Broadway stars and award winners will light up the Lehigh Valley this summer at the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival in a series of one night only concerts and performances.
William Michals – Broadway in Concert II
Sunday, June 24, 7:30pm
The renowned baritone returns to PSF this summer to play the title role in Sweeney Todd at PSF and will also perform a concert of Broadway classics. Michals played Emile in the landmark revivals of South Pacific at Lincoln Center and later at PSF. He made his Broadway debut as “The Beast” in Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, later returning to play Gaston.
The Gospel According to Saint Mark
Monday, July 23, 7:30pm
Veteran actor and Emmy Winner, Wayne S. Turney’s performance of The Gospel According to Saint Mark in the elegant cadences of the King James version has enraptured audiences around the country for the past 25 years. Well known to PSF audiences for his turns as Mr. Bennet, Polonius, and others, Turney breathes life into the character and words of St. Mark. Turney is also appearing in The Tempest at PSF this summer.
Victoria Clark – Live In Concert
Monday, July 30, 7:30pm
Winner of the Tony, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle Awards for her luminous portrayal of mother Margaret Johnson in The Light in the Piazza on Broadway, Victoria Clark maintains one of the most diverse performing careers of any artist living today, equally at home on Broadway, in film, television, and on the concert stage.
Artists Biographies
Victoria Clark. Clark received Tony, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle Awards, as well as a Drama League honor for her portrayal of the protective, domineering mother Margaret Johnson in the critically-acclaimed musical The Light in the Piazza in 2005. Her virtuoso performance in the Lincoln Center Production of the Tony Award-winning musical has made her a favorite among audiences and critics, including The New York Times’ Ben Brantley, who called Clark’s work in Piazza “the best musical performance by an actress this season.”
Starring as Mother Superior in the original cast of the hit Broadway musical, Sister Act, Ms. Clark garnered Tony, Drama Desk, and Out Critics Circle Award nominations and the Drama League honor last year. She also portrayed the role of Gabrielle York in Lincoln Center’s heralded production of When the Rain Stops Falling, for which she received a Drama Desk Award Nomination. She also starred opposite Nathan Gunn in the staged production of The Grapes of Wrath at Carnegie Hall under the musical direction of her colleague Ted Sperling. Clark was also among the featured performers in Stephen Sondheim: The Birthday Concert held at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall televised on PBS. She continues her concert career, and recently performed with the New York Philharmonic at Avery Fisher Hall and with the Collegiate Chorale at Carnegie Hall.
Film credits include Cradle Will Rock (Tim Robbins), The Happening (M. Night Shyamalan), Tickling Leo (Jeremy Davidson), Main Street (by Horton Foote directed by John Doyle) and the 2010 independent feature Harvest (Marc Meyers), which won the Best American Independent Feature Film Award at the 34th Cleveland International Film Festival.
Television appearances: Mercy, Law & Order, Law & Order: SVU, and the PBS special Sweeney Todd in Concert featuring Patti LuPone, George Hearn, and the San Francisco Symphony. She also enjoyed a recurring role on Garrison Keillor’s Prairie Home Companion on Minnesota Public Radio.
Clark’s recordings include her debut solo album, Fifteen Seconds of Grace, the original cast albums of The Light in the Piazza, Titanic, A Grand Night for Singing, and Far From the Madding Crowd; the new Broadway cast albums of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying and Guys and Dolls; The Scarlet Pimpernel with Linda Eder; the soundtrack for Cradle Will Rock, and soundtracks of numerous Disney animated musicals.
William Michals. Appeared in the leading role Emile DeBecque in the recent landmark revival of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific at Lincoln Center. The Broadway and concert star made his Broadway debut as The Beast in Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, and later returned to play Gaston in the same production. His career includes leading roles as Javert in Les Misérables, Billy Flynn in Chicago, Don Quixote in Man of La Mancha, Harold Hill in The Music Man, and the title role in The Phantom of the Opera. A recipient of the prestigious Anselmo Award, he also earned recognition by Chicago’s Jefferson Award for his portrayal of Chauvelin in the national tour of The Scarlet Pimpernel. Audiences across the country have enjoyed him as Captain von Trapp in The Sound of Music, and as Billy Flynn in Kander & Ebb’s Chicago.
In addition to Michals credits in the great theatrical venues, including Carnegie Hall, Broadway’s Palace Theatre, L.A.’s Ahmanson and D.C.’s Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, he’s also entertained in New York’s finest rooms, including the Rainbow Room, The Four Seasons, and the Grand Ballroom of The Plaza. Michals regularly appears with the country’s leading orchestras, including the San Francisco, San Diego, Utah, and Hartford Symphonies, The New York Pops, and with Peter Nero and the Philly Pops for a sold-out evening of “Broadway Showstoppers.”
He has sung the National Anthem for major league sporting events from coast to coast, and enjoys performed for the joint leadership of the House and Senate inside the United States Capitol. Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani personally called upon Michals to open the December 11, 2001 memorial service at Ground Zero with a solo, a cappella rendition of “Let There Be Peace On Earth,” which has been rebroadcast worldwide over network TV, CNN, National Public Radio, and the Internet.
Michals’ credits extend into the operatic world, in New York, Boston, and in concert at the Aspen and Tanglewood Music Festivals. Favorite roles include Figaro and the Count in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro, Escamillo in Bizet’s Carmen, Marcello in Puccini’s La Bohème, Danilo in Lehár’s The Merry Widow, and the dark Hunding in Wagner’s Die Walküre. TV appearances include Law and Order, All My Children, and The Guiding Light.
WAYNE S. TURNEY. Actor, director, playwright, and educator, Turney is a Professor of Theatre at DeSales University and a regular with the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival.
In residence for thirteen years at the Cleveland Play House, Turney performed in featured roles as varied as Custer and Scrooge. He appeared with most major arts organizations in Cleveland including Amphimusic, the Cleveland Pops, the Cleveland Orchestra, The Cleveland Opera, The Cleveland Institute of Music, as well as The Great Lakes Theatre Festival and Actors Summit.
He was seen for nearly ten years every Saturday morning in Cleveland and several other cities across the country on the highly honored children’s show, Hickory Hideout, for which he served as staff writer and won an Emmy. He has also performed at the Actor’s Theatre of Louisville, Detroit’s famed Hilberry Repertory Theatre, Woodstock Music Festival Theatre, Portland Opera, Michigan Opera Theatre, and Interlochen Arts Academy.
A graduate of Ohio Wesleyan University with a B.A. in Math and Theatre, in 1968, he accepted a commission in the United States Air Force and became a SAC pilot, graduating in Class 70-03 at Reese AFB, TX. He served as a pilot of EC-135 Airborne Command Posts with the Third Airborne Command and Control Squadron (3ACCS) for the next four years, during which time he directed a series of fund-raisers for the POW-MIA fund, won several talent contests and served as commander of Tops In Blue ’72.
On separation from the service at the end of the Vietnam Conflict, he spent three years at the famed Hilberry Repertory Theatre at Wayne State University where he earned an M.F.A. (and Ph.D ABD). Mr. Turney has taught at the Chautauqua Institution, Wayne State University, Case-Western Reserve University, John Carroll University, Ohio Wesleyan University, and Cleveland State University.
He is author, translator or adaptor of nine works, including a musical adaptation of Dickens’ A Cricket on the Hearth and was co-founder, with his wife The Rev. HarperJane McAdoo Turney of the Cleveland Actors Theatre Company.
