2021 Weston Playbill

PLAYWRIGHT BIOS

RICHARD MALTBY, JR. includes among his Broadway credits: Conceived/directed Ain’t Misbehavin’ (1978 Tony, NY Drama Critics, Outer Critics and Drama Desk Awards. Also Tony Award for Best Director); Fosse (1999 Tony, Outer Critics and Drama Desk Awards). Lyricist: Miss Saigon (Evening Standard Award 1990, Tony Nomination for Best Score 1991). Director and co-lyricist of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Song & Dance , 1986 (Tony Award for star Bernadette Peters). With composer David Shire: director/lyricist Baby, 1983 (book by Sybille Pearson; seven Tony Award nominations); Lyricist: Big, 1996 (book by John Weidman. Tony nomination: Best Score). Off-Broadway credits: director/lyricist Starting Here, Starting Now , 1977 (Grammy Award nomination); Closer Than Ever , 1989 (Outer Critics Circle Awards: Best Musical, Best Score). Contributes devilish crossword puzzles to Harpers Magazine. Son of well-known orchestra leader; married to Janet Brenner; five children: Nicholas, David, Jordan, Emily, and Charlotte. WILLIAM MEADE began his career as a musician. He has been a featured soloist with numerous orchestras, including the Zurich Philharmonic, Prague Philharmonic, and Jacksonville Symphony. He has produced concerts throughout the U.S. and Europe with artists ranging from Arlo Guthrie to BB Kind. Television: The Miss America Pageant, The Super Bowl Half Time Show, Sex and The City, Love Monkey, and Sesame Street . On Broadway, he has been involved with more than 50 musicals. He is a Grammy-nominated record producer with a wide range of theatrical releases to his credit, from Hello, Dolly! with Carol Channing to Elegies by William Finn. JOHNNY CASH is one of the most important, influential, and respected artists in the history of recorded music. From his monumental live prison albums, to his extraordinary series of commentaries on the American spirit and the human condition, to a mesmerizing canon of gospel recordings, to his remarkable and unprecedented late-life artistic triumphs of will and wisdom, his impact on our culture is profound and continuing. John R. Cash was born into a family of Arkansas sharecroppers in the middle of the Great Depression, and that hardscrabble life instilled in him a reverence for family, the earth, God and truth that informed his incredible life and vision over a half-century career. After a stint in the United States Air Force, where he distinguished himself as a radio intercept operator, and less- successful efforts as an automobile factory worker and door-to-door home goods salesman, Johnny broke onto the music scene in 1955 on Memphis’ fabled Sun Records. It was here, at the “birthplace of rock and roll,” where the world was introduced to his singular voice and compelling songwriting, through such eternal classics as “I Walk the Line,” “Big River,” and “Folsom Prison Blues.” As Johnny matured as an artist, he took his disciples on soaring adventures of the mind and soul, including Ride This Train , a travelogue of the sights and sounds of his beloved country; Blood, Sweat and Tears , the Cash canon of working man blues; Bitter Tears , a searing examination of the treatment of Native Americans; The Holy Land, Hymns from the Heart, and other deeply personal statements of faith and devotion; and, of course, the historic concerts at Folsom Prison and San Quentin, where he demonstrated that compassion and healing are more integral to humanity than retribution and disdain. In 1969, The Johnny Cash Show was a groundbreaking fusion of musical styles, fresh voices and enduring legends that elevated him to the pinnacle of his craft, taking him to stages such as the White House, Carnegie Hall, behind the Iron Curtain and even Northern Ireland, where the combatants in the Troubles temporarily ceased the hostilities to gather together in a Belfast church to hear him sing—albeit from opposite sides of the aisle. When he became the biggest selling recording artist on earth, it was an affirmation of his universality. His powerful statements on love, forgiveness, and life and death spoke across time and generations, and still do today. Biography adapted from johnnycash.com.