Howard Ashman followed a distinguished career as a musical comedy librettist, lyricist, playwright, and director with his animated feature film debut, Disney's critically and popularly celebrated The Little Mermaid. Ashman received the 1989 Academy Award® for Best Song for "Under the Sea," written with his longtime collaborator, Alan Menken. Ashman and Menken garnered a total of six awards for The Little Mermaid, including two Academy Awards®, two Golden Globe Awards®, and two Grammy Awards®.
Born in Baltimore, Ashman received his education at Goddard College and Boston University, and earned an MFA from Indiana University. He moved to New York in 1974 ... read more
Cy Coleman was a prolific composer, songwriter, and jazz pianist who made a significant impact on American music and Broadway. Born Seymour Kaufman in 1929 in New York City, Coleman began playing piano at an early age and was soon performing in clubs and bars around the city. He studied at the Juilliard School of Music and the Manhattan School of Music, but his true education came from playing with jazz greats like Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie.
Coleman's first foray into Broadway was with the musical "Wildcat" in 1960, which starred Lucille Ball. The show was not a critical success, ... read more
Betty Comden, born in Brooklyn in 1917, was an American lyricist, screenwriter, and actress. She is best known for her work with Adolph Green, with whom she collaborated on numerous musicals and films.
Comden and Green met in 1938 while both were studying at New York University, and began writing together shortly thereafter. Their first Broadway credit was for On the Town, a musical about three sailors on a 24-hour leave in New York City. The show premiered in 1944 and was a huge success, cementing Comden and Green's place in the world of musical theater.
Comden and Green went on to ... read more
As a writer, lyricist, composer and director, Fred Ebb made incalculable contributions to the New York theatrical community. Mr. Ebb is a Tony, Grammy, Emmy, Olivier and Kennedy Center Honors Lifetime Achievement Award winning recipient. Fred Ebb's first professional songwriting assignment came in 1953 when he and Phil Springer were hired by Columbia Records to write a song for Judy Garland called "Heartbroken." Mr. Ebb was introduced to composer John Kander in 1964 by music publisher Tommy Valando and became one of the most legendary songwriting teams in American history. The first successful collaboration was on the song "My Coloring ... read more
Adolph Green was an American lyricist and playwright who was born on December 2, 1914, in the Bronx, New York. He was the son of Hungarian Jewish immigrants. Green's father was a successful businessman, and his mother was a homemaker. Green attended New York University, where he studied English and drama.
Green began his career in show business as a performer in the late 1930s. He appeared in several Broadway productions, including "The New Yorkers" and "Two for the Show." However, it was his work as a lyricist that would make him famous.
Green's first major success as a lyricist came in ... read more
American composer John Kander (b. Kansas City, MO, March 18, 1927) is the musical partner of the songwriting team of Kander and Ebb, who together created at least sixteen Broadway shows, Flora the Red Menace (1965), Cabaret (1966), Chicago (1975), and Curtains (2007) among them. They also contributed material to fourteen films and television specials over their forty-year association. Independently John Kander supplied the scores to many films, including Something For Everyone (1970), Kramer vs. Kramer (1979), Places in the Heart (1984), and Billy Bathgate (1991). ... read more
Alan Menken is a Disney legend who has won more Academy Awards than any other living individual, including eight Oscars with 4 for Best Score and 4 for Best Song; 11 Grammy Awards (including Song of the Year for "A Whole New World"); and 7 Golden Globes. He is best known for his work on Disney films including The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Beauty and the Beast, Hercules, Pocahontas, Enchanted, and Tangled, as well as the onstage musicals Newsies, Little Shop of Horrors, A Christmas Carol and Sister Act. He is currently working with Lin-Manuel Miranda ... read more
David Zippel is a lyricist and director. His lyrics have won him the Tony Award, two Academy Award nominations, two Grammy Award nominations, and three Golden Globe Award nominations. His songs appear on over twenty-five million CDs around the world, and have been recorded by many great singers including Stevie Wonder, Christina Aguilera, Mel Torme, Ricky Martin, Cleo Laine, Barbara Cook and Nancy LaMott.
He made his Broadway debut with CITY OF ANGELS (music by Cy Coleman, book by Larry Gelbart), for which he received the Tony Award, the New York Drama Critics Circle Award, the Drama Desk Award and (in ... read more
Ken Billington is a highly acclaimed lighting designer with over 50 years of experience in the theatre industry. Born in 1944 in Long Island, New York, Billington attended Hofstra University where he studied theatre and lighting design. After graduating, he began his career as a lighting designer in the Off-Broadway scene in the 1960s, eventually making his way to Broadway.
Billington has designed the lighting for over 100 Broadway productions, including the original productions of Sweeney Todd, Chicago, and The Drowsy Chaperone. He has been nominated for the Tony Award for Best Lighting Design 21 times, winning three times for his ... read more
Pick a Stephen Sondheim Broadway premiere in the last three decades – say, Sweeney Todd or Sunday in the Park with George or Into the Woods. Who was at the podium on opening night? If you guessed Paul Gemignani, you got it right. In fact, Maestro Gemignani has been a distinguished and constant presence in musical theater for the last forty years. In 2001 he was honored with a Special Lifetime Achievement Tony Award®.
Significantly, for an artist so closely associated with Sondheim, Gemignani made his Broadway debut as a conductor in Sondheim’s Follies (1971), taking over the role of music ... read more
Harold S. Prince (b. New York City, NY, 30 January 1928), also known as “Hal” Prince, was a theater producer and director who made a significant contribution to Broadway musicals in America. In a career that spanned more than fifty years, Prince has received ten Drama Desk Awards as Outstanding Director and 21 Tony Awards® for Best Direction, Best Producer, Best Musical, and Lifetime Achievement. In addition, Prince was the Kennedy Center Honoree in 1994 and the recipient of the National Medal of Arts in 2000.
Prince received his education at University of Pennsylvania, where he enrolled in a liberal arts ... read more
