Curated playlist
Drama Desk Award winners
- Al PacinoAl Pacino's mother told him poor people don't do acting. He went on to earn nine Oscar nominations.
- Andrew Lloyd WebberAndrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom of the Opera closed on Broadway in 2023 after 13,981 performances.
- Ian McKellenIan McKellen came out as gay on BBC radio in 1988, while Parliament weighed Section 28.
- John GielgudJohn Gielgud was arrested months after being knighted. Backstage in Liverpool, he feared he could not face an audience.
- Anthony HopkinsAnthony Hopkins once delivered a seven-page courtroom speech in a single take on the set of Steven Spielberg's Amistad. The crew was astonished. Spielberg was so overawed that he could not bring himself to call the actor Tony, and he…
- Marisa TomeiMarisa Tomei's first film role was a waitress with exactly one line. She later earned three Oscar nominations.
- Jonathan PryceA drama school tutor said Jonathan Pryce would only play villains on Z-Cars. He was knighted in 2021.
- Ralph FiennesRalph Fiennes has played a Nazi camp commandant, a dark wizard, a British spymaster and a flirtatious hotel concierge, and audiences have believed every one of them. Born in 1962, the English actor and director carries the full name Ralph…
- Catherine Zeta-JonesCatherine Zeta-Jones once said that with one hour of television, her life completely changed and she could not go anywhere. She is a Welsh actress, born in Swansea on the 25th of September 1969. The Zeta in her name is pronounced ZEE-tuh.…
- Bryan CranstonIn 1968, a 12-year-old Bryan Cranston was riding horses with his cousin at Spahn Ranch when he met Charles Manson. About a year later, Manson ordered the Tate-LaBianca murders. Cranston grew up to become an American actor and filmmaker…
- Patrick StewartPatrick Stewart grew a moustache for Macbeth and saw his father's face in the mirror.
- Tom StoppardTom Stoppard arrived in England knowing not a word of Czech. He fled Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia as a child.
- Hugh JackmanHugh Jackman likes to tell the story of the thirteen seconds he spent out of work. In his words, "I was technically unemployed for thirteen seconds." The count began on the night of his final graduation performance at drama school, when a…
- Kristin ChenowethKristin Chenoweth is 4 feet 11 inches tall, and as a child she sang a song about it. At the age of 12, she stood alone before the national conference of the Southern Baptist Convention and performed "Four Feet Eleven," an Evie song. Its…