This is a weekly feature on BroadwayLiving.com. It’s
just like the game “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon”. You
know how it goes…someone throws out an actor’s
name and you have to try to connect them to Kevin Bacon
in six steps or less.
I thought it might be fun to do
the same thing with the theater’s luminaries. I
will be trying to connect them to the longest running
show in Broadway
history, The Phantom of the Opera and its
very first “Phantom”, Michael Crawford.
F. Murray Abraham’s career spans four decades
and last night he placed another notch in his belt
with the opening of Theresa Rebeck’s new play Mauritius. He
was born Fahrid Murray Abraham in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
but was raised in Texas. He was educated at the
University of Texas at Austin before studying acting
under Uta Hagen in New York.
His professional theatre debut
came in 1965 in an L.A. production of Ray Bradbury’s The Wonderful
Ice Cream Suit. He made his Broadway debut
a few years later in The Man in the Glass Booth (1968). Over
the next 16 years Mr. Abraham plied his trade in a
variety of acting jobs that included theatre, television,
films and several commercials. Some people may
remember him from a “Fruit of the Loom”series
in which he played a talking leaf. Then in 1984,
nearly 20 years into his career, F. Murray found himself
an “overnight”success.
1984 is the year that Mr. Abraham played the envious
composer Antonio Salieri in the movie version of Amadeus. His
work in the role would earn him an Academy Award for
Best Actor.
Other notable stage appearances include: replacing
Ron Leibman in the role of Roy Cohn in Angels in
America (1993); playing Betty Buckley’s
brother in the musical Triumph of Love (1997)
and playing Pozzo in the Mike Nichols’staging
of Waiting for Godot (1988) with Steve Martin
and Robin Williams.
1) F. Murray Abraham did Triumph of Love with
Nancy Opel
2) Nancy Opel was in Sunday in the Park with George with
Cris Groenendaal.
3) Cris Groenendaal was the original “Monsieur André”in The
Phantom of the Opera with Michael Crawford.
So that’s the game. Join
me each week as I try to come up with new ways of
connecting Michael
Crawford to the entire theater community.
