According to sources, Peters, who created this role this past summer at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, wishes to honor her multiple concert contracts, which she had previously postponed in order to play the Broadway run of Follies, which marks her sixth major role in a Sondheim musical, following Broadway performances in Sunday in the Park with George, Into the Woods, Gypsy, A Little Night Music and the Carnegie Hall sold-out staging of Anyone Can Whistle.
According to her official website, the actress, who won Tony Awards for her performances in Song & Dance and Annie Get Your Gun, has concert engagements planned in Ft. Wayne, IN (Feb. 4, 2012), West Palm Beach, FL (Feb. 10), Carmel, IN (Feb. 15), Atlanta, GA (Feb. 18), Bloomington, IN (Feb. 25), Northridge, CA (March 3), Storrs, CT (April 13-14), Cincinnati, OH (April 20-22), Indiana, PA (May 4), Boston, MA (May 9), Burlington, VT (May 17) and Newark, NJ (June 2).
Prior to Follies, Bernadette Peters was last on Broadway in the revival of A Little Night Music. She received a 2003 Tony Award nomination for her performance as Rose in the Sam Mendes-directed revival of Gypsy. Peters won her two Tonys for her performances in Andrew Lloyd Webber's Song & Dance and Irving Berlin's Annie Get Your Gun, and she has also starred on Broadway in Mack & Mabel, On the Town, Sunday in the Park with George, The Goodbye Girl and the original production of Stephen Sondheim's Into the Woods.
Peters' newest live recording, "Sondheim, Etc., Etc.—Bernadette Peters Live at Carnegie Hall (The Rest of It)," is available on the Angel Records label. Masterworks Broadway has also released a "Legends of Broadway" CD celebrating her theatrical career. Peters' screen credits are numerous, and she also recently celebrated the launch of her second children's book, "Stella Is a Star," for Blue Apple Books.
* Follies, which won the 1971 Tony Award for Best Score, has a book by Goldman and music and lyrics by Sondheim.
The Kennedy Center revival now at Broadway's Marquis Theatre first appeared at the Center's Eisenhower Theater in Washington, DC, May 7-June 19. It opened at the Marquis on Sept. 12.
Eric Schaeffer directs and Warren Carlyle choreographs. James Moore serves as music director and conducts the 28-piece orchestra. Jonathan Tunick’s original orchestrations are being employed for the production.
The new Follies cast recording, recent released on the PS Classics label, is available by clicking here.
Follies is produced on Broadway by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts (David M. Rubenstein, Chairman; Michael M. Kaiser, President; Max Woodward, Vice President); Nederlander Presentations, Inc.; Adrienne Arsht; HRH Foundation, Sponsor; Allan Williams, Executive Producer.
