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Alan Jay Lerner
Alan Jay Lerner 1918-86, American lyricist and librettist, b. New York City. After two years as a radio scriptwriter, Lerner began an association with the composer Frederick Loewe that resulted in several popular musicals, including Brigadoon (1947, film 1954), Paint Your Wagon (1951, film 1969...
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Satyajit Ray
Satyajit Ray , 1921-92, Indian film director, b. Calcutta (now Kolkata). His subtle, austere, and delicately lyrical films made him one of the outstanding filmmakers of the 20th cent.; he was the first Indian director to win international acclaim. During his formative years he was profoundly influen...
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Laurel and Hardy
Laurel and Hardy American film comedy team. The duo consisted of Stan Laurel, 1890-1965, b. Ulverson, England, whose real name was Arthur Stanley Jefferson; and Oliver Hardy, 1892-1957, b. Atlanta, Ga. The thin Laurel and rotund Hardy had occasionally appeared in films together before being purpose...
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James Cagney
James Cagney 1899-1986, American movie actor, b. New York City. He worked on Broadway as an actor and dancer before appearing in films. He is best remembered as a brash, sadistic, tough guy in such movies as Public Enemy (1931) and The Roaring Twenties (1939). He displayed equal vigor in sympat...
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Joan Crawford
Joan Crawford 1908-77, American movie star, b. San Antonio, Tex., as Lucille le Sueur. After working as a Broadway chorus dancer, Crawford began making films in 1926, eventually moving from musicals to drama. In 1945, she won an Academy Award for her performance in Mildred Pierce. Her best-known ...
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Madonna
Madonna (Madonna Louise Ciccone) , 1958-, American pop singer and actress, b. Bay City, Mich. She trained as a dancer at the Univ. of Michigan before moving to New York City to begin her music and dance career. Her albums Madonna (1983) and Like a Virgin (1984) secured her position as a sexual...
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Gene Kelly
Gene Kelly 1912-96, American dancer, choreographer, movie actor, and director, b. Pittsburgh. Kelly started dancing on Broadway in 1938 and first gained fame in the title role of the Broadway musical Pal Joey (1940). He moved to Hollywood in 1941 and soon starred in his first film, For Me and My...
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Ethel Merman
Ethel Merman 1908-84, American musical comedy star, b. Astoria, N.Y., originally named Ethel Zimmerman. Merman's theater debut was in George and Ira Gershwin 's Girl Crazy (1930). Noted for her brassy, booming voice, she appeared on Broadway in Annie Get Your Gun, Call Me Madam (also the fil...
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Fred Astaire
Fred Astaire , 1899-1987, American dancer, actor, and singer, b. Omaha, Nebr., as Frederick Austerlitz. After 1911 he and his sister Adele formed a successful Broadway vaudeville team. After his sister retired, Astaire became a film actor (1933). He became known as a debonair song-and-dance man, par...
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Howard Hawks
Howard Hawks (Howard Winchester Hawks), 1896-1977, American film director, b. Goshen, Ind. Although not as well known as such contemporaries as John Ford and Alfred Hitchcock , he has been critically acclaimed as one of the 20th cent.'s best motion picture directors. His directorial career began...
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