• A Little Night Music
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• United Kingdom
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• Vernon Harris
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• West End theatre
• Where Is Love?
• William David Brohn
• 
  

• 
  Belgium
  Belgium (ⁱ/ˈbɛldʒəm/ BEL-jəm), officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO. Belgium covers an area of 30,528 square kilometres (11,787 sq mi), and it has a population of about 11 million people. Straddling the cultural boundary between Germanic and Latin Europe, Belgium is home to two main linguistic groups, the Dutch-speakers, mostly Flemish (about 60%), and the French-speakers, mostly Walloons (about 40%), plus a small group of German-speakers. Belgium's two largest regions are the Dutch-speaking region of Flanders in the north and the French-speaking southern region of Wallonia. The Brussels-Capital Region, officially bilingual, is a mostly French-speaking enclave within the Flemish Region. A German-speaking Community exists in eastern Wallonia. Belgium's linguistic diversity and related political conflicts are reflected in the political history and a complex system of government.
  
  wn.com/Belgium
• 
  Broadway theatre
  Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City. Along with London's West End theatre, Broadway theatre is widely considered to represent the highest level of commercial theatre in the English-speaking world.
  The Broadway theatre district is a popular tourist attraction in New York. According to The Broadway League, Broadway shows sold approximately $1.081 billion worth of tickets in calendar year 2011, compared with $1.037 billion for 2010. Attendance in 2011 was 12.13 million.
  New York did not have a significant theatre presence until about 1750, when actor-managers Walter Murray and Thomas Kean established a resident theatre company at the Theatre on Nassau Street, which held about 280 people. They presented Shakespeare plays and ballad operas such as The Beggar's Opera. In 1752, William Hallam sent a company of twelve actors from Britain to the colonies with his brother Lewis as their manager. They established a theatre in Williamsburg, Virginia and opened with The Merchant of Venice and The Anatomist. The company moved to New York in the summer of 1753, performing ballad operas and ballad-farces like Damon and Phillida. The Revolutionary War suspended theatre in New York, but thereafter theatre resumed in 1798, the year the 2,000-seat Park Theatre was built on Chatham Street (now called Park Row). The Bowery Theatre opened in 1826, followed by others. Blackface minstrel shows, a distinctly American form of entertainment, became popular in the 1830s, and especially so with the arrival of the Virginia Minstrels in the 1840s.
  
  wn.com/Broadway_theatre
• 
  Cardiff
  Cardiff (ⁱ/ˈkɑrdɪf/; Welsh: Caerdydd (info) Welsh pronunciation: [kairˈdiːð, kaˑɨrˈdɨːð]) is the capital and largest city in Wales and the 10th largest city in the United Kingdom. The city is Wales' chief commercial centre, the base for most national cultural and sporting institutions, the Welsh national media, and the seat of the National Assembly for Wales. The unitary authority area's mid 2010 population was estimated to be 341,054, while the population of the Larger Urban Zone was estimated at 861,400 in 2009. Cardiff is a significant tourism centre and the most popular visitor destination in Wales with 18.3 million visitors in 2010. In 2011, Cardiff was ranked 6th in the world in National Geographic's alternative tourist destinations.
  The city of Cardiff is the county town of the historic county of Glamorgan (and later South Glamorgan). Cardiff is part of the Eurocities network of the largest European cities. The Cardiff Urban Area covers a slightly larger area outside of the county boundary, and includes the towns of Dinas Powys and Penarth. A small town until the early 19th century, its prominence as a major port for the transport of coal following the arrival of industry in the region contributed to its rise as a major city.
  
  wn.com/Cardiff
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  London Bridge
  Coordinates: 51°30′29″N 0°05′16″W / 51.50806°N 0.08778°W / 51.50806; -0.08778
  London Bridge is a bridge over the River Thames, connecting the City of London and Southwark, in central London. Situated between Cannon Street Railway Bridge and Tower Bridge, it forms the western end of the Pool of London. On the south side of the bridge are Southwark Cathedral and London Bridge station; on the north side are the Monument to the Great Fire of London and Monument tube station.
  It was the only bridge over the Thames downstream from Kingston until Putney Bridge opened in 1729. The current bridge opened on 17 March 1973 and is the latest in a succession of bridges to occupy the spot and claim the name.
  The bridge carries part of the A3 road, which is maintained by the Greater London Authority; the bridge itself is owned and maintained by the Bridge House Estates, an independent charity overseen by the City of London Corporation. The area between London Bridge and Tower Bridge on the south side of the Thames is a business improvement district (BID) and is managed by Team London Bridge.
  
  wn.com/London_Bridge
• 
  Melbourne
  Melbourne ([ˈmelbən, -bn̩, ˈmæl-],rhotically  /ˈmɛlbərn/) is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2010, the greater geographical area had an approximate population of four million. Inhabitants of Melbourne are called Melburnians or Melbournians.
  The metropolis is located on the large natural bay known as Port Phillip, with the city centre positioned at the estuary of the Yarra River (at the northernmost point of the bay). The metropolitan area then extends south from the city centre, along the eastern and western shorelines of Port Phillip, and expands into the hinterland. The city centre is situated in the municipality known as the City of Melbourne, and the metropolitan area consists of a further 30 municipalities.
  Melbourne was founded in 1835 (47 years after the European settlement of Australia) by settlers from Launceston in Van Diemen's Land. It was named by governor Richard Bourke in 1837, in honour of the British Prime Minister of the day, William Lamb—the 2nd Viscount Melbourne. Melbourne was officially declared a city by Queen Victoria in 1847. In 1851, it became the capital city of the newly created colony of Victoria. During the Victorian gold rush of the 1850s, it was transformed into one of the world's largest and wealthiest cities. After the federation of Australia in 1901, it then served as the interim seat of government of the newly created nation of Australia until 1927.
  
  wn.com/Melbourne
• 
  Philadelphia
  Philadelphia ( /ˌfɪləˈdɛlfiə/) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Philadelphia County, with which it is coterminous. The city is located in the Northeastern United States along the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. It is the fifth-most-populous city in the United States, with a population of 1,526,006 as of the 2010 U.S. Census. Philadelphia is also the commercial, cultural, and educational center of the Delaware Valley, home to 6 million people and the country's fifth-largest metropolitan area. The Philadelphia metropolitan division consists of five counties in Pennsylvania and has a population of 4,008,994. Popular nicknames for Philadelphia are Philly and The City of Brotherly Love, the latter of which comes from the literal meaning of the city's name in Greek (Greek: Φιλαδέλφεια ([pʰilaˈdelpʰeːa], Modern Greek: [filaˈðelfia]) "brotherly love", compounded from philos (φίλος) "loving", and adelphos (ἀδελφός) "brother").
  
  wn.com/Philadelphia
• 
  Singapore
  Singapore (ⁱ/ˈsɪŋəpɔər/ SI-ngə-pohr), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, 137 kilometres (85 mi) north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the Singapore Strait to its south. Singapore is highly urbanised but almost half of the country is covered by greenery. More land is being created for development through land reclamation.
  
  wn.com/Singapore
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  Sydney
  Sydney ( /sɪdni/) is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is classified as an Alpha+ World City indicating its influence in the region and throughout the world.
  Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people. Inhabitants of Sydney are called Sydneysiders, comprising a cosmopolitan and international population.
  The site of the first British colony in Australia, Sydney was established in 1788 at Sydney Cove by Arthur Phillip, commodore of the First Fleet as a penal colony. The city is built on hills surrounding Port Jackson which is commonly known as Sydney Harbour, where the iconic Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge feature prominently. The hinterland of the metropolitan area is surrounded by national parks, and the coastal regions feature many bays, rivers, inlets and beaches including the famous Bondi Beach and Manly Beach. Within the city are many notable parks, including Hyde Park and the Royal Botanic Gardens.
  
  wn.com/Sydney
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  Tallinn
  Tallinn (/ˈtɑːlɪn/ or /ˈtælɪn/,Estonian pronunciation: [ˈtɑlʲˑinˑ]) is the capital and largest city of Estonia. It occupies an area of 159.2 km² (61.5 sq mi) with a population of 416,470. It is situated on the northern coast of the country, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, 80 km (50 mi) south of Helsinki, east of Stockholm and west of Saint Petersburg. Tallinn's Old Town is in the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites. It is ranked as a global city and has been listed among the top 10 digital cities in the world. The city was a European Capital of Culture for 2011, along with Turku, Finland.
  Tallinn is the oldest capital^{[clarification needed]} in Northern Europe. The city was known as Reval from the 13th century until the 1920s.
  In 1154 a town called Qlwn or Qalaven (possible derivations of Kalevan or Kolyvan) was put on the world map of the Almoravid by the Muslim cartographer Muhammad al-Idrisi, who described it as a small town like a large castle among the towns of Astlanda. It has been suggested that the Quwri in Astlanda may have denoted the predecessor town of today's Tallinn.
  
  wn.com/Tallinn
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  Thames Embankment
  The Thames Embankment is a major feat of 19th century civil engineering designed to reclaim marshy land next to the River Thames in central London. It consists of the Victoria and Chelsea Embankment.
  There had been a long history of failed proposals to embank the Thames in central London. Embankments along the Thames were first proposed by Christopher Wren in the 1660s, then in 1824 former soldier and aide to George IV, Sir Frederick Trench suggested an embankment known as 'Trench's Terrace' from Blackfriars to Charing Cross. Trench brought a bill to Parliament which was blocked by river interests. In the 1830s, the painter John Martin promoted an embankment to contain an intercepting sewer. In January 1842 the City Corporation adopted a plan designed by James Walker but the plan fell foul of government infighting. The government itself built the Chelsea Embankment in 1854 from Chelsea Hospital to Millbank.
  Started in 1862, the present embankment on the northern side of the river was primarily designed by Sir Joseph Bazalgette. It incorporates the main low level interceptor sewer from west London, and an underground railway over which a wide road and riverside walkway were also constructed, as well as a retaining wall along the north side of the River Thames. In total, Bazalgette's scheme reclaimed 22 acres (89,000 m²) of land from the river.
  
  wn.com/Thames_Embankment
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  United Kingdom
  The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK, or Britain) is a sovereign state located off the north-western coast of continental Europe. The country includes the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland and many smaller islands. Northern Ireland is the only part of the UK that shares a land border with another sovereign state—the Republic of Ireland. Apart from this land border the UK is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, the North Sea, the English Channel and the Irish Sea.
  The United Kingdom is a unitary state governed under a constitutional monarchy and a parliamentary system, with its seat of government in the capital city of London. It is a country in its own right and consists of four countries: England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. There are three devolved administrations, each with varying powers, based in Belfast, Edinburgh and Cardiff, the capitals of Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. Associated with the UK, but not constitutionally part of it, are three Crown Dependencies. The United Kingdom has fourteen overseas territories. These are remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in 1922, encompassed almost a quarter of the world's land surface and was the largest empire in history. British influence can still be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former territories.
  
  wn.com/United_Kingdom
• 
  United States
  The United States of America (commonly abbreviated to the United States, the U.S., the USA, America, and the States) is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its forty-eight contiguous states and Washington, D.C., the capital district, lie between the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, bordered by Canada to the north and Mexico to the south. The state of Alaska is in the northwest of the continent, with Canada to the east and Russia to the west, across the Bering Strait. The state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific. The country also possesses several territories in the Pacific and Caribbean.
  At 3.79 million square miles (9.83 million km²) and with over 312 million people, the United States is the third or fourth largest country by total area, and the third largest by both land area and population. It is one of the world's most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, the product of large-scale immigration from many countries. The U.S. economy is the world's largest national economy, with an estimated 2011 GDP of $15.1 trillion (22% of nominal global GDP and over 19% of global GDP at purchasing-power parity). Per capita income is the world's sixth-highest.
  
  wn.com/United_States
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  West End theatre
  West End theatre is a popular term for mainstream professional theatre staged in the large theatres of London's 'Theatreland', the West End. Along with New York's Broadway theatre, West End theatre is usually considered to represent the highest level of commercial theatre in the English-speaking world. Seeing a West End show is a common tourist activity in London.
  Total attendances first surpassed 12 million in 2002 and 13 million in 2007, setting a new record for the West End. Since the late 1990s there has been an increase in the number of famous screen actors on the London stage.
  The Theatre in London flourished after the English Reformation. The first permanent public playhouse, known simply as The Theatre, was constructed in 1576 in Shoreditch by James Burbage. It was soon joined by The Curtain. Both are known to have been used by William Shakespeare's company. In 1599, the timber from The Theatre was moved to Southwark, where it was used in building the Globe Theatre in a new theatre district formed, beyond the controls of the City corporation. These theatres were closed in 1642 during the interregnum.
  
  wn.com/West_End_theatre

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  Adam Searles
  Adam Searles (born 1 June 1981) is a British stage, film, and television actor notably known for his performances as Gavroche in Les Misérables at the Palace Theatre, London and as the original Artful Dodger in Cameron Mackintosh's 1994 production of Oliver! at The London Palladium. Adam opened the show in 1994 with Jonathan Pryce in the role of Fagin and was requested to close to show in 1998 with Jim Dale as Fagin.
  Adam studied at the Sylvia Young Theatre School in London and also appeared in the original performance of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, Whistle Down The Wind at the Sydmonton Festival held at Lloyd Webber's country house, Sydmonton Court in 1995 and also featured in the Cameron Mackintosh's Gala Concert.. Hey Mr Producer and was part of the dream cast for Cameron Mackintosh's 10th Anniversary Concert of Les Misérables.
  Adam has since gone on to television work and in 2007 he appeared in Pantomime with Henry Winkler.
  In 2011, Adam graduated from The Royal Academy of Music's Musical Theatre course. He was also one of the 2010 recipients of the BBC Musical Theatre Bursary Award.
  
  wn.com/Adam_Searles
• Adolph Green
  Adolph Green (December 2, 1914  – October 23, 2002) was an American lyricist and playwright who, with long-time collaborator Betty Comden, penned the screenplays and songs for some of the most beloved movie musicals, particularly as part of Arthur Freed's production unit at MGM, during the genre's heyday. Many people thought the pair were married; they were not, but they shared a unique comic genius and sophisticated wit that enabled them to forge a six-decade-long partnership that produced some of Hollywood and Broadway's greatest hits.
  Green was born in The Bronx to Hungarian-Jewish immigrants Daniel and Helen Weiss Green. After high school, he worked as a runner on Wall Street while he tried to make it as an actor. He met Comden through mutual friends in 1938 while she was studying drama at New York University. They formed a troupe called the Revuers, which performed at the Village Vanguard, a club in Greenwich Village. Among the members of the company was a young comedian named Judy Tuvim, who later changed her name to Judy Holliday, and Green's good friend, a young musician named Leonard Bernstein, frequently accompanied them on the piano. The act's success earned them a movie offer and the Revuers traveled west in hopes of finding fame in Greenwich Village, a 1944 movie starring Carmen Miranda and Don Ameche, but their roles were so small they barely were noticed, and they quickly returned to New York.
  
  wn.com/Adolph_Green
• Alan Crofoot
  Alan Crofoot (June 2, 1929 - March 5, 1979) was a Canadian operatic Heldentenor, character tenor specialist, and actor, who is best remembered as the host of Mr Piper, a children's television series made in 1963. It was originally shown by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and also became well known in the United Kingdom. Crofoot hosted the show dressed as a Pied Piper, with a flower in his hat.
  Crofoot was born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He appeared in stage productions of musicals such as Man of La Mancha, in London's West End, and Oliver! on Broadway and Winnipeg's Rainbow Stage.
  His operatic career began at the Canadian Opera, as Spoletta in Tosca, in 1956, and included creating the role of Josiah Creach in the world premiere of Carlisle Floyd's Markheim, with Norman Treigle and Audrey Schuh, in New Orleans (1966), as well as appearances at the New York City Opera (Herod in Salome, opposite Maralin Niska, in 1975) and the Metropolitan Opera (The Bartered Bride, directed by John Dexter, in 1978). Also in his repertoire was the Jailer/Inquisitor in Il prigioniero.
  
  wn.com/Alan_Crofoot
• Alan Jay Lerner
  Alan Jay Lerner (August 31, 1918 – June 14, 1986) was an American lyricist and librettist. In collaboration with Frederick Loewe, he created some of the world's most popular and enduring works of musical theatre for both the stage and on film. He won three Tony Awards and three Academy Awards, among other honors.
  Born in New York City, he was the son of Edith Adelson Lerner and Joseph Jay Lerner, whose brother, Samuel Alexander Lerner, was founder and owner of the Lerner Stores, a chain of dress shops. One of Lerner's cousins was the radio comedian/television game show panelist Henry Morgan. Alan Jay Lerner was educated at Bedales School in England, The Choate School (now Choate Rosemary Hall) in Wallingford, Connecticut, (where he wrote "The Choate Marching Song") and Harvard. He attended both Camp Androscoggin and Camp Greylock. At both Choate and Harvard, Lerner was a classmate of John F. Kennedy; at Choate they had worked together on the yearbook staff. Like Cole Porter at Yale and Richard Rodgers at Columbia, his career in musical theater began with his collegiate contributions, in Lerner's case to the annual Harvard Hasty Pudding musicals. During the summers of 1936 and 1937, Lerner studied at Juilliard. While attending Harvard, he lost his sight in his left eye due to an accident in the boxing ring. In 1957, Lerner and Leonard Bernstein, another of Lerner's college classmates, collaborated on "Lonely Men of Harvard," a tongue-in-cheek salute to their alma mater.
  
  wn.com/Alan_Jay_Lerner
• Alma Cogan
  Alma Cogan (19 May 1932 – 26 October 1966) was an English singer of traditional pop music in the 1950s and early 1960s. Dubbed "The Girl With the Laugh/Giggle/Chuckle In Her Voice", she was the highest paid British female entertainer of her era. Throughout the mid-1950s, she was the most consistently successful female singer in the UK.
  She was born Alma Angela Cohen in Whitechapel, East London, England, of Russian-Romanian Jewish descent. Her father's family, the Kogins, arrived in England from Russia, while her mother’s family were refugees from Romania. Cogan's parents Mark and Fay Cohen had another daughter, the future actress Sandra Caron, four or five years later and Alma Cogan also had a brother. Mark Cohen's work as a haberdasher involved opening stores in different areas; this entailed frequent relocation for his family. One of Cogan's early residences was in Worthing, Sussex – where her family originally lived above her father's shop.
  Although Jewish, she attended St Joseph's Convent School in Reading. Her father was a singer but it was Cogan's mother who had show business aspirations for both her daughters – she had named Cogan after silent screen star Alma Taylor – and after eleven-year-old Cogan won the Sussex Queen of Song contest her encouraged mother managed to get her an audition with bandleader Ted Heath, who was impressed but thought Cogan too young.
  
  wn.com/Alma_Cogan
• 
  Barry Humphries
  John Barry Humphries, AO, CBE (born 17 February 1934) is an Australian comedian, satirist, dadaist, artist, author and character actor. He is best known for his on-stage and television alter egos Dame Edna Everage, a Melbourne housewife and "gigastar", and Sir Les Patterson, Australia's foul-mouthed cultural attaché to the Court of St. James's. He is a film producer and script writer, a star of London's West End musical theatre, an award-winning writer and an accomplished landscape painter. For his delivery of dadaist and absurdist humour to millions, biographer Anne Pender described Humphries in 2010 as not only the most significant theatrical figure of our time … [but] the most significant comedian to emerge since Charlie Chaplin.
  Humphries' characters, especially Dame Edna Everage, have brought him international renown, and he has appeared in numerous films, stage productions and television shows. Originally conceived as a dowdy Moonee Ponds housewife who caricatured Australian suburban complacency and insularity, Edna has evolved over four decades to become a satire of stardom, the gaudily dressed, acid-tongued, egomaniacal, internationally feted Housewife Gigastar, Dame Edna Everage. Humphries' other major satirical character creation was the archetypal Australian bloke Barry McKenzie, who originated as the hero of a comic strip about Australians in London (with drawings by Nicholas Garland) which was first published in Private Eye magazine. The stories about "Bazza" (Humphries' nickname, as well as an Australian term of endearment for the name Barry) gave wide circulation to Australian slang, particularly jokes about drinking and its consequences (much of which was invented by Humphries), and the character went on to feature in two Australian films, in which he was portrayed by Barry Crocker.
  
  wn.com/Barry_Humphries
• Betty Comden
  Betty Comden (May 3, 1917 – November 23, 2006) was one-half of the musical-comedy duo Comden and Green, who provided lyrics, libretti, and screenplays to some of the most beloved and successful Hollywood musicals and Broadway shows of the mid-20th century. Her writing partnership with Adolph Green lasted for six decades, during which time they collaborated with other leading entertainment figures such as the famed "Freed Unit" at MGM, Jule Styne and Leonard Bernstein.
  Betty Comden was born Basya Cohen in New York City, attended Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn, and studied drama at New York University. In 1938, mutual friends introduced her to Adolph Green, an aspiring actor. Along with the young Judy Holliday and Leonard Bernstein, Comden and Green formed a troupe called the Revuers, which performed at the Village Vanguard, a club in Greenwich Village. Due to the act's success, the Revuers appeared in the 1944 film Greenwich Village, but their roles were so small they barely were noticed, and they quickly returned to New York.
  
  wn.com/Betty_Comden
• Brian Conley
  Brian Conley (born 7 August 1961) is an English comedian, television presenter, singer and actor. At the peak of his television career, he was the highest-paid male television personality in the UK. Outside of television, he is best known for his frequent portrayals of Buttons in pantomime versions of Cinderella.
  Brian Paul Conley was born in Paddington, London. His father was a taxi driver. He was brought up in West London and studied Performing Arts at the Barbara Speake Stage School. As a teenager, Conley had a few minor television appearances, including an advert for hot dogs and a small role in a 1977 episode of the science fiction series Survivors. At the age of 16, by lying about his age, Conley started work as a Pontin's Bluecoat.
  Conley's first major show business success was fronting a comedy showband called Tomfoolery, who performed in pubs and clubs across England and Wales, sometimes as a support act for artists such as Johnny Mathis and The Nolans. Although the group broke up due to internal disputes when Conley was 19, his work with the band led to him being talent spotted by agent Bob Voice. As a result of this, Conley started working as a warm-up man for television personalities such as The Krankies, Kenny Everett and Terry Wogan.
  
  wn.com/Brian_Conley
• Burn Gorman
  Burn Hugh Winchester Gorman (born 1 September 1974) is an American-born English actor and musician. Burn is best known for his roles as Owen Harper in Torchwood and as William Guppy in Bleak House.
  Gorman was born in Hollywood, California, where his father worked as a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. He has three older sisters. At the age of seven he moved to London, England.
  Gorman trained at the Manchester Metropolitan School of Theatre.
  Gorman appeared in the first two seasons of the BAFTA Cymru winning science-fiction/crime drama Torchwood as Owen Harper. Other television includes Sex, The City and Me, "Funland", "Bonekickers" and other projects for the BBC.
  Gorman appeared in the BAFTA and EMMY winning BBC One adaptation of Charles Dickens' Bleak House as William Guppy, and the BAFTA nominated political thriller Low Winter Sun (Tiger Aspect/Channel 4) the same year. He played scriptwriter Ray Galton in the BAFTA nominated and RTS winning BBC Four television play, The Curse of Steptoe.
  
  wn.com/Burn_Gorman
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  Cameron Mackintosh
  Sir Cameron Anthony Mackintosh (born 17 October 1946) is a British theatrical producer notable for his association with many commercially successful musicals. At the height of his success in 1990, he was described as being "the most successful, influential and powerful theatrical producer in the world" by the New York Times. He is the producer of shows such as Les Misérables, The Phantom of the Opera, Mary Poppins, Martin Guerre, Miss Saigon and Cats.
  Mackintosh was born in Enfield, London, the son of Diana Gladys (née Tonna), a production secretary, and Ian Robert Mackintosh, a timber merchant and jazz trumpeter. His father was Scottish and his mother, a native of Malta, was of Maltese and French descent. Mackintosh was raised in his mother's Roman Catholic faith^{[citation needed]} and educated at Prior Park College in Bath.
  He first knew that he wanted to become a theatre producer after his aunt took him to a matinee of the Julian Slade musical Salad Days when he was 8 years old.
  Mackintosh began his theatre career in his late teens, as a stagehand at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, graduating to stage manager on several touring productions. Before long, he began producing his own small scale tours before becoming a London-based producer in the 1970s. His early London productions included Anything Goes (which closed after only two weeks), Side By Side By Sondheim, The Card, My Fair Lady and Tom Foolery.
  
  wn.com/Cameron_Mackintosh
• Cat Simmons
  Cat Simmons is an English actress, best known for her role as DC Kezia Walker in the long running ITV drama The Bill. And for starring in Family Affairs as Scarlett Anderson. Simmons also plays a character called "Sista Twista" in a film called "Life & Lyrics". She also made appearances in No Angels and Casualty.
  The daughter of a singer and nurse, her father Guyanese and mother English.
  Simmons trained with the Oldham Theatre Workshop and National Youth Music Theatre and studied in Pleckgate High School, Mathematics and Computing College.
  Simmons has worked in numerous stage shows. Her work includes Nancy in Cameron Mackintosh 's Production of Oliver!, Mary Magdalene in Gale Edwards Jesus Christ Superstar, the Young Vic’s sell-out production of Langston Hughes’ Simply Heavenly as Joyce, she starred as the Princess in Aladdin alongside Ian McKellen. The production – the second in the Old Vic Theatre Company’s inaugural season under artistic director Kevin Spacey.
  In 2005 Simmons collaborated with music group Three Levels and released a track called Rock U 2Nite.
  
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• 
  Charles Dickens
  Charles John Huffam Dickens ( /ˈtʃɑrlz ˈdɪkɪnz/; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic who is generally regarded as the greatest novelist of the Victorian period and the creator of some of the world's most memorable fictional characters. During his lifetime Dickens' works enjoyed unprecedented popularity and fame, but it was in the twentieth century that his literary genius was fully recognized by critics and scholars. His novels and short stories continue to enjoy an enduring popularity among the general reading public.
  Born in Portsmouth, England, Dickens left school to work in a factory after his father was thrown into debtors' prison. Though he had little formal education, his early impoverishment drove him to succeed. He edited a weekly journal for 20 years, wrote 15 novels and hundreds of short stories and non-fiction articles, lectured and performed extensively, was an indefatigable letter writer, and campaigned vigorously for children's rights, education, and other social reforms.
  
  wn.com/Charles_Dickens
• Charlie Smalls
  Charlie Smalls (October 25, 1943 in Queens, New York – August 27, 1987 in Belgium) was an African-American composer and songwriter, best known for writing the music for the 1975 Broadway musical The Wiz.
  A musical prodigy, Smalls attended the Juilliard School at age eleven in 1954, staying until 1961. In 1968, he appeared on the "Some Like It Lukewarm" episode of The Monkees (episode #56, original airdate March 4, 1968), chatting at a piano with singer Davy Jones. He wrote a song for John Cassavetes's 1968 film Faces called "Never Felt Like This Before". He also wrote the score for the 1976 film, Drum. He also wrote the song "From Me To You" for the Hugh Masekela 1966 albumHugh Masekela's Next Album.
  After graduating from the High School of Performing Arts, Smalls toured as a member of the New York Jazz Repertory Company before beginning work on The Wiz. An African-American retelling of L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, The Wiz was adapted into a feature film, starring Diana Ross and Michael Jackson, by Motown Productions and Universal Pictures in 1978.
  
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• 
  Claire Moore
  Claire Mary Moore (born 19 February 1956) is an Australian politician. Moore was elected to the Australian Senate from Queensland in July 2001, representing the Australian Labor Party. Her term began on 1 July 2002.
  Moore was born in Toowoomba, Queensland, to Catholic parents, and attended school there, prior to going to university in Brisbane. She worked as a public servant, and was Branch Secretary of the Community and Public Service Union from 1994 to her election to the Australian Senate in 2001.
  Both before and since her election, Moore has been engaged with social issues, through trade unions, as a member of Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation (ANTAR), the Australian Republican Movement and Emily's List. In the Senate, she has been chair or deputy chair of the Community Affairs committee since July 2005.
  
  
  
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• 
  Clive Barnes
  Clive Alexander Barnes CBE (May 13, 1927 – November 19, 2008) was a British-born American writer and critic. From 1965 to 1977 he was the dance and theater critic for the New York Times, the most powerful position he had held, since its theater critics' reviews historically have had great influence on the success or failure of Broadway productions.
  Barnes was educated at Emanuel School, and St Catherine's College, Oxford. He was the dance and drama critic at the New York Post since 1978, and senior consulting editor at Dance Magazine, where he wrote a monthly column, "Attitudes". Late in life, he also contributed regularly to the British journal "Dance Now". He also continued to edit and write for British newspapers such as The Times and the Daily Express, and the weekly Spectator magazine.
  Barnes authored numerous books related to theater and the performing arts, particularly dance. These include four volumes of 50 Best Plays of the American Theatre, nine series of Best American Plays (with John Gassner), American Ballet Theatre: A 25 Year Retrospective (with Elizabeth Kaye), Masters of Movement: Portraits of America's Great Choreographers (with Rose Eichenbaum), Ballet in Britain Since the War, New York Times Directory of the Theater, Ballet Here and Now, Dance Scene USA, Inside American Ballet Theatre, as well as biographies of Tennessee Williams and Rudolf Nureyev.
  
  wn.com/Clive_Barnes
• Clive Revill
  Clive Selsby Revill (born 18 April 1930) is a New Zealand-born British character actor best known for his performances in musical theatre and on the London stage.
  Revill was born in Wellington, New Zealand, the son of Eleanor May (née Neel) and Malet Barford Revill. He originally trained to be an accountant in his homeland of New Zealand, but decided to change his career path in 1950 when he made his stage debut as Sebastian in Twelfth Night. He then moved to England, where he appeared in The Shakespeare Memorial Theatre Company's elebrated 1956–1958 season of productions in Stratford, which included Hamlet, Love's Labour's Lost, The Merchant of Venice, Julius Caesar, and The Tempest. He went on to have such varied stage roles as Ratty in Toad of Toad Hall, and Jean-Paul Marat in The Marat/Sade.
  He made his Broadway debut in 1952, playing Mr. Pickwick in The Pickwick Papers, and subsequently appeared in Irma La Douce, The Incomparable Max, and Oliver!, for which his Fagin was nominated for a Tony Award. He is also known for his roles in the operettas of Gilbert and Sullivan, on both stage and television.
  
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• 
  Cole Porter
  Cole Albert Porter (June 9, 1891 – October 15, 1964) was an American composer and songwriter. Born to a wealthy family in Indiana, he defied the wishes of his domineering grandfather and took up music as a profession. Classically trained, he was drawn towards musical theatre. After a slow start, he began to achieve success in the 1920s, and by the 1930s he was one of the major songwriters for the Broadway musical stage. Unlike most successful Broadway composers, Porter wrote both the lyrics and the music for his songs.
  After a serious horseback riding accident in 1937, Porter was left disabled and in constant pain, but he continued to work. His shows of the early 1940s did not contain the lasting hits of his best work of the 1920s and 30s, but in 1948 he made a triumphant comeback with his most successful musical, Kiss Me, Kate.
  Porter's other musicals include Fifty Million Frenchmen, DuBarry Was a Lady, Anything Goes and Can-Can, and his numerous hit songs include "Night and Day", "I Get a Kick out of You", "Well, Did You Evah!" and "I've Got You Under My Skin". He also composed scores for films from the 1930s to the 1950s. He was noted for his sophisticated, suggestive lyrics, clever rhymes and complex forms.
  
  wn.com/Cole_Porter
• David Lean
  Sir David Lean, CBE (25 March 1908 – 16 April 1991) was an English film director, producer, screenwriter and editor, best remembered for big-screen epics The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), Lawrence of Arabia (1962), Doctor Zhivago (1965), and A Passage to India (1984); for bringing Charles Dickens' novels to the silver screen with films such as Great Expectations (1946) and Oliver Twist (1948); and for the renowned romantic drama Brief Encounter (1945).
  Acclaimed by directors including Steven Spielberg and Stanley Kubrick,, Lean was voted 9th greatest film director of all time in the British Film Institute Sight & Sound Directors' Top Directors" poll 2002. Lean has four films in the top eleven of the British Film Institute's Top 100 British Films.
  David Lean was born in Croydon, Surrey (now part of Greater London), to Francis William le Blount Lean and the former Helena Tangye (niece of Sir Richard Trevithick Tangye). His parents were Quakers and he was a pupil at the Quaker-founded Leighton Park School in Reading. His younger brother, Edward Tangye Lean (1911–1974), founded the original Inklings literary club when a student at Oxford University. Lean was a half-hearted schoolboy with a dreamy nature who was labeled a "dud" of a student; he left in his mid-teens and entered his father's chartered accountancy firm as an apprentice. At age 16, his father deserted the family when he ran off with another woman, and young David would later follow a similar path after his own first marriage and child.
  
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• David Merrick
  David Merrick (November 27, 1911 – April 25, 2000) was a prolific Tony Award-winning American theatrical producer.
  Born David Lee Margulois to Jewish parents in St. Louis, Missouri, Merrick graduated from Washington University, then studied law at the Jesuit-run Saint Louis University School of Law. In 1940 he left his legal career to become a successful theatrical producer. He often was his own competition for the Tony Award, and he frequently won multiple nominations and/or wins in the same season.
  
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• 
  Davy Jones (actor)
  David Thomas "Davy" Jones (30 December 1945 – 29 February 2012) was an English recording artist and actor, best known as a member of The Monkees.
  Davy Jones was born at 20 Leamington Street, Openshaw, Manchester, England, on 30 December 1945. At age 11, he began his acting career, appearing on the British television soap opera Coronation Street, which was produced at Granada Studios by Granada Television in Manchester. In 1961, Jones played Ena Sharples' grandson, Colin Lomax, the second year Coronation Street was broadcast. He also appeared in the BBC police series Z-Cars. After the death of his mother from emphysema when he was 14 years old, Jones rejected acting in favour of a career as a jockey, apprenticing with Newmarket trainer Basil Foster. He dropped out of high school to begin his career in that field. This career was short-lived however, as though Foster believed Jones would be successful as a jockey, he encouraged his young protégé to take a role as the Artful Dodger a production of Oliver! in London's West End, a move which consequently changed the course of Jones' life forever. In turn, Jones cared for Foster in his later years, bringing him to the United States and providing financial support for his mentor.
  
  wn.com/Davy_Jones_(actor)
• Dodi Protero
  Dodi Protero (March 13, 1931—April 22, 2007) was a Canadian operatic soprano who had a prolific international career from 1955 through 1980. A singer with a great deal of technical finess, she excelled in the coloratura soprano and soubrette repertoires. She later had a successful second career as a voice teacher.
  Born Dorothy Ann MacGregor (later adopted the name McIlraith) in Toronto, Protero studied singing with James Rossellino in her native city from 1949 through 1959 and her first professional performing experiences were with his Rosselino Opera Company during the early 1950s as Annina in performances of Giuseppe Verdi's La traviata. She was also a pupil of Toti dal Monte in Venice (1955-1957), Ferdinand Grossmann in Vienna (1957), Lawrence Fehenberger in Munich (1963), and in New York City with Rosa Bok (1967-1970) and Oren Brown (1975-1976). She made her European opera debut in 1955 as Papagena in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's The Magic Flute at the Teatro di San Carlo. That same year she won the Siena International Singing Competition and in 1957 she won the singing competition at the Salzburg Mozarteum.
  
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• 
  Dominic Chianese
  Dominic Chianese ( /ˌkiːəˈnɛzɛ/; born February 24, 1931) is an American film, television and theatre actor, perhaps best known for his role as Corrado "Junior" Soprano on the HBO TV series, The Sopranos.
  Chianese was born in the borough of The Bronx in New York, the son of a bricklayer. He graduated from Bronx High School of Science in 1948. He worked as a bricklayer with his father and attended night school during the 1950s, graduating with a bachelor's degree in speech and theater from Brooklyn College in 1961. His earliest stage work occurred in 1952 with a Gilbert and Sullivan repertory company of singers, actors and musicians called The American Savoyards, under the direction of Dorothy Raedler.
  After a decade of attending college and appearing in off-broadway theatre, Chianese attended his first professional acting class at HB Studios in Manhattan, with renowned teacher Walt Witcover. Drama and musical theater became Chianese's passion. His first Broadway show was Oliver! in 1965. He has continued to perform in Broadway theatre, Off Broadway, and regional theatre. To supplement income in the dry periods, he played rhythm guitar and sang in taverns and restaurants. Chianese's first television credit occurred when George C. Scott recommended him for a role in the acclaimed series East Side, West Side. In 1974, Francis Ford Coppola cast Chianese as Johnny Ola in The Godfather Part II, which sparked a film career, culminating in several films (and plays) with Al Pacino.
  
  wn.com/Dominic_Chianese
• Donald Albery
  Sir Donald Arthur Rolleston Albery (London 19 June 1914 – 14 September 1988) was an English theatre impresario who did much to translate the adventurous spirit of London in the 1960s into theatrical reality.
  Born into a theatrical family, his father was director Sir Bronson James Albery, his first job was struggling to manage Sadler's Wells Ballet during the air raids of World War II. Perhaps such an experience formed a modernist sensibility and when he launched his own Donmar company in 1953 he championed plays by Graham Greene, Tennessee Williams, Edward Albee, Jean Anouilh, and an adaptation by J.B. Priestley of an Iris Murdoch novel.
  Though always commercially minded, his spirit of adventure endured with the first London production of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot and sponsorship of Joan Littlewood's Theatre Workshop. In 1960, Albery, in collaboration with William Donaldson, produced Beyond the Fringe in London and, in 1962, in New York.
  From 1964 through 1968, Albery served as director and administrator of the London Festival Ballet.
  
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• Francesca Jackson
  Francesca Jackson (born 6 December 1983) is a musical theatre actress. She took part in the Reality television show I'd Do Anything and lost out the role of Nancy to Jodie Prenger.
  Jackson was born in Wolverhampton, England to parents, Mel and Steve Jackson. She later moved to Ystalyfera, Swansea where she grew up and where her parents still live today.
  She joined the National Youth Music Theatre in 1991, and starred in many productions such as Whistle Down the Wind and Bugsy Malone. Jackson now resides in London.
  Although, receiving many acting and singing jobs since the age of 10, Francesca's first big break was playing Bet at the age of 14 in the Sam Mendes production of Oliver! at the London Palladium alongside Robert Lindsay and Sonia Swabey. In recent years Francesca's most notable role was starring as Joanne in Rent remixed alongside Denise van Outen and she has also played the leading role of Alice in the workshop production of 'All the Fun of the Fair', directed by Nikolai Foster. She also appeared in the 2006 production of 'Tonight's the night' as an understudy for Rachel Tucker (future I'd Do Anything contestant). Later, Francesca auditioned for Reality TV show I'd Do Anything attempting to win the part of Nancy. She was put through and eliminated fourth on the live show. She once shared an apartment with Connie Fisher, the future winner of How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?.
  
  wn.com/Francesca_Jackson
• Fred Ebb
  Fred Ebb (April 8, 1928 – September 11, 2004) was an American musical theatre lyricist who had many successful collaborations with composer John Kander. The Kander and Ebb team frequently wrote for such performers as Liza Minnelli and Chita Rivera.
  Ebb was born in Manhattan to a Jewish family, the son of Anna Evelyn (née Gritz) and Harry Ebb. He worked during the early 1950s bronzing baby shoes, as a trucker's assistant, and was also employed in a department store credit office and at a hosiery company. He graduated from New York University with a bachelor’s degree in English Literature, and also earned his Master’s Degree in English from Columbia University.
  One of his early collaborators was Phil Springer, and a song they wrote together ("I Never Loved Him Anyhow") was recorded by Carmen McRae in 1956. Another song Ebb wrote with Springer was "Heartbroken" (1953), which was recorded by Judy Garland, the mother of his future protégée, Liza Minnelli. Other Springer-Ebb tunes include "Moonlight Gambler" and "Nevertheless I Never Lost the Blues". "Don't Forget", which he wrote with Norman Leyden, was recorded by singer Eddy Arnold in 1954.
  
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• Frederick Loewe
  Frederick Loewe (/ˈloʊ/, originally German Friedrich (Fritz) Löwe [ˈløːvə]; June 10, 1901 – February 14, 1988), was an Austrian-American composer. He collaborated with lyricist Alan Jay Lerner on the long running Broadway musicals My Fair Lady and Camelot, with book and lyrics by Lerner, both of which were made into films.
  Loewe was born in Berlin, Germany, to Viennese parents Edmond and Rosa Loewe. His father was a noted Jewish operetta star who performed throughout Europe and in North and South America; he starred as Count Danilo in the original production of The Merry Widow.
  Frederick Loewe grew up in Berlin and attended a Prussian cadet school from the age of five until he was thirteen. At an early age Loewe learned to play piano by ear and helped his father rehearse, and he began composing songs at age seven. He eventually attended a music conservatory in Berlin, one year behind virtuoso Claudio Arrau, and studied with Ferruccio Busoni and Eugene d'Albert. He won the coveted Hollander Medal awarded by the school and gave performances as a concert pianist while still in Germany. At 13, he was the youngest piano soloist ever to appear with the Berlin Philharmonic.
  
  wn.com/Frederick_Loewe
• George Layton
  George Layton (born George Lowy on 2 March 1943) is an English actor, director, screenwriter and author. He was educated at Belle Vue Boys' Grammar School in Bradford and later studied acting at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts where he won the Emile Littler award. He went on to leading parts at Coventry and Nottingham and appeared on Broadway in Chips with Everything. He also appeared in an Australian production called Funny Peculiar.
  He is best known for two television roles: that of Junior Dr Paul Collier in the comedy series Doctor in the House and its first two sequels Doctor at Large and Doctor in Charge, and that of Bombardier 'Solly' Solomons in the first two series of It Ain't Half Hot Mum.
  Layton was born in Bradford, West Riding of Yorkshire, England. His early television work includes Swizzlewick, Enter Solly Gold, United!, Thirty-Minute Theatre, Detective, What's In It For Me? and Lay Down Your Arms. He also made guest appearances in many classic British series, including The Likely Lads, Z-Cars, The Liver Birds, The Sweeney, and played the lead in Len and the River Mob. In 1969 he played a small role in the Doctor Who story The Space Pirates.
  
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• 
  Griff Rhys Jones
  Griffith "Griff" Rhys Jones (born 16 November 1953) is a Welsh comedian, writer, actor, television presenter and personality. Jones came to national attention in the early 1980s for his work in the BBC television comedy sketch shows Not the Nine O'Clock News and Alas Smith and Jones along with his comedy partner Mel Smith. With Smith, he founded television production company Talkback Productions, now part of RTL Group. He went on to develop a career as a television presenter and writer, as well as continuing with acting work.
  Rhys Jones was born in Cardiff, the son of Gwyneth Margaret (née Jones) and Elwyn, a doctor. Moving with his father's work, he attended Conifers Primary School in Midhurst, West Sussex, junior school in Epping, Essex and Brentwood School, also in Essex. While the family was resident in Essex, his father had a boat in West Mersea on Mersea Island, which they would sail around the coast of Suffolk and into The Broads.
  
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  Harry Secombe
  Sir Harry Donald Secombe, CBE (8 September 1921 – 11 April 2001) was a Welsh entertainer with a talent for comedy and a noted fine tenor singing voice. He is best known for playing Neddie Seagoon, the central character in the BBC radio comedy series The Goon Show (1951–60). He also appeared in musicals and, in his later years, was a prominent presenter of television shows incorporating hymns and other devotional songs.
  Secombe was born in a council house in the St Thomas district of Swansea, the third of four children of Nellie Jane Gladys (née Davies), a shop manageress, and Frederick Ernest Secombe, a grocer. From the age of 11 he attended Dynevor School, a state secondary school in central Swansea.
  His family were regular church-goers, belonging to the congregation of St Stephen's Church in Danygraig. A member of the choir, Secombe would - from the age of 12 - perform a sketch entitled The Welsh Courtship at church socials, acting as "feed" to his sister Carol. His elder brother, Fred Secombe, was the author of several books about his experiences as an Anglican priest and rector.
  
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• Harry Stott
  Harry Stott (born September 30, 1995), from Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, is a British stage and television actor. His theatre experience includes the role of Michael Banks in the West End production of Mary Poppins for which he also sang in the cast recording.
  In 2008, he was one of three boys selected on the TV show I'd Do Anything to share the title role in Cameron Mackintosh's 2009 West End revival of Oliver! at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane. He alternated the role with Gwion Wyn Jones and Laurence Jeffcoate. The cast featured Jodie Prenger who won her role of Nancy on I'd Do Anything, Burn Gorman as Bill Sikes and Rowan Atkinson as Fagin. He performed on the show's opening night of 14 January 2009, and is featured on the cast recording. He played the role from January until July 2009.
  He plays one of the main characters called Lupus in the television series Roman Mysteries, based on the novels of the same name by Caroline Lawrence. Lupus cannot speak, and interacts with his friends through sign language, writing and drawing.
  
  wn.com/Harry_Stott
• Iain Fletcher
  Iain Fletcher is a British television actor, best known for his role as DC Rod Skase in the ITV1 drama series The Bill. He served on the show for 9 years.
  Other television credits include Family Affairs, Casualty and Doctors.
  Stage credits include Sam Carmichael in the musical Mamma Mia! in the West End and Bill Sikes in Cameron Mackintosh's Production of Oliver!
  
  
  
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• 
  Irving Berlin
  Irving Berlin (May 11, 1888 – September 22, 1989) was an American composer and lyricist of Jewish heritage, widely considered one of the greatest songwriters in American history. He published his first song, "Marie from Sunny Italy", in 1907 and had his first major international hit, "Alexander's Ragtime Band" in 1911.
  "Alexander's Ragtime Band" sparked an international dance craze in places as far away as Berlin's native Russia, which also "flung itself into the ragtime beat with an abandon bordering on mania." Over the years he was known for writing music and lyrics in the American vernacular: uncomplicated, simple and direct, with his aim being to "reach the heart of the average American" whom he saw as the "real soul of the country."
  He wrote hundreds of songs, many becoming major hits, which made him "a legend" before he turned thirty. During his 60-year career he wrote an estimated 1,500 songs, including the scores for 19 Broadway shows and 18 Hollywood films, with his songs nominated eight times for Academy Awards. Many songs became popular themes and anthems, including "Easter Parade", "White Christmas", "Happy Holiday", "This is the Army, Mr. Jones", and "There's No Business Like Show Business". His Broadway musical and 1942 film, This is the Army, with Ronald Reagan, had Kate Smith singing Berlin's "God Bless America" which was first performed in 1938. Smith still performed the song on her 1960 CBS television series, The Kate Smith Show. After the September 11 attacks in 2001, Celine Dion recorded it as a tribute, making it #1 on the charts.
  
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• Jack Wild
  Jack Wild (30 September 1952 – 1 March 2006) was a British actor who is best remembered for his performances in both stage and screen productions of the Lionel Bart musical Oliver! with Ron Moody, Mark Lester, Shani Wallis and Oliver Reed. He received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor at the age of 16 for the role of The Artful Dodger in Oliver! (1968), as well as nominations for a BAFTA Award and a Golden Globe Award. He is also known for his leading role in the 1969 children's television series H.R. Pufnstuf (1969–71) and for his significant position in the 1976 HBO mini-series, The Tale of Charlie Niebanck.
  Wild was born into a working class family in Royton, near Oldham, Manchester, to a labourer father and a mother who worked as a butcher. Wild moved to Hounslow, west London, with his parents in 1960. He was discovered whilst playing football by theatrical agent June Collins, the mother of one of Jack's team-mates, Phil Collins (who would go on to become a member of Genesis and a well-known solo vocal artist).
  
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• James Villiers
  James Michael Hyde Villiers (29 September 1933 – 18 January 1998) was a British character actor and a familiar face on British television. He was particularly memorable for his plummy voice and ripe articulation.
  Born in London and educated at Wellington College, Berkshire and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, 'Gentleman Jim' Villiers (pronounced Villers) was from an upper class background, related to the Earl of Clarendon, and this was often reflected in the types of roles he played, such as King Charles II in the BBC series, The First Churchills (1969).
  He made his film debut in 1958, and appeared in many British films over the years, including Joseph Losey's The Damned a.k.a. These Are the Damned, shot in 1961, but not released until 1963; Seth Holt's The Nanny (1965), Joseph Andrews (1977), For Your Eyes Only (1981), The Scarlet Pimpernel (1982), Mountains of the Moon (1990) and The Tichborne Claimant (1998), along with numerous other projects. He often specialised in playing cold, somewhat effete villains.
  
  wn.com/James_Villiers
• Jenny Galloway
  Jenny Galloway (born 1949) is a British actress, and singer best known for her stage career.
  Theatre credits include:
  She has received numerous awards and nominations, winning the 1999 Olivier Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Musical for her performance in Mamma Mia!.
  Galloway can be heard on the cast recordings of Les Misérables 10th Anniversary Concert,Les Misérables 25th Anniversary Concert, Oliver!, Mamma Mia! and Mary Poppins.
  Film credits include In Transit, About a Boy, Fierce Creatures and the role of the Foreign Secretary in Johnny English. She appeared in Madame de Sade alongside Judi Dench and Deborah Findlay as Charlotte in 2008.
  In what was probably her largest television role, Galloway had a principal role in the fifth series episode of Marple The Pale Horse alongside Julia McKenzie. Her role was Bella Ellis - the town's local witch and cook to Thyrza Grey, (played by Pauline Collins) - who are considered prime suspects at many points during the episode. The episode aired as the first part of the fifth series in the UK in August 2010, for some reason before the fourth series had finished airing.
  
  wn.com/Jenny_Galloway
• Jerry Bock
  Jerrold Lewis "Jerry" Bock (November 23, 1928 – November 3, 2010) was an American musical theater composer. He received the Tony Award for Best Musical and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama with Sheldon Harnick for their 1959 musical Fiorello! and the Tony Award for Best Composer and Lyricist for the 1964 musical Fiddler on the Roof with Harnick.
  Born in New Haven, Connecticut and raised in Flushing, Queens, New York, Bock studied the piano as a child. He attended the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he wrote the musical Big As Life, which toured the state and enjoyed a run in Chicago. After graduation he spent three summers at the Tamiment Playhouse in the Poconos and wrote for early television revues with lyricist Larry Holofcener.
  He made his Broadway debut in 1955 when he and Lawrence Holofcener contributed songs to Catch a Star. The following year the duo collaborated on the musical Mr. Wonderful, designed for Sammy Davis, Jr., after which they worked on Ziegfeld Follies of 1956, which closed out-of-town.
  
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  Jerry Herman
  Jerry Herman (born July 10, 1931) is an American composer and lyricist, known for his work in Broadway musical theater. He composed the scores for the hit Broadway musicals Hello, Dolly!, Mame, and La Cage aux Folles. He has been nominated for the Tony Award five times, and won twice, for Hello, Dolly! and La Cage aux Folles. In 2009, Herman received the Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre. He is a recipient of the 2010 Kennedy Center Honors.
  
  wn.com/Jerry_Herman
• Jodie Prenger
  Jodie Prenger (born 12 June 1979 in Blackpool, Lancashire) is an English actress and singer. She was the winner of BBC talent show-themed television series I'd Do Anything on 31 May 2008. She was also the winner of the second series of The Biggest Loser on Living in 2006. She is also a former panellist on ITV1's flagship daytime show Loose Women.
  Prenger was educated at Elmslie Girls' School in Blackpool and Blackpool and The Fylde College before starting work in the area as an entertainer. She has performed extensively on the cabaret circuit in Northern England and particularly her hometown of Blackpool and Fylde coast where she has also worked as an agony aunt. In June 1998 she appeared in two different shows each night in two Blackpool theatres. First she had a solo spot in the Tiptoes Summer Spectacular at the resorts Opera House theatre before appearing 20 minute later in one of the main roles in a Blackpool and The Fylde College production of the musical comedy, Hot Mikado at the Grand Theatre.
  
  wn.com/Jodie_Prenger
• Joe Darion
  Joe Darion, (30 January 1917 - 6 June 2001) was an American musical theatre lyricist, most famous for Man of La Mancha.
  Darion was born in New York City and died in Lebanon, New Hampshire.
  
  
  
  wn.com/Joe_Darion
• Joe McGann
  Joseph 'Joe' McGann (born 24 July 1958) is an English actor. His most well known role is the lead role of Charlie Burrows, the "housekeeper" in the TV comedy series The Upper Hand (1990–1996). He is also known as a television reporter on the BBC's South Today programme, reporting on local events in the south of England. He was also a key character in ITV's soap Night and Day, who had an affair with the underage main character Jane Harper before her disappearance.
  McGann was born in Kensington, Liverpool, to a metallurgist father and a teacher mother, Claire McGann. His three younger brothers — Paul, Mark and Stephen — are also actors. Together with Stephen and Mark, he starred in Tom, Dick and Harry, a play by Ray and Michael Cooney at the Duke of York's Theatre, in 1995.
  In 1992 Joe was the voice of Masklin in the TV adaptation of Truckers, the first of Terry Pratchett's three books in The Nome Trilogy.
  Joe featured as Grimes at the Chichester Festival Theatre in the 2003 stage musical adaptation (by Jason Carr and Gary Yershon of the novel The Water Babies.
  
  wn.com/Joe_McGann
• John Bluthal
  John Bluthal (born 12 August 1929) is a Polish-born British film and television actor, mostly in comedy. He is best known for his work with Spike Milligan and for his roles in the television series Never Mind the Quality Feel the Width and The Vicar of Dibley.
  Bluthal was born in Galicia, Poland, of Jewish descent. He emigrated to Australia with his family in 1938 at the age of nine. He studied drama at the University of Melbourne, and visited England, during which time he appeared in pantomime. He worked in repertory theatre in Melbourne and was also involved in broadcasting and schools broadcasting. He appeared in drama on ABC radio, and variety, including The Shell Hour and Gaslight Music Hall, which he devised, produced and starred in.
  In 1960 he came to England again and appeared in Citizen James for BBC television and also in the long-running UK TV series Never Mind the Quality Feel the Width where he played Manny Cohen, a Jewish tailor in business with an Irishman in London. Also in the early 1960s, he provided the voice for Commander Zero in the television puppet series Fireball XL5. He appeared in the role of Fagin in the musical Oliver! at New Theatre, London. He has made dozens of film and TV shows since he came to England.
  
  wn.com/John_Bluthal
• John Kander
  John Harold Kander (born March 18, 1927) is the American composer of a number of musicals as part of the songwriting team of Kander and Ebb.
  Kander was born in Kansas City, Missouri, the son of Bernice (née Aaron) and Harold S. Kander. Kander attended The Pembroke Country-Day School and Oberlin College before earning a Master's degree at Columbia University where he was a protégé of Douglas Moore and studied composition with Jack Beeson.
  Kander began his Broadway career as substitute rehearsal pianist for West Side Story. The stage manager for West Side Story then asked Kander to play the auditions for her next show, Gypsy. During the auditions, Kander met the choreographer, Jerome Robbins, who suggested that Kander compose the dance music for the show in 1959. After that experience, he wrote dance arrangements for Irma la Douce in 1960.
  His first produced musical was A Family Affair, written with James and William Goldman. He met lyricist Fred Ebb in 1962 and began a songwriting collaboration that would last for more than four decades. Later that year rising star Barbra Streisand recorded two of the duo's songs, "My Coloring Book" and "I Don't Care Much." In 1965, Kander and Ebb landed their first show on Broadway, Flora the Red Menace, produced by Hal Prince, directed by George Abbott, and with book by George Abbott and Robert Russell,^{[disambiguation needed ]} in which Liza Minnelli made her initial Broadway appearance. Kander and Ebb have since been associated with writing material for both Liza Minnelli and Chita Rivera, and have produced special material for their appearances live and on television.
  
  wn.com/John_Kander
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  Jonathan Pryce
  Jonathan Pryce, CBE (born 1 June 1947) is a Welsh stage and film actor and singer. After studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and meeting his longtime partner English actress Kate Fahy in 1974, he began his career as a stage actor in the 1970s. His work in theatre, including an award-winning performance in the title role of the Royal Court Theatre's Hamlet, led to several supporting roles in film and television. He made his breakthrough screen performance in Terry Gilliam's 1985 cult film Brazil.
  Critically lauded for his versatility, Pryce has participated in big-budget films such as Evita, Tomorrow Never Dies, Pirates of the Caribbean and The New World, as well as independent films such as Glengarry Glen Ross and Carrington. His career in theatre has also been prolific, and he has won two Tony Awards—the first in 1977 for his Broadway debut in Comedians, the second for his 1991 role as "The Engineer" in the musical Miss Saigon.
  
  wn.com/Jonathan_Pryce
• Josephine Barstow
  Dame Josephine Clare Barstow, DBE (born 27 September 1940) is an English soprano.
  Josephine Barstow was born in Sheffield and educated at the University of Birmingham. She made her professional debut (Mimì in La bohème) with the touring company Opera for All in 1964. She won a scholarship to study during 1965-66 at the London Opera Centre, where she met her husband Ande Anderson (d. 1996). During the following season, she sang Gluck's Euridice and Verdi's Violetta for the Sadler's Wells Opera Company and in 1968 she began a three-year contract with Welsh National Opera. In 1969 she made her Royal Opera debut as one of the Nieces in Peter Grimes
  Among other roles with the Royal Opera, she has sung Alice Ford (Falstaff), Santuzza (Cavalleria rusticana), Ellen Orford in Peter Grimes, Leonore (Fidelio) and the Old Countess (The Queen of Spades). She also appeared in the world premières of two operas by Sir Michael Tippett: The Knot Garden (as Denise) and The Ice Break (as Gayle).
  At Glyndebourne, she has appeared as Lady Macbeth, Elettra (Idomeneo) and Leonore. Roles with English National Opera include an acclaimed Violetta, Emilia Marty (The Makropulos Case), Natasha in the British stage première of War and Peace and the title roles in Salome, Aida, Arabella, Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk and Der Rosenkavalier.
  
  wn.com/Josephine_Barstow
• Jule Styne
  Jule Styne (December 31, 1905 – September 20, 1994) was a British-born American songwriter especially famous for a series of Broadway musicals, which included several very well known and frequently revived shows.
  Styne was born in London, England as Julius Kerwin Stein of Jewish immigrants from Ukraine. At the age of eight he moved with his family to Chicago, where at an early age he began taking piano lessons. He proved to be a prodigy and performed with the Chicago, St. Louis, and Detroit Symphonies before he was ten years old.
  Styne attended Chicago Musical College, but before then he had already attracted attention of another teenager, Mike Todd, later a successful film producer, who commissioned him to write a song for a musical act that he was creating. It would be the first of over 1,500 published songs Styne would compose in his career.
  Styne established his own dance band, which brought him to the notice of Hollywood, where he was championed by Frank Sinatra and where he began a collaboration with lyricist Sammy Cahn, with whom he wrote many songs for the movies, including "It's Been a Long, Long Time" (#1 for 3 weeks for Harry James and His Orchestra in 1945), "Five Minutes More," and the Oscar-winning "Three Coins in the Fountain". He collaborated on the score for the 1955 musical film My Sister Eileen with Leo Robin. Ten of his songs were nominated for the Oscar, many written with Cahn, including "I've Heard That Song Before" (#1 for 13 weeks for Harry James and His Orchestra in 1943), "I'll Walk Alone", "It's Magic" (a #2 hit for Doris Day in 1948) and "I Fall in Love Too Easily".
  
  wn.com/Jule_Styne
• Julia Deakin
  Julia Deakin (born 1952) is an English actress.
  On television, Deakin played Stella Tulley in Side by Side and Marsha, the ageing but lovely divorcée landlady, in the British sitcom Spaced (1999).
  Deakin earlier appeared in the television sitcom Oh, Doctor Beeching! (1996–1997), where she played the role of May Skinner, replacing Sherrie Hewson from the original pilot. She has also made many single television appearances, including playing Jill, the receptionist from Pear Tree Productions, in one episode of the first series of I'm Alan Partridge, a rural dominatrix in Doc Martin as well as roles in Midsomer Murders and Coronation Street. She appeared in the sketch comedy series Big Train alongside fellow Spaced cast members Simon Pegg and Mark Heap. She plays Dr. Jean in the Alan segments on Modern Toss.
  She has appeared on radio, as Eva Tattle in The Maltby Collection. She also guest starred in the Doctor Who audio drama Terror Firma for Big Finish Productions.
  She is currently playing the role of Mrs. Daphne Andrews in House of Anubis.
  
  wn.com/Julia_Deakin
• Julian Bleach
  Julian Bleach is an English actor who is best known as co-creator and "M. C." of Shockheaded Peter, a musical entertainment based on the works of Heinrich Hoffmann, which won the 2002 Olivier Award for Best Entertainment.
  Bleach trained at LAMDA. His other theatre work includes playing Ariel to Patrick Stewart's Prospero in the RSC's 2007 production of The Tempest, and Mr. Sowerberry (to Louise Gold's Mrs. Sowerberry) and Dr. Grimwig in the 2009 Theatre Royal Drury Lane production of the musical Oliver!.
  On television, he has starred as "The Monster" in the 2007 ITV adaptation of Frankenstein. He played the Grand Master from the second series of children's drama M.I.High and guest-starred as the villainous "Ghostmaker" in Peter J. Hammond's "From Out of the Rain" in the second series of Torchwood. Bleach performed the role of Davros, enemy of the Doctor and creator of the Daleks, in "The Stolen Earth" & "Journey's End", the 2-part season finale of the 2008 series of Doctor Who, and live at the Doctor Who Prom. In 2010, it was announced that he would star as the titular character in The Nightmare Man, the opening story of Series 4 of The Sarah Jane Adventures. In 2011, he appeared as Niccolò Machiavelli in the Showtime series The Borgias.
  
  wn.com/Julian_Bleach
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  Julian Glover
  Julian Wyatt Glover (born 27 March 1935) is a British actor best known for such roles as General Maximilian Veers in Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, the Bond villain Aristotle Kristatos in For Your Eyes Only, Walter Donovan in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and Brian Harcourt-Smith in The Fourth Protocol.
  Glover was born in Hampstead, the son of Honor Ellen Morgan (née Wyatt), a BBC journalist and a close friend of novelist Barbara Pym, and Claude Gordon Glover, a BBC radio producer. His younger half-brother is the musician Robert Wyatt. Glover has been twice married to actresses: Eileen Atkins and Isla Blair, with whom he has a son, actor Jamie Glover. In 2006, he held the role of Edward Alleyn Club President.
  Glover attended Bristol Grammar School in Bristol, England, where he was in the same class as actors Timothy West and Darth Vader actor David Prowse, and also Alleyn's School in Dulwich. Glover trained at the National Youth Theatre and performed with the Royal Shakespeare Company. In the early 1950s, he appeared in several shows at Unity Theatre, London. During the 1960s and 1970s, Glover frequently appeared in British television shows, including The Avengers, Doctor Who, The Saint, Strange Report and Blake's 7.
  
  wn.com/Julian_Glover
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  Kerry Ellis
  Kerry Jane Ellis (born 6 May 1979) is an English actress and singer who is best known for her work in musical theatre and subsequent crossover into music. Born and raised in Suffolk, Ellis began performing at an early age before attending Laine Theatre Arts from the age of 16.
  Ellis made her first professional stage appearance at 19. Her appearance in the 2001 revival of My Fair Lady as Martine McCutcheon's understudy in the role of Eliza Doolittle marked her West End debut. After meeting Queen guitarist Brian May in 2002, she originated the role of Meat in We Will Rock You and has since played lead roles in West End musicals Les Misérables, Wicked (which also took her to Broadway) and Oliver! as well as appearing in national tours like Miss Saigon and musical concerts such as Chess. Now a recognised musical theatre actress, Ellis has received several awards and nominations and been hailed as the First Lady of the West End. She has also worked sporadically in film and television.
  Despite her misfortune on The Voice UK in 2012, Ellis had been expanding her repertoire as a solo artist in collaboration with May since 2002. With May, she has released an extended play Wicked in Rock (2008) and a studio album Anthems (2010); the latter peaked at number 15 on the UK Albums Chart and spawned her first headlining concert tour Anthems: The Tour. In addition to singing in concerts across the world, Ellis also appears as a featured artist on several albums and is featured on three cast albums. She is currently working on her second studio album with May.
  
  wn.com/Kerry_Ellis
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  Kurt Weill
  Kurt Julian Weill (March 2, 1900 – April 3, 1950) was a German-Jewish composer, active from the 1920s, and in his later years in the United States. He was a leading composer for the stage who was best known for his fruitful collaborations with Bertolt Brecht. With Brecht, he developed productions such as his most well known work The Threepenny Opera, a Marxist critique of capitalism, which included the ballad "Mack the Knife". Weill was a socialist^{[unreliable source?]} who held the ideal of writing music that served a socially useful purpose. He also wrote a number of works for the concert hall, as well as several Judaism-themed pieces.
  Kurt Julian Weill was born on March 2, 1900, the third of four children to Albert Weill (1867–1950) and Emma Weill née Ackermann (1872–1955). He grew up in a religious Jewish family in the "Sandvorstadt", the Jewish quarter in Dessau, Germany, where his father was a cantor. At the age of twelve, Kurt Weill started taking piano lessons and made his first attempts at writing music; his earliest preserved composition was written in 1913 and is titled Mi Addir. Jewish Wedding Song.
  
  wn.com/Kurt_Weill
• Louise Gold
  Louise Gold (born 1956) is an English singer, actress and puppeteer whose career has spanned almost four decades.
  From 1977, Gold was a puppeteer and voice actress for The Muppet Show and Sesame Street, and she has performed voice and puppet work on various other Muppet films and specials. She was a founder and lead puppeteer for the satirical television show Spitting Image from 1984 to 1986. She is also known as an actress in musical theatre, having starred in numerous shows on the West End since 1982, playing such roles as Reno Sweeney in Anything Goes, Tanya in Mamma Mia!, Phyllis in Follies, Baroness Bomburst in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Miss Andrew in Mary Poppins, and Mrs Sowerberry and Mrs Bedwin in Oliver!.
  Gold was born in London, England, to parents who were active with Unity Theatre in London. Her father was John Gold (1920–1998), a journalist, and her mother was an actress, Una Brandon-Jones (1916–2010). Her brother, Max, is also an actor. Gold trained at The Arts Educational Schools from age 11.
  
  wn.com/Louise_Gold
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  Matthew Bourne
  Matthew Bourne OBE (born 13 January 1960) is a British choreographer. His work includes contemporary dance and musical theatre. He has received multiple awards and award nominations, including the Laurence Olivier Award, Tony Award and Drama Desk Award, and he has also received several Honorary Doctorates of Arts from UK universities.
  Matthew Bourne was born in Hackney, London in 1960. He went to William Fitt and Sir George Monoux School in Walthamstow, London. From the ages of 14 to 16 he was an avid autograph hunter, attending most West End opening nights and waiting outside Stage Doors and top London Hotels. In 1978 he left full-time education and worked in various jobs at the BBC (filing clerk), Keith Prowse Theatre Agents (selling theatre tickets) and The National Theatre (bookshop and ushering). Despite having never done a dance class, he ran and directed various amateur Dance Companies in his teenage years. In 1982 he enrolled at the Laban Centre for Movement and Dance (now simply Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance) in Deptford, southeast London, where he was awarded a B.A. in Dance Theatre. For his final year (1986) he danced with the Laban Centre's Transitions Dance Company. After graduation he formed the dance company Adventures In Motion Pictures with fellow directors, and friends, Emma Gladstone and David Massingham. He has worked as a professional choreographer and director since 1987, becoming sole artistic director of AMP in 1991 and New Adventures in 2002. He now lives in Islington, London and Brighton, East Sussex.
  
  wn.com/Matthew_Bourne
• Meg Johnson
  Meg Johnson (born 30 September 1936) is an English actress who currently plays the role of Pearl Ladderbanks in ITV's popular soap opera Emmerdale. Prior to joining Emmerdale, Johnson was a part of the axed UK soap Brookside, playing Brigid McKenna for three years. In the early 1980s she also played the part of Eunice Gee in Coronation Street, a role she briefly reprised in 1999.
  In November 1997, she was in the original cast of the London revival of Chicago playing the matron Mama Morton, the prison warder, for more than a year. She can be heard on the London Cast Recording of Chicago, singing "When You're Good To Mama", "Me And My Baby" and "Class".
  Following her role in Coronation Street she appeared sporadically on television, and was a part of the cast of Victoria Wood As Seen On TV (from 1985 to 1987) alongside Wood, Julie Walters, Celia Imrie and others. Johnson is married to the former Granada Television continuity announcer, Charles Foster.
  
  
  
  wn.com/Meg_Johnson
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  Michael Caine
  Sir Michael Caine, CBE (born Maurice Joseph Micklewhite; 14 March 1933) is an English actor.
  Caine is one of two actors nominated for an Academy Award for acting in every decade from the 1960s to 2000s, the other one being Jack Nicholson. In 2000, Caine was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in recognition of his contribution to cinema.
  Caine was born in St Olave's Hospital, Rotherhithe, Southwark in South East London, the son of Ellen Frances Marie (née Burchell; 1900-1989), a cook and charwoman, and Maurice Joseph Micklewhite, a fish market porter. His father was of English, Irish, and, reportedly, Irish Traveller ancestry. Caine was brought up in his mother's Protestant religion (his father was Catholic).
  Caine grew up in Southwark, South London, and during the Second World War he was evacuated to North Runcton near King's Lynn in Norfolk. After the war, when his father was demobilised, the family was rehoused by the council in Marshall Gardens at the Elephant and Castle in a pre-fabricated house made in Canada, as much of London's housing stock had been damaged during the Blitz in 1940-41.
  
  wn.com/Michael_Caine
• Miles Anderson
  Miles Anderson (born 23 October 1947) is a Zimbabwean stage and television actor. He has appeared in television serials both in the UK and North America and in award-winning Shakespearean roles at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego
  He was born in 1947 in Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe. Educated at Prince Edward school, his father commanded the Rhodesian Army until dismissed by Premier Ian Smith for his stance against racism and a Unilateral Declaration of Independence from Great Britain. His mother Daphne Anderson wrote a memoir of her difficult childhood in Rhodesia, The Toerags.
  He has appeared in the US TV series, "Criminal Minds", as well as the ongoing ITV's Ultimate Force as Colonel Aiden Dempsey. He had previously played Lt. Col. Dan Fortune (this time a Regular "green" Army officer) in ITV's Soldier Soldier (series 1 and 2 only, 1991–92) and as Captain Bannock in Sky Bandits. He was awarded the 1982 London Critics' Circle Drama Theatre Award for Best Supporting Actor of 1981 for his performances in The Twin Rivals and The Witch of Edmonton.
  
  wn.com/Miles_Anderson
• Mitch Leigh
  Mitch Leigh (born January 30, 1928) is an American musical theatre composer and theatrical producer best known for the musical Man Of La Mancha.
  Leigh was born in Brooklyn, New York) as Irwin Michnick. He graduated from Yale in 1951 with a Bachelor of Music, and in 1952 received his Master of Music under Paul Hindemith.
  He began his career as a jazz musician and writing commercials for radio and television. In 1965 he teamed with lyricist Joe Darion and writer Dale Wasserman to write a musical based on Wasserman's 1959 television play, I, Don Quixote. The resulting show, the musical Man Of La Mancha opened on Broadway in 1965 and in its original engagement ran for 2,328 performances.
  Leigh's next show was Chu Chem. This show followed Man of La Mancha by exactly one year, but closed on the road. Produced by Leigh, it opened on Broadway in 1989 for 68 performances.
  Cry for Us All, based on the play, Hogan's Goat, opened on Broadway in 1970 but ran for 9 performances. Leigh was the producer as well as composer. His next musical was Home Sweet Homer, starring Yul Brynner, which opened on Broadway officially in January 1976 but closed after 1 performance. He produced as well as was the composer for Saravà which ran for 101 performances in 1979. Leigh both produced and directed the 1985 revival of The King and I starring Yul Brynner. Lee Adams asked Leigh to collaborate on a musical, entitled Mike, about producer Mike Todd, but it closed on its pre-Broadway tryout in 1988. After renaming it Ain't Broadway Grand!, the show made it to Broadway, but closed after 25 performances in 1993.
  
  wn.com/Mitch_Leigh
• Oliver Reed
  Robert Oliver Reed (13 February 1938 – 2 May 1999) was an English actor known for his burly screen presence. Reed exemplified his real-life macho image in "tough guy" roles. His films include The Trap, Oliver!, Women in Love, Hannibal Brooks, The Triple Echo, The Devils, The Three Musketeers, Tommy, Castaway, Lion of the Desert and Gladiator.
  Reed was born Robert Oliver Reed in Wimbledon, London, to sports journalist Peter Reed and his wife Marcia (née Andrews). He was the nephew of film director Sir Carol Reed, and grandson of the actor-manager Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree by his alleged mistress May Pinney Reed. He was alleged to have been a descendant (through an illegitimate step) of Tsar Peter the Great of Russia. Reed attended Ewell Castle School in Surrey.
  After time in the British Army, serving in the Royal Army Medical Corps, Reed commenced his thespian career as an extra in films in the late 1950s. He had no acting training or theatrical experience.
  Oliver Reed appeared uncredited in an early Norman Wisdom film, The Square Peg in 1958, and in another Wisdom comedy, The Bulldog Breed in 1960, where Reed played the leader of a gang of Teddy Boys roughing up Wisdom in a cinema. Uncredited television includes episodes of The Invisible Man (1958) and The Four Just Men (1959). Reed got his first notable roles in Hammer Films' Sword of Sherwood Forest (1960), The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll (1960), Captain Clegg (1962), Pirates of Blood River (1962), and The Curse of the Werewolf (1961). Reed also starred in Paranoiac, and The Damned. In 1964 he starred in the first of six films directed by Michael Winner, The System, (known as The Girl-Getters in the U.S.). More Hammer Films productions followed, such as The Brigand Of Kandahar (1965). He first collaborated with director Ken Russell in a TV biopic of Claude Debussy in 1965, and later played Dante Gabriel Rossetti in Russell's subsequent TV biopic Dante's Inferno (1967).
  
  wn.com/Oliver_Reed
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  Omid Djalili
  Omid Djalili ( /əˈmiːd dʒəˈlɪli/; Persian: امید جلیلی‎; born 30 September 1965) is a British Iranian stand-up comedian, actor, television producer and writer.
  Djalili was born in Chelsea, London to Iranian Bahá'í parents and is a Bahá'í himself. He attended Holland Park School and then the University of Ulster in Coleraine, Northern Ireland, studying English and Theatre studies.
  Djalili is a Chelsea fan. He is married to British actress and playwright Annabel Knight, with whom he has a daughter, Isabella, and two sons, Louis and Daniel.
  The first significant success of his stand-up comedy career was at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1995 with "Short, Fat Kebab Shop Owner's Son", followed by "The Arab and the Jew" in 1996.
  He has performed in numerous countries, including Australia, Ireland, Sweden, Belgium, Canada and the United States, where he had his own HBO Special and did 22 episodes of the NBC sitcom Whoopi with Whoopi Goldberg.
  He did his part for Comic Relief after the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami and also in 2005 he appeared on the British TV show Top Gear as a celebrity driver. The same year he broke Edinburgh Festival box office records with over 16,500 ticket sales.
  
  wn.com/Omid_Djalili
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  Patti LuPone
  Patti Ann LuPone (born April 21, 1949) is an American singer and actress, known for her Tony Award-winning performance as Eva Perón in the 1979 stage musical Evita and for her Olivier Award-winning performance as Fantine in the original London cast of Les Misérables.
  LuPone was born in Northport, New York, on Long Island, the daughter of Angela Louise (née Patti), a college library administrator, and Orlando Joseph LuPone, a school administrator. Her great-grand-aunt was the celebrated nineteenth-century opera singer Adelina Patti. Her brother Robert LuPone is an actor, dancer, and director who originated the role of Zach the choreographer in A Chorus Line. Her other brother William LuPone is a teacher. When they were young, they performed on Long Island as the LuPone Trio. She is of Italian/Abruzzese descent and a graduate of Northport High School, where she studied under the musical direction of voice coach Esther Scott.
  LuPone was part of the first graduating class of Juilliard's Drama Division (1968-1972: Group 1), which also included actors Kevin Kline and David Ogden Stiers. She graduated from Juilliard in 1972 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree.
  
  wn.com/Patti_LuPone
• Peter Bayliss
  Peter Bayliss (27 June 1922 – 29 July 2002) was an English actor.
  Bayliss was born in Kingston upon Thames and trained at the Italia Conti Academy and the John Gielgud Company. More than six feet tall, with a voice to match, he supplemented it with a barrage of wheezings, croakings, mutterings and, as the opera singer in Frontiers of Farce (Old Vic, 1977), garglings. In 1956 he appeared on stage in "The Matchmaker" at the Royale Theatre in New York and in 1960 he appeared in "Ross" at the Royal Haymarket Theatre in London. His 20 films ranged from The Red Shoes (1948) to Darling (1965). He acted in more than 40 television productions including Please Sir!, The Sweeney, Coronation Street, Lovejoy and The Bill, plus dramas like Bye, Bye Columbus (1990), Alice In Wonderland (1998) and The Arabian Nights (1999). On radio he was particularly good in Jacobean adaptations, playing characters with names such as Sir Moth-Interest and Walter Whorehound.
  He appeared in more than 100 theatre productions.
  
  wn.com/Peter_Bayliss
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  Richard Rodgers
  Richard Charles Rodgers (June 28, 1902 – December 31, 1979) was an American composer of music for more than 900 songs and for 43 Broadway musicals. He also composed music for films and television. He is best known for his songwriting partnerships with the lyricists Lorenz Hart and Oscar Hammerstein II. His compositions have had a significant impact on popular music down to the present day, and have an enduring broad appeal.
  Rodgers was the first person to win what are considered the top show business awards in television, recording, movies and Broadway—an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony—now known collectively as an EGOT. He has also won a Pulitzer Prize, making him one of two people (Marvin Hamlisch is the other) to receive each award.
  Born into a prosperous ethnic German Jewish family in Arverne, Queens, New York City, Rodgers was the son of Mamie Levy and Dr. William Abrahams Rodgers, a prominent physician who had changed the family name from Abrahams. Richard began playing the piano at age six. He attended P.S. 10, Townsend Harris Hall and DeWitt Clinton High School. Rodgers spent his early teenage summers in Camp Wigwam (Waterford, Maine) where he composed some of his first songs.
  
  wn.com/Richard_Rodgers
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  Rowan Atkinson
  Rowan Sebastian Atkinson (born 6 January 1955) is a British actor, comedian, and screenwriter. He is most famous for his work on the satirical sketch comedy show Not The Nine O'Clock News, and the sitcoms Blackadder, Mr. Bean and The Thin Blue Line. He has been listed in The Observer as one of the 50 funniest actors in British comedy, and amongst the top 50 comedians ever in a 2005 poll of fellow comedians. He has also had cinematic success with his performances in the Mr. Bean movie adaptations Bean and Mr. Bean's Holiday and in Johnny English and its sequel Johnny English Reborn. He also starred in the film Never Say Never Again (a spy film based on the James Bond novel Thunderball) in 1983.
  Atkinson, the youngest of four brothers, was born in Consett, County Durham, England. His parents were Eric Atkinson, a farmer and company director, and Ella May (née Bainbridge), who married on 29 June 1945. His three older brothers were Paul, who died as an infant, Rodney, a Eurosceptic economist who narrowly lost the United Kingdom Independence Party leadership election in 2000, and Rupert. Atkinson was brought up Anglican, and was educated at Durham Choristers School, St. Bees School, and Newcastle University. In 1975, he continued for the degree of MSc in Electrical Engineering at The Queen's College, Oxford, the same college his father matriculated at in 1935, which made Atkinson an Honorary Fellow in 2006. First achieving notice at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1976, while at Oxford, he also acted and performed early sketches for the Oxford University Dramatic Society (OUDS), the Oxford Revue and the Experimental Theatre Club (ETC), meeting writer Richard Curtis and composer Howard Goodall, with whom he would continue to collaborate during his career.
  
  wn.com/Rowan_Atkinson
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  Roy Hudd
  Roy Hudd, OBE (born 16 May 1936 in Croydon) is an English comedian, actor, radio host, author and authority on the history of music hall entertainment.
  His father was a carpenter and he attended Tavistock Secondary Modern School, Croydon and Croydon Secondary Technical School. His jobs then included a messenger for an advertising agency, window dresser and commercial artist. In 1958 he took a summer job as a Redcoat at Butlins, Clacton. From the Daily Mail: Roy and Debbie met nearly 30 years ago in panto in Nottingham. Debbie, a dancer, now directs panto. Roy was already divorced from his first wife, Ann, with whom he has a 45-year-old son, Max, a stage manager. Roy and Debbie married in 1988. 'Debbie is 22 years younger than me, it's amazing, people never picked up on that. It never bothered us.' They have no children. 'We tried and tried, but we didn't get lucky,' says Roy.
  Hudd first appeared on radio in 1959 on the Workers' Playtime show and he is best known for his very long-running BBC Radio 2 series The News Huddlines. His acting talent found a new outlet in the 1970s when he was chosen as the reader for Radio Four's 'Morning Story' produced at BBC Pebble Mill by David Shute. He starred in the title role in The Newly Discovered Casebook of Sherlock Holmes in 1999, and has also given his voice to the roles of Max Quordlepleen in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and James Phillimore in The Singular Inheritance of Miss Gloria Wilson, an original Sherlock Holmes radio play in the series The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (2002).
  
  wn.com/Roy_Hudd
• Rupert Goold
  Rupert Goold (born 1972) is an English theatre director. He is the artistic director of Headlong Theatre (previously the Oxford Stage Company) and from 2010 he will be an associate director at the Royal Shakespeare Company.
  Goold was born in Highgate, England (a suburb of North London). His father was a management consultant, and his mother was an author of children's books. He attended the independent University College School,graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge in 1994 and studied at New York University on a Fulbright Scholarship. He was trainee director at Donmar Warehouse for the 1995 season, and assisted on productions including 'Art' and Speed-the-Plow in the West End.^{[citation needed]}
  Goold was artistic director of the Royal and Derngate Theatres in Northampton from 2000 to 2005. Prior to that, he was an associate at the Salisbury Playhouse in 1996-97. In addition to his work as a director he has co-authored three adaptions for the stage.
  Goold directed Patrick Stewart (whom he had previously directed as Prospero) as Macbeth in his acclaimed Minerva Studio staging of Macbeth at the Chichester Festival Theatre in May 2007. In September 2007 the production transferred to the Gielgud Theatre in London, then the Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York and then to the Lyceum Theater on Broadway. At the 2007 Evening Standard Theatre Awards, Macbeth won two awards: Stewart won the Best Actor Award, while Goold won The Sydney Edwards Award for Best Director. It also won Goold a 2008 Olivier Award for Best Director. He says he wasn't concerned with thoughts of a career anti-climax. "I came home to an empty house after the Olivier Awards, clutching my trophy for Best Director and I realised that I'd peaked. It was now going to be downhill all the way. But I still felt quite comfortable with the realisation that nothing could get better after this." He won the Best Director Evening Standard Award again in 2009 for ENRON.
  
  wn.com/Rupert_Goold
• Russ Abbot
  Russ Abbot (born Russell Allan Roberts on 18 September 1947) is an English musician, comedian and actor who first came to public notice during the 1970s as the singer and drummer with British comedy showband the Black Abbots, later forging a prominent solo career as a television comedian with his own weekly show on British television.
  Continuing his musical career as a solo artist Abbot released several charting singles and albums. Latterly his career has continued with a shift into more mainstream serious acting in television shows, series and stage productions.
  As a drummer/backing singer, Abbot founded the Black Abbots in Chester during the mid-1960s and released several singles to modest chart success on minor labels in the early 1970s. The band only signed their first major recording contract in 1977, putting out a series of comedy singles and a lone live album with Abbot now taking lead vocals, before disbanding in 1980. Later on he appeared as a comedian, winning the Funniest Man On Television award five times.
  
  wn.com/Russ_Abbot
• Ruthie Henshall
  Valentine Ruth Henshall (born 7 March 1967), better known as Ruthie Henshall, is an English singer, dancer, and actress best known for her work in musical theatre. Henshall attended the Laine Theatre Arts school in Epsom, Surrey before making her first professional appearance on stage in 1986. Her appearance in the 1987 production of Cats marked her West End debut.
  Henshall was born in Bromley, South East London, England. Her father David was a journalist, later the editor of the East Anglian Daily Times, a Suffolk morning newspaper. Ruthie Henshall's early ambition was to be a ballet dancer, but she lacked the necessary physique. Her sister, Noel, died in 2007 of a drugs overdose while living in San Francisco, California.
  Henshall dated Prince Edward "solidly" for two years, but "on and off for five years", before becoming engaged to actor John Gordon Sinclair. After she took the role of Velma Kelly in Chicago on Broadway, New York, they broke up, after which Henshall admitted going through a process of excessive drinking and considering suicide.
  
  wn.com/Ruthie_Henshall
• Sally Ann Triplett
  Sally Ann Triplett (born 15 April 1962, London, United Kingdom) is a British singer and actress most famous for her participation in the Eurovision Song Contest and many West End productions. Her son, Max Milner was mentored by Danny O'Donoghue in the UK version of The Voice.
  Triplett first represented the United Kingdom in the Eurovision Song Contest 1980 as the lead female vocals of the six-piece band Prima Donna. Other band members included Danny Finn from The New Seekers and Lance Aston, brother of Bucks Fizz singer Jay Aston. Prima Donna finished a moderately successful third with their pop-ballad "Love Enough for Two"; however the song was a flop in the charts, and the group disbanded after their second single.
  Two years later, she again represented United Kingdom in the Eurovision Song Contest 1982, this time as part of a double act Bardo. Their song, "One Step Further", was a frantic pop number with a complex dance routine. The vigorous choreography noticeably affected the vocals, and not helped by no backing track and a live orchestra, the song finished seventh. Author and historian John Kennedy O'Connor notes in his The Eurovision Song Contest - The Official History that Sally-Ann Triplett is one of only four singers to have sung for the United Kingdom in the competition twice, alongside Ronnie Carroll, Cliff Richard and Cheryl Baker of Bucks Fizz. Triplett is the only act to have won the UK heat for Eurovision at all attempts, excluding Cliff Richard who was nominated twice without having to actually compete for the opportunity. The song however proved to be a success in the UK Singles Chart when it reached #2, and Bardo went on to release two more singles, although no further success followed.
  
  wn.com/Sally_Ann_Triplett
• Sally Dexter
  Sally Julia Dexter (born 15 April 1960), is an English actress of stage and screen.
  She was educated at Chiltern Edge School, King James's College at Henley-on-Thames, now The Henley College. and the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA).
  Her many on screen appearances have included A Touch of Frost, Dalziel and Pascoe and Family as well as the long-running Night and Day.
  As a stage actress, Dexter has appeared in both straight plays and musicals in London's West End. Her credits include Nancy in Sam Mendes's 1994 revival of Oliver! at the London Palladium opposite Jonathan Pryce. For her highly acclaimed performance in Oliver!, she received an Olivier Award nomination. The Variety Magazine reviewer wrote: "If this 'Oliver!' creates any star, it should be RSC alumna Sally Dexter, whose blowsy, huge-voiced Nancy is the career-making performance this actress has long deserved."
  Other roles include Mrs. Wilkinson in Billy Elliot the Musical opposite Leon Cooke for 12 months, leaving the show to standing ovations^{[citation needed]}, Lady Macbeth in Macbeth opposite Rufus Sewell, Anna in the original production of Patrick Marber's Closer and Regan in King Lear. She spent several years playing roles with the Royal Shakespeare Company and at the Royal National Theatre, London.
  
  wn.com/Sally_Dexter
• 
  Sam Mendes
  Samuel Alexander "Sam" Mendes, CBE (born 1 August 1965) is an English stage and film director. He is best known for his Academy Award-winning work on his debut film American Beauty (1999) and his dark re-inventions of the stage musicals Cabaret (1994), Oliver! (1994), Company (1996) and Gypsy (2003). He is currently working on Skyfall, the 23rd James Bond film. He has a child with his former wife Kate Winslet.
  Mendes was born in Reading, Berkshire, the only child of Valerie Helene (née Barnett), an author of children's books, and Jameson Peter Mendes, a university professor. His father is from Trinidad of ethnic Portuguese descent, and his mother an English Jew. His grandfather is the Trinidadian writer Alfred Mendes.
  Mendes' parents divorced when he was a child. He grew up in Oxfordshire and attended Magdalen College School and Peterhouse, Cambridge where he graduated with a first in English. While at Cambridge, he was a member of the Marlowe Society and directed several plays, including a critically acclaimed production of Cyrano de Bergerac with Tom Hollander and Nick Clegg amongst the cast members.
  
  wn.com/Sam_Mendes
• Samantha Barks
  Samantha Barks (born 2 October 1990, Laxey) is a Manx professional singer and actress who came third in the BBC talent show-themed television series I'd Do Anything in 2008. On Tuesday 31 January 2012, Cameron Mackintosh appeared during the curtain call of the Oliver! UK tour (then running at the Palace Theatre in Manchester) to announce that Barks (the tour's Nancy), would play Eponine in the film version of the long running musical Les Misérables. Barks later tweeted this as the 'Most incredible moment of my life'.
  Samantha was born and brought up on the Isle of Man. She attended Laxey Primary School in Laxey and St Ninian's High School in Douglas before moving to London(United Kingdom) to study A levels at The Arts Educational Schools (ArtsEd) in Chiswick.
  Barks has been dancing since the age of 3, training in Ballet, Modern and Tap with Dancers Barre, then Stagecoach Isle of Man, Theatrix, Stage One and the Manx Ballet Company. She was also a member of the Manx Operatic Society, which provided her with a lot of performing experience.
  
  wn.com/Samantha_Barks
• Sarah Lark
  Sarah Lark (born 28 January 1983) is a Welsh singer and actress who rose to fame when she competed as one of the finalists in the BBC talent show-themed television series I'd Do Anything in 2008.
  Lark was born in Roath, Cardiff to Bev and Billy Lark, and began performing at an early age. When she was twelve years old she played the lead role in the Starstruck Theatre production of musical, Annie at St Peter's Church Hall in Roath alongside Charlotte Church, who took the role of Molly. She appeared in the television series The Biz and The Healer and appeared in the original performance of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, Whistle Down The Wind at the Sydmonton Festival held at Lloyd Webber's country house, Sydmonton Court in 1995 as part of the ensemble.
  In 2000 Lark made her West End debut creating the role of "Little Girl" in Cameron Mackintosh's production of The Witches of Eastwick at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. In 2003 she played John Barrowman's daughter in the musical, Beautiful and Damned at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre in Guildford, Surrey.
  
  wn.com/Sarah_Lark
• Shani Wallis
  Shani Wallis (born 14 April 1933) is an English actress and singer.
  Wallis was born in Tottenham, London. Making her first stage appearance at the age of four, she later studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) on a scholarship. Wallis went on to play many leading roles in the West End, but she is best known for the role of Nancy in Carol Reed's 1968 film production of Lionel Bart's musical Oliver! which co-starred Ron Moody, Harry Secombe, Oliver Reed, Jack Wild and Mark Lester. Wallis has appeared with Liberace, Jack Benny, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis.
  Wallis is a naturalized citizen of the United States, where she has lived for some time. She married her agent/manager Bernie Rich on Friday 13 September 1968. Asked, "Why on that day?" she replied, "Everything good has happened to me on Friday 13th and Shani means 'lucky jewel'. The couple have one child, Rebecca, and two granddaughters. She is also the sister of jazz drummer Leon Roy.
  Wallis is a patron of the theatre charity The Music Hall Guild of Great Britain and America.
  
  wn.com/Shani_Wallis
• 
  Sheldon Harnick
  Sheldon Harnick (born April 30, 1924) is an American lyricist best known for his collaborations with composer Jerry Bock on hit musicals such as Fiddler on the Roof.
  Harnick began his career writing words and music to comic songs in musical revues. One of these, "The Merry Minuet", was popularized by the Kingston Trio. It is in the caustic style usually associated with Tom Lehrer and is sometimes incorrectly attributed to him.
  Harnick began writing music while still in Carl Schurz High School. After his Army service, he graduated from the Northwestern University School of Music (1946-1949) with a Bachelor of Music Degree, and worked with various orchestras in the Chicago area. He then moved to New York City and wrote for many musicals and revues.
  Around 1956, Harnick met Jerry Bock, forming "what is arguably the most important musical partnership of the '60s." Their first musical was The Body Beautiful, running for only 60 performances in 1958, but Fiorello! (1959) ran for 795 performances and won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Fiddler on the Roof (1964) "became one of the most cherished of all Broadway musicals."
  
  wn.com/Sheldon_Harnick
• Stephen Sondheim
  Stephen Joshua Sondheim ( /ˈsɒnd.haɪm/) (born March 22, 1930) is an American composer and lyricist known for his contributions to musical theatre. He is the winner of an Academy Award, eight Tony Awards (more than any other composer) including the Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre, multiple Grammy Awards, a Pulitzer Prize and the Laurence Olivier Award. Described by Frank Rich of the New York Times as "the greatest, and perhaps best-known artist working in musical theatre", his most famous works include (as composer/lyricist) A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Company, Follies, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd, Sunday in the Park with George and Into the Woods. He also wrote the lyrics for West Side Story and Gypsy.
  Sondheim has also written material for movies, including the 1981 Warren Beatty film Reds, contributing the song "Goodbye For Now". He also wrote five songs for the 1990 movie Dick Tracy, including "Sooner or Later (I Always Get My Man)", which won the Academy Award for Best Song.
  
  wn.com/Stephen_Sondheim
• 
  Steve Bastoni
  Steve Bastoni (born 4 March 1966) is an Italian Australian actor. He is best known for his role in Police Rescue as Constable Yannis 'Angel' Angelopoulos and as Steve Parker in Neighbours.
  His major roles have been in Police Rescue from 1991 until 1996, and in Neighbours from 2007 until 2009. He has also appeared in many other Australian series such as Wildside (1998), Prisoner (1986), On the Beach (2000) and Stingers (1999–2002). Bastoni hosted Missing Persons Unit (replacing Mike Munro) in 2009 and 2010. He appeared in Underbelly 3 in 2010 as Louis Bayeh. Steve appeared once in Sea Patrol (2010); He was temporarily replacing Mike Flynn as the Commanding Officer aboard the fictional RAN vessel HMAS Hammersley.
  In 2002, he had a small role in Steve Irwin vehicle The Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course.
  Other film roles include The Heartbreak Kid, Wanted, Suburban Mayhem, Macbeth, The Matrix Reloaded, and South Pacific.
  Theatre work includes the role of 'Rocky' in the 1987 Australian national tour of The Rocky Horror Show starring Daniel Abineri. Abineri also gave him the role of Charlie Fortune in his controversial rock musical Bad Boy Johnny and the Prophets of Doom in 1989. He starred in the high budget stage production Oliver! the musical in Sydney and Melbourne in the role of Bill Sikes alongside John Waters and Tamsin Caroll.
  
  wn.com/Steve_Bastoni
• Steven Hartley
  Steven Hartley (born 12 August 1960, in Yorkshire) is a British actor known internationally for his television, film and theatre roles. He has appeared in leading roles on British television since 1985, including the series EastEnders from 1987-1989 and The Bill 2000-2002. He has continued to work constantly in TV in series such as Rumble, Strictly Confidential, Trial & Retribution, Sharman, Holby City, Casualty, Doctors, The Cut and most recently Merlin, The Borgias and Vera alongside Brenda Blethyn.
  He has worked opposite notable actors on film Including Marlon Brando, Catherine Zeta Jones, Benicio del Toro, Lauren Bacall, Kristin Scott Thomas, Woody Harrelson and Jon Voight. His films include The Walker (2007), A Dog of Flanders (1999), Christopher Columbus: The Discovery (1992) and Young Toscanini (1988). Hartley's extensive theatre work includes reprising his role as Bill Sikes in the West End Musical Oliver! in 2009-2010 for producer Cameron Mackintosh, the third time Hartley has played the role since being cast by director Sam Mendes in 1996 and recently played a leading role in 'Fit and Proper people' for the Royal Shakespeare company.
  
  wn.com/Steven_Hartley
• Stuart Wagstaff
  Stuart Wagstaff AM (born 13 February 1925) is an Australian television and stage entertainer.
  
  
  Wagstaff was born in Great Durnford, Wiltshire, England, and grew up on a farm with his parents and two older sisters. His father was very strict and emotionally abusive, and he received little affection from his mother. However, his mother frequently took Stuart and his sisters to see plays and pantomime, generating an early interest in the theatre. At the age of 11 he was sexually abused by a farm hand.
  In September 1940, at the insistence of his father, he joined the Royal Navy as an apprentice aircraft mechanic in the Fleet Air Arm, and served at naval air stations and on aircraft carriers until the end of the war, but considered himself to be a poor mechanic. He frequently volunteered for ships' concert parties to further his interest in acting.
  After the war he joined the Windsor Repertory as an assistant stage manager, occasionally taking small roles in plays. He then joined Whitley Repertory where he took part in up to 48 plays plus four weeks of pantomime each year, as well as a few West End appearances and some film and television.
  
  wn.com/Stuart_Wagstaff
• 
  Tom Fletcher
  Thomas Michael "Tom" Fletcher (born 17 July 1985) is an English singer, songwriter, and guitarist. He is best known as one of the lead vocalists and guitarists of English pop rock band McFly, in addition to being the group's founder and principal songwriter. In his nearly ten-year career as a professional songwriter, Fletcher has penned ten UK number one singles and twenty-one top ten singles.
  Fletcher was born in Harrow, London, to a working-class family. His father, who worked at Kodak and played in local bands, and mother, a special needs teacher, encouraged and supported his love of music from a young age. He has a younger sister, Carrie Fletcher. When he was 10, Fletcher starred as the main role in Oliver! at the London Palladium alongside Jim Dale as Fagin. He then went on to do a documentary about HIV for schools.
  Fletcher attended the Sylvia Young Theatre School, a co-educational independent school in the Marylebone area of the City of Westminster in west London, on a scholarship.
  
  wn.com/Tom_Fletcher
• 
  Tony Robinson
  Tony Robinson (born 15 August 1946) is an English actor, comedian, historian, TV presenter and political activist. He is best known for playing Baldrick in the BBC television series Blackadder and for hosting Channel 4 programmes such as Time Team and The Worst Jobs in History. Robinson is a member of the Labour Party and has served on its National Executive Committee. He has also written 16 children's books.
  Born in Homerton in the London Borough of Hackney, London, Robinson attended the independent Woodford Green Preparatory School followed by Wanstead High School in what is now the London Borough of Redbridge. He performed in his first professional acting role at the age of 12, as a member of Fagin's gang in the original production of the musical Oliver!, including a stint as the Artful Dodger when the boy playing the role didn't turn up. Over the next five years, he appeared in a number of West End shows, in film and on television.
  At school, Robinson passed four O-Levels (English Language, English Literature, History and Geography) and went on to study for A-Levels. However, he did not complete his A-Levels and decided to study at a drama school instead. Too young to attend the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, Robinson instead studied at the Central School of Speech and Drama. After leaving, he spent four years in repertory theatre.
  
  wn.com/Tony_Robinson
• Vernon Harris
  Vernon Harris (26 February 1905, Folkestone - November 1989, Surrey) was a British screenwriter.
  
  wn.com/Vernon_Harris
• 
  Victor Spinetti
  Victor Spinetti (born Victorio G. A. Spinetti, 2 September 1929) is a Welsh comic actor.
  Spinetti was born in Cwm, Ebbw Vale, Wales of Welsh and Italian heritage from a grandfather who was said to have walked from Italy to Wales to work as a coal miner. His parents, Giuseppe and Lily (née Watson), owned the chip shop in Cwm, over which premises the family lived and where Spinetti was born. He was educated at Monmouth School and the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama in Cardiff, of which he is now a Fellow. Early on he was a waiter and a factory worker.
  Spinetti sprang to international prominence in three Beatles' films in the 1960s, A Hard Day's Night, Help! and Magical Mystery Tour. He also appeared on one of The Beatles' Christmas recordings. The best explanation for this long-running collaboration and friendship might have been provided by George Harrison, who said, "You've got to be in all our films ... if you're not in them me Mum won't come and see them — because she fancies you." But Harrison would also say, "You've got a lovely karma, Vic." Sir Paul McCartney described Spinetti as "the man who makes clouds disappear". Spinetti would later make a small appearance in the promotional video for Paul's song, 'London Town', off the 1978 album of the same name. In July 2010 his performance of the song "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da", at The Festival Theatre, Malvern, would be later made available on "The Beatles Complete on Ukulele" podcast.
  
  wn.com/Victor_Spinetti
• William David Brohn
  William David Brohn (born March 30, 1933, Flint, Michigan) is an American arranger and orchestrator, best known for his theatre scores of musicals such as Miss Saigon, Ragtime and Wicked. He won the Tony Award for Best Orchestrations for Ragtime and has won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Orchestrations three times.
  His work has been eclectic, orchestrating many different styles of music. His modern scores are known for their keyboard writing for the orchestra pit, and their balance between acoustic and synthesised sounds. Brohn is one of the few theatre orchestrators to use the E-bow attachment to the electric guitar, which can be heard in his orchestrations for Wicked and Mary Poppins.^{[citation needed]}
  Brohn studied Music Theory at Michigan State University (1955), Composition at the New England Conservatory (1958) and took further education in Tanglewood, Massachusetts and in Salzburg, Austria. He was also mentored by the esteemed arranger Robert Russell Bennett. While a student, he performed on the Contrabass with dance bands, and some of these jazz and pop elements can be seen regularly in his Broadway arrangements.
  
  wn.com/William_David_Brohn

Oliver! (1968)

Actors

• Ron Moody
• Shani Wallis
• Oliver Reed
• Harry Secombe
• Mark Lester
• Jack Wild
• Hugh Griffith
• Hugh O'conor
• Peggy Mount
• Leonard Rossiter
• Hylda Baker
• Kenneth Cranham
• Megs Jenkins
• Sheila White
• Wensley Pithey

Director

• Carol Reed

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• timeline:
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