Richard Charles Rodgers
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Richard Rodgers was the first person to achieve EGOT status, winning an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony. He also won a Pulitzer Prize for Drama for South Pacific in 1950. With over 900 songs and 43 Broadway musicals, Rodgers transformed musical theater alongside Lorenz Hart and Oscar Hammerstein II. His collaborations with Hammerstein produced classics like The Sound of Music and Oklahoma!.
Names, aliases, and relatives of Richard Rodgers — birth name, kin, and personal ties.
Richard Rodgers by the numbers — life, work, and family.
Richard Rodgers — early life, career, personal life, and legacy.
Rodgers was born on June 28, 1902, in Arverne, Queens, New York. His family name was originally Rojazinsky, changed to Rodgers by his father in the 1880s.
He attended DeWitt Clinton High School and Townsend Harris High School, then studied at Columbia University and the Institute of Musical Art in New York from 1921 to 1923.
Rodgers began his career with lyricist Lorenz Hart, writing musicals like Pal Joey 1940 and Babes in Arms 1939. In 1943, he teamed with Oscar Hammerstein II for Oklahoma!, which revolutionized Broadway by integrating song and story.
Their subsequent works included Carousel 1945, South Pacific 1949, The King and I 1951, and The Sound of Music 1959. Rodgers also won an Academy Award for Best Original Song for It Might as Well Be Spring from State Fair 1945. He became the first person to win all four major entertainment awards: Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony, known as EGOT.
Rodgers married Dorothy Rodgers on March 5, 1930, and they had one daughter, Mary Rodgers, who became a writer and composer. Mary later married Daniel Melnick. His father was Dr. William Rodgers, and his mother was Mamie Levy. He had an older brother, Mortimer, who became a doctor. The family name was originally Rojazinsky.
Rodgers won 11 Tony Awards, a Pulitzer Prize, and is one of only two people to achieve the EGOT plus a Pulitzer the other is Marvin Hamlisch. The 46th Street Theater in New York was renamed the Richard Rodgers Theater in 1980. His innovations, such as using ballet sequences to reveal character thoughts, influenced later composers. He is best remembered for his collaborations with Oscar Hammerstein II, producing works like The Sound of Music and Oklahoma!.
The complete filmography of Richard Rodgers — every film, TV show, and documentary credit, ranked by popularity.
Every award, honor, and recognition received by Richard Rodgers — Grammys, hall-of-fame inductions, civic honors, lifetime achievements.
Richard Rodgers's bibliography — every authored, edited, and co-written book, ranked by edition count.
A wall of memorable lines from Richard Rodgers — lyrics, interviews, and off-the-cuff remarks captured over a lifetime.
Whenever I Get an Idea for a Song, Even Before Jotting Down the Notes, I Can Hear It in the Orchestra, I Can Smell It in the Scenery, I Can See the Kind of Actor Who Will Sing It, and I Am Aware of an Audience Listening to It.
Frank Loesser as a Man Is a Book in Himself. He Was Happy; He Was Strong; He Had Enormous Peaks and Frightening Depths. This Is Only to Say That He Was Intensely Human. with It All, He Was a Living Refutation of the Theory That Composers Are Not Very Bright. Frank Was a First-rate Businessman Without Ever Having to Resort to Tricks. He Knew His Own Value, and He Recognized the Value of Others.
In Many Ways, a Song-writing Partnership Is Like a Marriage. Apart from Just Liking Each Other, a Lyricist and a Composer Should Be Able to Spend Long Periods of Time Together – Around the Clock If Need Be – Without Getting on Each Other’s Nerves. Their Goals, Outlooks, and Basic Philosophies Should Be Similar. They Should Have Strong Convictions, but No Man Should Ever Insist That His Way Alone Is the Right Way. a Member of a Team Should Even Be so in Tune with His Partner’s Work Habits That He Must Be Almost Able to Anticipate the Other’s Next Move. in Short, the Men Should Work Together in Such Close Harmony That the Song They Create Is Accepted as a Spontaneous Emotional Expression.
A Song Is a Lot of Things. But, First of All, a Song Is the Voice of Its Time. Setting Words to Music Gives Them Weight, Makes Then Somehow Easier to Say, and It Helps Them to Be Remembered. It May Be That That We Can Sing What We Often Cannot Say, Whether It Be from Shyness, Fear, Lack of the Right Words or the Passion or Dramatic Gift to Express Them. More Souls Have Rallied to More Causes by the Strains of Music Than by Straining Rhetoric.
In Many Respects ‘Pal Joey’ Forced the Musical Theatre to Wear Long Pants for the First Time.
Little-known facts about Richard Rodgers — origins, oddities, and behind-the-scenes details from a public life.
Wrote over 1,500 songs at least 85 regarded as standards and 42 musicals, 19 of which were transferred to film.
He was one of the pioneers, along with Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II, in the creation of a less frivolous type of musical theater than had been the case, in which musicals were adapted from well-known plays or novels, and featured dialog taken directly from those plays and/or novels, as well as believable, realistic characterizations, with dramatic storylines which sometimes contained tragedy and did not necessarily follow the usual formulas. His first musical using an unusual storyline and characters was Pal Joey, written with Lorenz Hart and produced in 1940, based on short stories by John O’Hara, about an unprincipled but sympathetic nightclub hoofer who does not reform. It was not very successful in its first run, but became a hit in 1952 and was unfortunately watered down in its 1957 film version. The musicals Rodgers wrote, beginning in 1943 with Oscar Hammerstein II, overthrew many of the usual musical theater formulas of the time and continued the path begun by Hammerstein and Kern in their 1927 Show Boat. The Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals sometimes used ballet sequences to reveal what was happening in the mind of one of the characters, the lead characters were not necessarily admirable people i.e Carousel‘s Billy Bigelow, one or more characters were sometimes killed off in the storylines, the hero and heroine did not necessarily fall in love or have a love scene as in The King and I, and very often subjects which were then considered taboo in musicals were used. The songs in most of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals with the exception of some of the musical numbers in The Sound of Music developed the storyline and the characters, and could not be removed from the shows without seriously damaging them.
His father changed the family name from Rojazinsky to Rodgers in the 1880s to sound more Americanized.
In addition to their phenomenal success as writers of their own shows, Rodgers and Hammerstein produced shows by other writers, as well, most notably Irving Berlin’s Annie Get Your Gun and John Van Druten’s I Remember Mama. The latter became the basis for Rodgers’ last completed show. Written in collaboration with Martin Charnin and starring Liv Ullmann, Rodgers’ I Remember Mama was one of the most notorious Broadway flops of the 1970s, running only a few months in 1979, largely on advance ticket sales. Rodgers died shortly after it closed. Most agreed that it was a sad end to an otherwise distinguished career.
Father of writer Mary Rodgers and Linda Rogers Melnick.
Grandfather of composer/lyricist/actor Adam Guettel and composer Peter Melnick.
The King and I was performed at the London Palladium in 2000 and was nominated for Outstanding Musical Production at the Laurence Olivier Theatre Awards in 2001.
Broadway’s 46th Street Theater was renamed the Richard Rodgers Theater in 1980, though none of his major shows had ever played there.
Father Dr. William Rodgers married his mother Mamie Levy on 24 November 1896.
Older brother Mortimer b. 13 January 1898 became a doctor like their father.
One of the first Kennedy Center Honorees in 1978.
Served as Managing Director of the Music Theater of Lincoln Center, 1964-1969. During this period, the Music Theater, whose productions were given at the New York State Theater, presented three successful revivals of Rodgers and Hammerstein shows: The King and I with Risë Stevens, Darren McGavin and Frank Porretta in 1964; Carousel with John Raitt and Edward Everett Horton in 1965 and Southeastern with Florence Henderson and Giorgio Tozzi in 1967.
Along with his lyricist-partner Oscar Hammerstein II, he made more than ten appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show, Ed Sullivan’s television show. They are probably the only American musical play creators to have made that many personal appearances on one television series.
Won a 1961 Special Tony Award New York City for his work with young people in the theater and putting the orchestra on the stage in his production No Strings.
Richard Rodgers won the 1950 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for the musical South Pacific collaborating with Oscar Hammerstein II and Joshua Logan.
Studied at the Institute of Musical Art in New York from 1921 to 1923.
Oscar Hammerstein and his musical, The Sound of Music at the Drury Lane Oakbrook Theatre in Oakbrook, Illinois was nominated for a 2012 Equity Joseph Jefferson Award for Musical Production Large.
Richard is the first one of 19 people to be considered an EGOT. The other 18 are chronologically Helen Hayes, Rita Moreno, John Gielgud, Audrey Hepburn, Marvin Hamlisch, Jonathan Tunick, Mel Brooks, Mike Nichols, Whoopi Goldberg, Scott Rudin, Robert Lopez, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Tim Rice, John Legend, Alan Menken, Jennifer Hudson, Viola Davis, and Elton John.
Richard and daughter Mary are one of three sets of relatives to be nominated for the Tony in the same category in the same year. In 1960 they were nominated for Composer: Mary for Once Upon a Mattress and Richard for The Sound of Music won.
Was born at his family’s summer residence on Brandieth Avenue now Beach 79th Street in Far Rockaway, Queens, New York.
His musical Oklahoma! was awarded the 1998 London Evening Standard Theatre Award for Best Musical.
Won eleven Tony Awards: three in 1950 for South Pacific for his music as part of the Best Musical win; as Best Composer; and as Best Producers Musical, shared with Oscar Hammerstein II, Leland Hayward and Joshua Logan; one in 1952, for his music with Hammerstein’s book and lyrics as part of a Best Musical win for The King and I; two in 1960, for his music as part of a Best Musical win for The Sound of Music in a tie with Fiorello!, and as Best Composer, in a tie with Jerry Bock for Fiorello!; two in 1962, as Best Composer for No Strings and a Special Tony Award for all he has done for young people in the theatre and for taking the men of the orchestra out of the pit and putting them on stage in No Strings; one in 1972, another Special Tony Award; and one in 1979, the Lawrence Langner Memorial Award for Distinguished Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre. He was also Tony-nominated five other times: in 1956, for his music and as a co-producer of Best Musical nominee Pipe Dream; in 1959 for his music for Best Musical nominee Flower Drum Song; in 1962 for his music and lyrics and as co-producer of Best Musical nominee No Strings; in 1972 for Best Composer and Lyricist with collaborator Stephen Sondheim for Do I Hear a Waltz?; and in 1996, posthumously, for Best Original Musical Score, music only for designated songs that were original and not in the previous film version of State Fair 1945.
Inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970.
Is a member of Pi Lambda Phi fraternity.
Won a 1972 individual Special Tony Award New York City.
Won a 1979 Lawrence Langner Tony Award New York City for a distinguished life in the American theater.
Portrayed by Tom Drake in Words and Music 1948.
Lorenz Hart and his musical, Pal Joey, at the Porchlight Music Theatre in Chicago, Illinois was nominated for a 2013 Equity Joseph Jefferson Award for Midsize Musical Production.
Oscar Hammerstein and his musical, South Pacific, at the Marriott Theatre in Chicago, Illinois was nominated for a 2013 Equity Joseph Jefferson Award for Large Musical Production.
Oscar Hammerstein and his musical, A Grand Night for Singing, was nominated for a 2013 Equity Joseph Jefferson Award for Production Revue.
Oscar Hammerstein and his musical, The King and I at the Marriott Theatre in Chicago, Illinois was nominated for a 1987 Equity Joseph Jefferson Award for Musical Production.
Oscar Hammerstein and his musical, The King and I at the Marriott Theatre in Chicago, Illinois was awarded the 2001 Equity Joseph Jefferson Award for Musical Production.
The 1956 West German film The Trapp Family about the von Trapp family, and its 1958 sequel Die Trapp-Familie in America became the most successful films in West Germany during the post-war years. The two films popularity extended throughout Europe and South America. In 1956, Paramount Pictures purchased the United States film rights, intending to produce an English language version with Audrey Hepburn as Maria. The studio eventually dropped their option; but one of the Paramount film studio’s directors involved in preliminary development of the film, Vincent J. Donehue, proposed the story as a stage musical for his friend Mary Martin. Broadway producers Leland Hayward and Richard Halliday Mary Martin’s husband agreed and secured the rights. Originally envisioned as a non-musical play, they hired playwrights Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, who had won the Pulitzer Prize for State of the Union, with the play featuring songs from the repertoire of the Trapp Family Singers. The production team asked Richard Rogers to add an original song, but the two styles did not work together. Rodgers and Hammerstein then offered to write a complete new score if the producers were willing to wait while they completed work on Flower Drum Song. Rogers and Hammerstein based their fictionalized musical on the memoir of Maria Augusta von Trapp, The Story of the Trapp Family Singers published in 1949 by J.B. Lippincott Company of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The original multiple Tony Award-winning Broadway musical by Richard Rogers, lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II and a book by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse The Sound of Music starring Mary Martin at age 46 and Theodore Bikel at age 35, opened on Broadway at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre on November 16, 1959, moved to the Mark Hellinger Theatre on November 6, 1962 and closed on June 15, 1963 after 1,433 performances. The director was Vincen
Oscar Hammerstein and his musical, The King and I at the Marriott Theatre in Chicago, Illinois was nominated for a 2015 Joseph Jefferson Equity Award for Large Musical Production.
Carousel was awarded the 1996 Drama Logue Award for Production in the Royal National Theatre production at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles, California.
His musical, South Pacific in a Lincoln Center Theater production at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles, California was awarded the 2010 Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle McCulloh Award for Shows Written between 1920 and 1980.
He and Oscar Hammerstein shared a special Pulitzer citation for Oklahoma!, an Oscar for the song It Might as Well Be Spring from State Fair and were recipients of several Donaldson and Antoinette Perry Awards.
Ex-father-in-law of Daniel Melnick.
Brother-in-law of Ben Feiner Jr.
Oscar Hammerstein and his musical, The King and I, at the Porchlight Music Theatre in Chicago, Illinois was nominated for the 2011 Equity Joseph Jefferson Award for Musical Production Midsize.
His musical, South Pacific in a Lincoln Center Theater production at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles, California was awarded the 2011 Back Stage Garland Award for Production.
Oscar Hammerstein and his musical, Oklahoma! at the Paramount Theatre in Chicago, Illinois was nominated for a 2016 Joseph Jefferson Equity Award for Large Musical Production.
Quick answers to the questions readers ask most about Richard Rodgers.
Celebrities similar to Richard Rodgers — same craft, ranked by reach.
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