Audra Mc Donald

The range and diversity of Audra's work as a performer is second to none. Audra has been awarded seven Tony Awards, two Grammy Awards, and an Emmy Award. The winner of a record-breaking seven Tony Awards two Grammy Awards as well as an Emmy Award in 2015 she was named one of Time magazine's top 100 influential people. She also received the National Medal of Art, which is America's highest award for accomplishment in the field--from President Barack Obama. Because of her stunning soprano's tone and unbeatable ability to tell dramatic stories her success has been evident both on Broadway and at the opera, as well as in both film and television. As well as her stage work, she has a thriving career as a recording and concert performer who regularly appears at world's foremost venues. McDonald is from Fresno California, where she was surrounded by a large family of musicians. In the Juilliard School in New York City, McDonald received training as the classical singer. The year 1994 was the year after she graduated from Juilliard School, McDonald was awarded the Tony Award for "Best Performance of a Leading Actress musical" for her performance in Carousel. Following four years of performing in Broadway's premieres, Master Class by Terrence M. McNally (1996) and Ragtime (1998) and Ragtime (1998), she was awarded two more Tony Awards. The year 2004, she was awarded her fourth Tony for the role that she portrayed alongside Sean Diddy Combs in A Raisin in the Sun. When she was in 2012, she was a lead actor on stage in The Gershwins Porgy and Bess she won five Tony and also won her first Tony Award in the best actor category. In 2014 she made Broadway history by becoming an official Tony Awards most decorated performer in the sixth Tony Award for her performance as Billie Holiday in Lady Day at Emerson's Bar & Grill the role that also served as the basis for her Olivier Award-nominated debut performance on London's West End. As well as setting the record for most competitive wins by an actor she also became the first to win awards for all four categories of acting. McDonald has also appeared on The Secret Garden (1993), Marie Christine (1999), Henry IV (2004) as well as 110 in the Shade (2007 Twelfth night (2009) and Shuffle Along Shuffle Along: the Making of the Musical Shock of 1921 and All That Followed (2016). McDonald was the first to make her Public Theater Shakespeare in the Park debut on Twelfth Nacht (2009). McDonald was first introduced to the TV audience as a dramatic actor in Peabody Award winning CBS's Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters first 100 years. Her next appearance was as a recurring actor on NBC's Law & Order Special Victims Unit where she starred alongside Kathy Bates and Victor Garber. McDonald, who earned an Emmy Award nomination for 1999 for her performance on the HBO adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play Wit with Emma Thompson, made her return on the network's air in 2003 with the drama about politics Mister Sterling. The film was created by Emmy Award-winning Lawrence O'Donnell Jr. Then, in the beginning of 2006, she joined the crew of show on WB called The Bedford Diaries and over the following season, she played the role of a regular on NBC's television series Kidnapped. McDonald was nominated for a fourth Emmy in the year 2016 for her performance in HBO's film in the series Lady Day, at Emerson's Bar & Grill. The Bite was a six episodes pandemic-themed drama created in collaboration with Spectrum Originals in collaboration with CBS Studios. McDonald was first seen as U.S. lawyer Liz Lawrence (now Liz Reddick), in the CBS law-and-order thriller The Good Wife, in 2009. In 2018, she recast the role on The Good Fight for Paramount+ as a regular in the series. Her performance received three Critics Choice Award Nominations. McDonald guest-stars in Julian Fellowes historical drama The Gilded Age.