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Betty
Buckley made her Broadway debut in 1969 as
Martha Jefferson singing "He Plays the Violin" in the
original production of 1776, and the theatre world was a-buzz
with the discovery of its next great voice. From there she went on
to do Promises, Promises in London and What's a Nice Country
Like You Doing in a State Like This? off-Broadway, while also going
on in the role of Catherine in Bob Fosse's production of Pippin
and playing Heather in I'm Getting My Act Together and Taking it on
the Road. In 1983 she won a Tony Award for playing Grizzebella
the Glamour Cat in Andrew Lloyd Webber's ridiculously over-rated musical Cats,
in which she nightly stopped the show with her rendition of
"Memory," then going on to play the title role in The
Mystery of Edwin Drood (1985) and Emma in Song & Dance
(1986). But she is best remembered for her appearance as Mrs. White
in the disastrous flop Carrie (1988), known forever as the
biggest flop in Broadway history, and incidentally was also given a Tony
nomination for her performance in another flop, Triumph of Love
(1997). She has since gone on to play roles like Rose in Gypsy,
Pirate Jenny in The Threepenny Opera, and Norma Desmond in Sunset
Boulevard, all to great acclaim. She's recently made theatre
headlines for not going on a Mrs. Lovett in a cancelled Odessa,
Texas, production of Sweeney Todd (Summer, 2005). |
