The 18th Annual Tony Awards 1964 premiere
by germanior | created - 19 Nov 2020 | updated - 29 Jan 2022 | PublicWednesday April 8th, New York Hilton 1335 6th Ave, New York, NY 10019
1. George Abbott
Writer | The Pajama Game
Legendary Broadway writer/producer/director George Abbott was born in 1887 in Forestville, New York. His father was mayor of Salamanca, New York, for two terms. In 1898 his family moved to Cheyenne, Wyoming, and Abbott attended Kearney Military Academy. The family returned to New York, where Abbott...
2. Lauren Bacall
Actress | To Have and Have Not
Lauren Bacall was born Betty Joan Perske on September 16, 1924, in New York City. She was the daughter of Natalie Weinstein-Bacal, a Romanian Jewish immigrant, and William Perske, who was born in New Jersey, to Polish Jewish parents. Her family was middle-class, with her father working as a ...
3. Anne Bancroft
Actress | The Graduate
Anne Bancroft was born on September 17, 1931 in The Bronx, NY, the middle daughter of Michael Italiano (1905-2001), a dress pattern maker, and Mildred DiNapoli (1907-2010), a telephone operator. She made her cinema debut in Don't Bother to Knock (1952) in 1952, and over the next five years appeared...
4. Harry Belafonte
Actor | Bobby
Harold George Belafonte was born on March 1, 1927 in New York City. He was educated at the New York Dramatic Workshop. He grew up in Jamaica, British West Indies, and did folk-singing in nightclubs and theaters, and on television and records. His debut was at the Village Vanguard in New York. Also,...
5. Constance Bennett
Actress | Topper
Independent, outspoken Constance Bennett, the first of the Bennett sisters to enter films, appeared in New York-produced silents before a chance meeting with Samuel Goldwyn led to her Hollywood debut in Cytherea (1924). She abandoned a burgeoning career in silents for marriage to Philip Plant in ...
6. Sidney Blackmer
Actor | Rosemary's Baby
Sidney Blackmer, the Tony-award winning actor who played Teddy Roosevelt in seven movies, is best remembered by today's movie audiences for his turn as the warlock/coven-leader Roman Castevet in Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby (1968).
Born and raised in Salisbury, North Carolina, where he made his ...
7. May Britt
Actress | The Hunters
She was only 18 years old and working as a photographer's assistant in Stockholm when two Italians showed up. Producer Carlo Ponti and director Mario Soldati were there to see pictures of beautiful models, searching for a blonde girl for a movie. They picked her instead and soon she found herself ...
8. Georgia Brown
Actress | Cheers
She was was born in London's East End, the daughter of a Russian immigrant family who settled in Britain at the turn of the century. During WWII she was evacuated to South Wales where Welsh choirs fascinated her and she remembers the miners harmonising which made her want to sing professionally. ...
9. David Burns
Actor | The Saint in London
David Burns was born on June 22, 1901 in New York City, New York, USA. He was an actor, known for The Saint in London (1939), Let's Make Love (1960) and She Couldn't Say No (1940). He was married to Mildred Todd. He died on March 12, 1971 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA.
10. Richard Burton
Actor | Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Probably best-remembered for his turbulent personal life with Elizabeth Taylor (whom he married twice), Richard Burton was nonetheless also regarded as an often brilliant British actor of the post-WWII period.
Burton was born Richard Walter Jenkins in 1925 into a Welsh (Cymraeg)-speaking family in ...
11. Mindy Carson
Actress | The United States Steel Hour
Mindy Carson was born on July 16, 1927 in Bronx, New York. She is an actress, known for The United States Steel Hour (1953), Armstrong Circle Theatre (1950) and Ford Star Revue (1950).
12. Jack Cassidy
Actor | The Eiger Sanction
Actor. Jack Cassidy, by his own design, defied mere definition from the day he was born in Richmond Hills, New York in 1927 until his tragic death in 1976. An actor, singer, writer, designer - the consummate showman and irrefutable creative entity - his life never followed a simple path nor did it ...
13. Carol Channing
Actress | Thoroughly Modern Millie
Carol Channing was born January 31, 1921, at Seattle, Washington, the daughter of a prominent newspaper editor, who was very active in the Christian Science movement. She attended high school in San Francisco and later worked as a model in Los Angeles. She attended prestigious Bennington College in...
14. Peggy Cass
Actress | Auntie Mame
Mary Margaret Cass was born May 21, 1924, in Boston, Massachusetts. After three years in the Cambridge Latin School drama club without one speaking part, she moved to New York, where she worked as a secretary, telephone operator, advertising solicitor and model. She joined a USO troupe that took ...
15. Montgomery Clift
Actor | From Here to Eternity
Edward Montgomery Clift (nicknamed 'Monty' his entire life) was born on October 17, 1920 in Omaha, Nebraska, just after his twin sister Roberta (1920-2014) and eighteen months after his brother Brooks Clift. He was the son of Ethel "Sunny" Anderson (Fogg; 1888-1988) and William Brooks Clift (1886-...
16. Barbara Cook
Actress | Thumbelina
Barbara Cook is best-loved and remembered for her work on the Broadway stage. An amazing singer and refreshingly impulsive actress, she made her debut at age 23 in the musical "Flahooley". Roles in "Plain and Fancy" and, the most famous flop of all time, "Candide" followed. In 1957, she created her...
17. Sammy Davis Jr.
Actor | The Cannonball Run
Sammy Davis Jr. was often billed as the "greatest living entertainer in the world".
He was born in Harlem, Manhattan, the son of dancer Elvera Davis (née Sanchez) and vaudeville star Sammy Davis Sr.. His father was African-American and his mother was of Cuban and African-American ancestry. Davis Jr....
18. Sandy Dennis
Actress | Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
It would not be easy for anyone to out-do one of American theater's finest thespians, but somehow actress Sandy Dennis managed to even out-quirk the legendary Geraldine Page when it came to affecting nervous tics and offbeat mannerisms on stage and in film. She and Page had few peers when it came ...
19. Paul Ford
Actor | It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
If any man ever had a curmudgeon character face absolutely made for TV and film, it was Paul Ford. Small-eyed, balding, lugubrious, pot-bellied and with a memorable plum nose to rival that of the great Karl Malden, he made a very late entry into show business, finding major success as blowhard ...
20. Robert Goulet
Actor | The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear
Robert Gerard Goulet was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts, to a family of French-Canadian origin. He was the son of Jeanette (Gauthier) and Joseph Georges André Goulet. After hearing his son sing "Lead Kindly Light", in their church hall, his father told him, "I'm proud of you, son". A few weeks ...
21. Alec Guinness
Actor | Star Wars
Alec Guinness was an English actor. He is known for his six collaborations with David Lean: Herbert Pocket in Great Expectations (1946), Fagin in Oliver Twist (1948), Col. Nicholson in The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor), Prince Faisal in Lawrence...
22. Arthur Hill
Actor | The Andromeda Strain
Canadian-born actor Arthur Hill was raised in the Saskatchewan town of Melfort. The son of a lawyer, he served with the Royal Canadian Air Force during WWII before receiving his college education at the University of British Columbia. Intending on following in his father's footsteps in the field of...
23. Robert Horton
Actor | The Green Slime
Robert Horton was born on July 29, 1924 into a Mormon family in Los Angeles, California as Meade Howard Horton Jr. He began his contract career at MGM in 1952 and adopted the acting name of Robert Horton.
Following his final role (as a guest star on Murder, She Wrote (1984)), Horton retired from ...
24. Shirley Jones
Actress | The Music Man
Named after child star Shirley Temple, Shirley Jones started singing at the age of six. She started formal training at the age of 12 and would dream of singing with her idol, Gordon MacRae. Upon graduating from high school, Shirley went to New York to audition for the casting director of Rodgers & ...
25. Shirley Knight
Actress | As Good as It Gets
Shirley Knight was an American actress who appeared in more than 180 feature films, television movies, television series, and Broadway productions in her career playing leading and character roles.
She was a member of the Actors Studio. Knight was nominated twice for the Academy Award for Best ...
26. Bert Lahr
Actor | The Wizard of Oz
Fittingly known to be a "Leo" for his horoscope, Bert Lahr is always remembered as the Cowardly Lion in (and the farmer "Zeke") The Wizard of Oz (1939). But during his acting career, he has been known for being in burlesque, vaudeville, and Broadway.
Dropped out of high school at the age of fifteen ...
27. Carol Lawrence
Soundtrack | Death to Smoochy
Singer-actress Carol Lawrence earned widespread stardom quite early in her singing career with the immortal role of Maria in the Broadway musical "West Side Story." However, that success would not parlay into film stardom for Carol as established star Natalie Wood, in spite of the fact that she ...
28. Steve Lawrence
Actor | The Blues Brothers
Singer, composer, actor and author, educated at Brooklyn's Thomas Jefferson High School and a student of saxophone and piano. Between 1958 and 1960 he served in the US Army and was a vocalist with the US Army Band and Orchestra based in Fort Myers, Virginia. After he was discharged, he commenced ...
29. Hal March
Actor | Send Me No Flowers
Hal March, born Harold Mendelson, first came on the scene in 1944 as one half of the comedy duo, Sweeney & March. He and Bob Sweeney had their own radio program, aptly named the "Sweeney and March Show" on CBS radio through 1948. In the early fifties, March sought a variety of venues in which to ...
30. Mercedes McCambridge
Actress | Giant
Mercedes McCambridge was a highly talented radio performer who won a best supporting Actress Oscar for her film debut.
Mercedes McCambridge was born in Joliet, Illinois, to Marie (Mahaffry) and John Patrick McCambridge, a farmer. She was of mostly Irish (with a small amount of English and German) ...
31. Roddy McDowall
Actor | Fright Night
Roddy McDowall was born in Herne Hill, London, England, to Winifriede Lucinda (Corcoran), an Irish-born aspiring actress, and Thomas Andrew McDowall, a merchant seaman. Roddy was enrolled in elocution courses at age five and by ten had appeared in his first film, Murder in the Family (1938), ...
32. Tessie O'Shea
Actress | Bedknobs and Broomsticks
She was aptly and affectionately dubbed "Two Ton Tessie" not only for her plentiful girth but for the tons of talent she possessed as one of the British Isle's most beloved, unabashed music hall entertainers. Give her an audience and bawdy Tessie O'Shea could have them on their feet in seconds flat.
...
33. Molly Picon
Actress | Fiddler on the Roof
Barely 5' tall, the little "yente" with the big, expressive talent and mischievous twinkle in her eye, Yiddish icon Molly Picon, entertained theater, radio, TV and film audiences for over seven decades. Born Malka Opiekun to Polish-Jewish parents in New York on February 28, 1898, she would ...
34. Robert Preston
Actor | The Music Man
American leading man of vast charisma, Robert Preston was the son of a garment worker and a record store clerk and grew up in Los Angeles. He was a trained musician, playing several instruments, and in high school became interested in theatre. He joined the Pasadena Community Playhouse, taking ...
35. Lee Remick
Actress | The Omen
Lee Remick was born in Quincy, Massachusetts, to Gertrude Margaret (Waldo), an actress, and Francis Edwin Remick, a department store owner. She had Irish and English ancestry. Remick was educated at Barnard College, studied dance and worked on stage and TV, before making her film debut as a sexy ...
36. Cyril Ritchard
Actor | Producers' Showcase
Legendary for his preening, prancing, delightfully playful villain Captain Hook on the award-winning stage (as well as TV) opposite America's musical treasure Mary Martin, beloved musical star Cyril Ritchard had a vast career that would last six decades, but "Peter Pan" would become his prime ...
37. Paul Scofield
Actor | A Man for All Seasons
Though his number of film roles amount to a bit over 30, Paul Scofield has cast a giant shadow in the world of stage and film acting. He grew up in West Sussex, the son of a schoolmaster. He attended the Varndean School for Boys in Brighton. The love of acting came early. While still high school ...
38. Martha Scott
Actress | The Ten Commandments
Martha Ellen Scott was born in Jamesport, Missouri, to Letha (McKinley) and Walter Alva Scott, an engineer and garage owner. She entered films in the early 1940s, following an initial appearance in stock. Her first film appearance was Our Town (1940), playing the same character as she played on the...
39. Zachary Scott
Actor | Mildred Pierce
American leading man of suave or sinister roles. A collateral relative of George Washington and William Barclay 'Bat' Masterson, Scott was the son of a wealthy surgeon. Intending to follow his father into medicine, Scott studied at the University of Texas, but found he preferred the theater. He ...
40. Elizabeth Taylor
Actress | Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor was considered one of the last, if not the last, major star to have come out of the old Hollywood studio system. She was known internationally for her beauty, especially for her violet eyes, with which she captured audiences early in her youth and kept the world hooked ...
41. Rip Torn
Actor | Men in Black
Rip Torn was born Elmore Rual Torn Jr. on February 6, 1931 in Temple, Texas, the son of Thelma Mary (Spacek) and Elmore Rudolph Torn, who was an agriculturalist and economist, credited with popularizing the custom of eating black-eyed peas on New Year's Day. "Rip" is a family name, taken by ...
42. Gwen Verdon
Actress | Cocoon
Gwen Verdon was born to the theater. Her mother, Gertrude, was a vaudevillian and dancer. Her father, Joseph, was an MGM studio electrician. She had to wear corrective boots as a child to straighten out her legs, which were misshapen by childhood illness. Nonetheless, she first appeared as a tapper...
Tell Your Friends