Time Steps: My Musical Comedy Life - Hardcover

McKechnie, Donna; Lawrence, Greg

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0743255208 ISBN 13: 9780743255202

Publisher: Simon & Schuster, 2006

Synopsis

A poignant and revealing memoir from a legendary entertainer.

Donna McKechnie began her love affair with dance as a child in Detroit. At fifteen, she ran away from home to join a touring dance troupe, and in 1961, she was cast in the Broadway smash hit How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. She soon won acclaim as Michael Bennett's show-stopping muse in Promises, Promises and Company. In 1975, with her Tony-winning performance in Michael Bennett's masterpiece, A Chorus Line, McKechnie vaulted to stardom as a unique Broadway "triple threat" who could do it all -- dance, sing, and act.

Moving among the circles of artists, dancers, and musicians who inspired and challenged her in myriad ways, McKechnie writes about the trajectory of her career as it intertwined with and influenced her personal life and the lives of those around her. Recounting her dazzling career, McKechnie also reveals the dark side of fame: from her parents' troubled relationship to a searing account of her own marriage to Michael Bennett and her inspiring triumphs over depression and the rheumatoid arthritis that nearly ended her career. With affectionate reminiscences of Bob Fosse, Gwen Verdon, Stephen Sondheim, Fred Astaire, and many other well-known friends, McKechnie exhibits all the warmth, sensitivity, and verve that have endeared her to legions of fans over the years.

Filled with behind-the-scenes stories and anecdotes, Time Steps is a candid, funny, and deeply personal memoir by a vivacious woman with an indomitable spirit and an illustrious, ongoing career.

About this title

About the Authors

Donna McKechnie is the legendary actress best known for her Tony Award-winning performance in A Chorus Line. She made her Broadway debut in 1961 with How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. Her other Broadway shows include Promises, Promises; Company; Sondheim: A Musical Tribute (which she also choreographed); On the Town; Sweet Charity (national tour); and State Fair, for which she won a Fred Astaire Award in 1996. Reviewing her recent one-woman show, My Musical Comedy Life, Ben Brantley wrote in the New York Times: "She remains the essence of the heroic drive that A Chorus Line celebrates." She lives in New York.

Greg Lawrence is the author and coauthor of five books, including Dance with Demons: The Life of Jerome Robbins; the bestselling autobiography of Gelsey Kirkland, Dancing on My Grave; Colored Lights; and The Shape of Love.

Reviews

In 1975, singer-dancer-choreographer McKechnie was one of the brightest lights on the Great White Way, winning a Tony for her performance in A Chorus Line, and now theatergoers will be elated to see her autobiography shelved in stores only days before A Chorus Line's October Broadway revival. McKechnie's memories of the original musical's creative genesis serve as the centerpiece, and the other chapters are equally compelling. Her story is one of fierce drive and determination. Leaving Detroit at 16, she ran away from home to dance with a touring troupe, arriving in Manhattan at 17. Following a failed audition with American Ballet Theatre, she performed in Massachusetts musicals, filmed commercials and toured in West Side Story, leaping from the long-run Broadway hit How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying in 1961 to TV (Hullabaloo; Dark Shadows). By the time Stephen Sondheim's Company brought her back to Broadway in 1970, her career was a cakewalk, but the aftermath of a divorce from choreographer Michael Bennett led to a "vicious circle of depression." McKechnie writes honestly, revealing her innermost thoughts, looking back at family, close friends and intimate relationships, while probing her anxieties, low self-esteem and personal pain between the plaudits, raves and theatrical triumphs. 16-page photo insert not seen by PW. (Sept.)
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McKechnie won a 1976 Tony Award for her smart, sensitive portrayal in the innovative, ensemble-written musical A Chorus Line of Cassie, a character based largely on herself. She brings similar sensitivity and openness to her autobiography, written with eminent theatrical biographer Lawrence (Dance with Demons: The Life of Jerome Robbins, 2001). Not quite a tell-all, McKechnie's memoir reviews with remarkable candor the many highs and lows of a long, varied career: unhappy childhood, entry into show business (she was in a touring production before graduating high school), early Broadway success (in How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying; Promises, Promises; and Company), two unhappy marriages, post-Tony career setbacks and comebacks, and myriad battles to overcome arthritis and depression. Her account of the making of Chorus Line, from early group-therapy-like workshops to the final touches for Broadway, is especially fascinating. That that career high was followed by a series of life-disrupting reversals, including a disaster of a marriage to Chorus Line director Michael Bennet, makes her story all the more riveting. Jack Helbig
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Publication date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0743255208
• ISBN 13: 9780743255202
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 304