Audra Mc Donald

Audra McDonald's talent is unparalleled in its breadth and diversity as a singer, and an actor. In 2015, she won an unprecedented Six Tony Awards as well as two Grammy Awards and the Emmy Award. Her work was recognized as a result of Time magazine among the 100 most influential people, and she was also awarded with the National Medal of Arts - the most prestigious honor in America to recognize artistic accomplishment and achievement - by President Barack Obama. She has a home on screen, in television as well as Broadway. Her stunning soprano will make her an ideal performer on the stage. As well as her stage work, she continues to make a name for herself as a recording artist who performs regularly at top venues around the globe. McDonald was born in a musical family in California, Fresno. She received classical vocal training from the Juilliard School of New York. Following her graduation, she took home her debut Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in the Musical Carousel at Lincoln Center Theater (1994). In the following four years, she also won two Tony Awards in the featured actress category, for her roles in both the Broadway performances of the world premiere of Terrence McNally's play Master Class (1996) and his production Ragtime (1998) giving her an unprecedented total of three Tony Awards before the age of thirty. In 2004 she won her fourth Tony acting alongside Sean Diddy Combs in A Raisin in the Sun and in 2012 she won five awards, including her first-ever in the leading actress category in the role of her lead for her role in The Gershwins Porgy and Bess. She created Broadway the history books in 2014 as she became the top-recognized Tony Award-winning performer. In her role as Billie Holiday at Emerson's Bar & Grill in the show, that also helped launch the career of her Olivier Award nominated debut on London's West End in 2017, was her six award. The actress also broke the record of most awards received by actors. Some of her theater credits are The Secret Garden (1993) Marie Christine (99) Henry IV (2005) 110 in the Shade (2006) Twelfth Nacht (2009) Twelfth Nacht (2009), her Public Theater Shakespeare in the Park premiere Shuffle Along or the Making of the Musical sensation of 1921 & All That Followed (2017) Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune (2018) and Ohio State Murders 2023. McDonald was first introduced to television viewers as a dramatic actress by Peabody Award winning CBS's Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters first 100 years. In 1999, she appeared alongside Kathy Bates in ABC's acclaimed remake of Annie. In addition, she played an occasional role in NBC's Law & Order Special Victims Unit in the year 2000. McDonald, who was awarded an Emmy Award nomination in 1999 for her performance as a character in an HBO adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning film Wit featuring Emma Thompson was back on network TV in 2003 with the drama about politics Mister Sterling. The film was produced by Emmy Award-winning Lawrence O'Donnell Jr. Then, in the beginning of 2006, she joined in the ensemble of the WB's The Bedford Diaries and over the following season, she played the role of a regular on NBC's popular television show Kidnapped. McDonald received a fourth Emmy for her portrayal of Lady Day in Emerson's Bar and Grill, which aired on HBO in 2016. The actress starred with Taylor Schilling and Steven Pasquale in The Bite a six-episode pandemic-themed drama produced with Spectrum Originals and CBS Studios in 2021. In 2009, she portrayed U.S. Attorney Liz Lawrence in CBS's legal drama The Good Wife. In 2018, McDonald took on the role of Liz Reddick as a regular on Paramount's The Good Fight. She was awarded three Critics Choice Award nods for her performance. Presently, she is an actor in Julian Fellowes' historical drama The Gilded Age, which airs on HBO.