow. She is proud to be the recipient of the 2003 Lifetime Achievement Asian Woman Warrior Award from Columbia College in Chicago.(Top)
ROBIN WAGNER(Scenic Design). Broadway includes The Producers, On the Twentieth Century, City of Angels (all Tony Awards), Kiss Me Kate, Jelly’s Last Jam, Dreamgirls, Jesus Christ Superstar (Tony nomination), TheBoy From Oz; Flower Drum Song; Sideshow; Angels in America; Victor/Victoria; Crazy for You; Jerome Robbins’ Broadway; 42nd Street; A Chorus Line; Lenny; Chess; The Great White Hope; Promises, Promises; Hair. Ballet and opera include productions at the Royal Opera House, the Metropolitan Opera House, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Vienna State Opera, Royal Swedish Opera, Hamburg State Opera, Gotenberg Opera, American Ballet Theatre and the New York City Ballet. He is a trustee of the New York Shakespeare Festival and a member of the American Theatre Hall of Fame.(Top)
THEONI V. ALDREDGE(Costume Design). With over 150 Broadway shows to her credit, and numerous more Off-Broadway productions, ballets and operas, Ms. Aldredge was inducted into the Theatre Hall of Fame in 1986. Among her many theatre credits include Sweet Bird of Youth, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Anyone Can Whistle, A Chorus Line, The Threepenny Opera, Annie (Tony Award), Barnum (Tony Award), 42nd Street, Dreamgirls, La Cage aux Folles (Tony Award) and Gypsy. Film credits include The Mirror Has Two Faces, The First Wives Club, Addams Family Values, Moonstruck, Network, The Rose and The Great Gatsby, for which she won the Academy Award and the BAFTA Award. She is the recipient of the New York City Liberty Medal and was honored with the Costume Guild Career Achievement Award. For over 20 years, Ms. Aldredge was the principal designer for NYSF. She is married to actor Tom Aldredge.(Top)
THARON MUSSER(Original Lighting Designer) has been the lighting designer for 117 Broadway productions among which are: Long Days Journey into Night; Mame; Applause; Same Time, Next Year; A Little Night Music; California Suite; The Prisoner of Second Avenue; The Sunshine Boys; Ballroom; The Act; The Real Thing; Tribute; They’re Playing Our Song and 42nd Street. Ms. Musser won Tony Awards for Follies, Dreamgirls and A Chorus Line. She was the staff lighting designer for the Phoenix Theatre, the National Repertory Theatre Company, the American Shakespeare Festival, the Mark Taper Forum and the Dallas and Miami Opera Companies.(Top)
NATASHA KATZ(Lighting Design Adapter) has designed extensively on Broadway, Off-Broadway and in American regional theatre. Recent Broadway: Tarzan, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Aida (Tony Award, 2000), Beauty and the Beast, Taboo, Flower Drum Song, Sweet Smell of Success, Twelfth Night, Dance of Death, The Capeman and Barrymore. Recent dance and opera: Carnival of the Animals (NYC Ballet), Tryst (Royal Ballet), Don Quixote (American Ballet Theatre) and Die Soldaten (NYC Opera). Permanent lighting installations: Niketown NYC and London and the Big Bang at the Museum of Natural History in NYC.(Top)
ACME SOUND PARTNERS(Sound Design). Broadway: The Light in the Piazza, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Spamalot, Dracula the Musical, Twentieth Century, Fiddler on the Roof, Never Gonna Dance, The Boy From Oz, Avenue Q, Gypsy, La Bohème (Drama Desk Award), Flower Drum Song, Elaine Stritch: At Liberty, Bells Are Ringing, A Class Act, Jane Eyre, The Full Monty. New York Shakespeare Festival: Much Ado About Nothing, Henry V, Twelfth Night, The Seagull, Measure for Measure. The partners are Tom Clark, Mark Menard and Nevin Steinberg. (Top)
PATRICK VACCARIELLO(Music Direction & Supervision) Patrick most recently was the music director for the Broadway revival of La Cage aux Folles. He has also served as musical director for The Boy From Oz starring Hugh Jackman, as well as music supervisor/director for Gypsy with Bernadette Peters, Dance of the Vampires with Michael Crawford, Jesus Christ Superstar, Cabaret with Alan Cumming and Natasha Richardson, as well as productions word-wide of Victor/Victoria, Joseph… and Cats. Patrick conducted The Music Of Andrew Lloyd Webber worldwide including Beijing’s Great Hall of the People. He has conducted the Music of Andrew Lloyd Webber with stars including Michael Crawford, Sarah Brightman, Elaine Paige, Anthony Warlow and Fei Xiang. Patrick was the music director/ supervisor for cast recordings of Cabaret revival, Gypsy with Bernadette Peters and The Boy From Oz with Hugh Jackman. He was also the music director for Hugh Jackman’s one-man show In Time premiering at the Steve Wynn casino in Las Vegas. Kennedy Center: Sondheim Celebration, Passion. World premieres: Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Whistle Down the Wind and Kander and Ebb’s Over and Over. Conducted over 10 productions at the Goodspeed Opera house and is a graduate of the Hartt School of Music. (Top)
VIENNA WAITS PRODUCTIONS(Producer) is a company organized by John Breglio to produce this new production of A Chorus Line. Mr. Breglio is also a partner in the New York law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison where he heads the firm’s Entertainment Department and is a member of the firm’s Intellectual Property Group. Since joining the firm in 1971, he has concentrated in the representation of companies and individuals involved in all aspects of the entertainment industry, including the legitimate theater, motion picture, publishing and music businesses. Mr. Breglio advises and represents cultural not-for-profit organizations such as The New York Shakespeare Festival, The Actors Fund of America, The Manhattan Theatre Club, the Goodman Theatre of Chicago, Playwrights Horizons, the Roundabout Theatre Company, and Second Stage. A Chorus Line marks Mr. Breglio’s producing debut. John Breglio is married to writer Nan Knighton, www.nanknighton.com(Top)
