- Joan Diener
Joan Diener (
February 24 1930 –May 13 2006 ) was an Americantheatre actress andsinger with a three-and-a-half-octave range.Born in
Columbus, Ohio , Diener majored inpsychology atSarah Lawrence College and moonlighted as an actress while still a student. She made her Broadway debut in the 1948revue "Small Wonder ",choreographed byGower Champion and co-starringTom Ewell ,Alice Pearce andJack Cassidy .
birthdate=birth date|1930|2|24
birthplace=Columbus, Ohio
deathdate=death date and age|2006|5|13|1930|2|24
deathplace=New York City, New York
occupation=Stage actress ,singer
spouse=Albert Marre
children=Adam, JenniferDiener met her future husband,
theatre director Albert Marre , when she won the role of Lalume, the seductive wife of the Wazir, in "Kismet ", winning aTheatre World Award for her performance. They were married three years later and subsequently had a son Adam and a daughter Jennifer.In 1958, Marre directed a production of "At the Grand", a musical adaptation of
Vicki Baum 's 1930 novel "Grand Hotel", inLos Angeles with Diener as anopera diva (aballerina in the book) who falls in love with a charming, but larcenous, fauxbaron . (Although the show never reached Broadway, it was revamped drastically more than thirty years later and, directed byTommy Tune , became the hit "Grand Hotel".)Mitch Leigh 's "Man of La Mancha " also was directed by Marre, who cast his wife as Aldonza, the lusty serving wench envisioned by the derangedDon Quixote as virtuous Dulcinea. The critics were unanimous in praising her portrayal, but she inexplicably was overlooked by the Tony nominations committee. She went on to play the role inLondon andAmsterdam , inParis andBrussels in French and, at age 62, in the 1992 Broadway revival starringRaul Julia , she took over in the same role she had created decades earlier. Pop singerSheena Easton collapsed during one performance and proved unable to perform vocallyin the extremely demanding role of Aldonza.Diener reunited with Leigh as composer and Marre as director for both "
Cry for Us All " (1970), which closed after nine performances, and "Home Sweet Homer" (1975), which never made it past opening night, despite the presence ofYul Brynner asOdysseus .Diener's most famous stage roles went to others when they reached the screen -
Dolores Gray in "Kismet" andSophia Loren in "La Mancha" - and she never had a film career of her own. In addition to appearing on Broadway and inLondon 's West End, she performed innightclubs , such as the Blue Angel inManhattan , early television ("Androcles and the Lion " on "Omnibus"), and inregional theatre .Joan Diener died of complications from
cancer inNew York City , aged 76.External links
*ibdb|67330
*findagrave|14316774
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.