Playbill Vault's Today in Theatre History: February 22 | Playbill

Playbill Vault Playbill Vault's Today in Theatre History: February 22

In 2018, Bernadette Peters steps into the lead role in the revival of Hello, Dolly!

Bernadette Peters in Hello, Dolly!

1930 Birthday of Marni Nixon, the singer whose voice is dubbed into the mouths of Natalie Wood in the film of West Side Story and Audrey Hepburn in the film of My Fair Lady. She makes her Broadway debut in 1954's The Girl in Pink Tights and does not return to Broadway until James Joyce's The Dead in 2000. Other Broadway appearances include revivals of Follies and Nine.

1961 Opening night of Come Blow Your Horn, Neil Simon's first full-length Broadway comedy. It runs 677 performances at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre.

1962 Olivia de Haviland and Henry Fonda star in A Gift of Time at the Barrymore Theatre. The production is directed by playwright Garson Kanin.

1966 Two one-acts comprise Tennessee Williams' Slapstick Tragedy at the Longacre Theatre. The Mutilated features Kate Reid and Margaret Leighton as two shop women in an abrasive friendship and The Gnadiges Fraulein has Leighton as an ex-performer who must pick through the garbage to eat. Zoe Caldwell wins her first Tony as Polly in the latter opposite Leighton.

1967 MacBird! is Barbara Garson's parodic melding of Macbeth and Lyndon Johnson's presidency. It runs at the Village Gate Theatre. The cast includes Stacy Keach and Rue McClanahan.

1978 Jeremy Irons and Simon Ward are directed by Harold Pinter in The Rear Column at London's Globe Theatre. Simon Gray's drama is about British soldiers on a special mission in Africa.

1983 Arthur Bicknell's Moose Murdersa farce set at a rundown ski lodge decorated with numerous moose heads, opens and closes in the same night.

1996 William Inge's Bus Stop opens at Circle in the Square Theatre. The production, directed by Josephine R. Abady, stars Billy Crudup, Mary-Louise Parker, Ron Perlman, and Kelly Bishop.

2007 Boyd Gaines, Jefferson Mays, Hugh Dancy, and Stark Sands star in Journey's End, the Broadway revival of R.C. Sherriff's 1929 play. David Grindley directs after helming the 2004 London revival.

2012 The world premiere of Early Plays, Richard Maxwell's adaptation of Eugene O'Neill's plays about the world of sailors and the sea, opens at St. Ann's Warehouse. A collaboration between the Wooster Group and the New York City Players, the production includes O'Neill's Bound East for Cardiff (1914), The Long Voyage Home (1917), and The Moon of the Caribbees (1918).

2017 The New York premiere of John Kander and Greg Pierce's Kid Victory opens Off-Broadway at the Vineyard Theatre. Brandon Flynn and Karen Ziemba star in the musical about the return of a teenage boy who was missing for several months.

2017 The Roundabout Theatre Company production of Steven Levinson's If I Forget opens Off-Broadway under the direction of Daniel Sullivan. The cast features Larry Bryggman, Maria Dizzia, Tasha Lawrence, Jeremy Shamos, Seth Michael Steinberg, Kate Walsh, and Gary Wilmes.

2018 Hello, Bernadette! Tony winner Bernadette Peters takes over the title role in the Broadway revival of Hello, Dolly! at the Shubert Theatre. She is joined by four-time Tony nominee Victor Garber as Horace Vandergelder, Charlie Stemp as Barnaby, and Molly Griggs in her Broadway debut as Minnie Fay.

More of Today's Birthdays: James Kirkwood, Sr. (1875–1963). Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892–1950). Nacio Herb Brown (1896–1964). Dwight Frye (1899-1943). Robert Weede (1903–1972). Sheldon Leonard (1907–1997). John Mills (1908–2005). Jules Munshin (1915–1970). Ray Fry (1923–2009). Edward Gorey (1925–2000). Martha Swope (1928–2017). Paul Dooley (b. 1928). Marni Nixon (1930-2016). Sheila Hancock (b. 1933). Milton Katselas (1933–2008). Barry Weissler (b. 1939). Ellen Greene (b. 1951). Richard Greenberg (b. 1958). Kyle MacLachlan (b. 1959). Lea Salonga (b. 1971). Jeremy Shamos (b. 1971). Haven Burton (1980). Trent Kowalik (b. 1995). Celia Rose Gooding (b. 2000).

 
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