Barbra Streisand

Barbra Joan Streisand (pronounced STRY-sand, IPA: /ˈstraɪsænd/; born April 24, 1942) is a two time Academy Award-winning American singer and film and theatre actress. She has also achieved some notability as a composer, political activist, film producer and director. She has won Oscars for Best Actress and Best Original Song as well as multiple Emmy Awards, Grammy Awards, and Golden Globe Awards.

She is considered one of the most commercially and critically successful female entertainers in modern entertainment history and one of the best selling solo recording artists in the US, with RIAA-certified shipments of over 71 million albums. She is the highest ranking female artist on the Recording Industry Association of America's (RIAA) Top Selling Artists list.^[1] She has sold approximately 145 million albums worldwide.^{[citation needed]}

Early years

She was born Barbara Joan Streisand in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Her father, Emanuel Streisand, a grammar school teacher who emigrated from Vienna, Austria, died when she was 15 months old; she had a turbulent relationship with her stepfather, Louis Kind. She has a half-sister from her mother's second marriage, Roslyn Kind, who was also a performer.^{[citations needed]}

Her mother, Diana, a school secretary,^[2] did not encourage her daughter to pursue a show business career, opining that Barbra was not attractive enough, and encouraged Barbra to learn to type. Streisand attended Erasmus Hall High School,^[3] where she graduated fourth in her class in 1959, and where she sang in the school choir with Neil Diamond. She was also friendly there with future World Chess Champion Bobby Fischer. She never attended college.

Early singing, theater, and television career

After a music competition, Streisand became a nightclub singer while in her teens. She originally wanted to be an actress and appeared in a number of Off-Off-Broadway productions, including one with then-aspiring actress Joan Rivers, but when her boyfriend Barry Dennen helped her create a club act — first performed in a gay bar in Manhattan's Greenwich Village in 1960; she achieved success as a singer. In 1961 Streisand appeared at the Town and Country nightclub in Winnipeg, MB, but her appearance was cut short; audiences did not understand her revolutionary singing style. http://www.barbra-archives.com/Performances/streisand_towncountry.html. It was at this time that she shortened her first name to Barbra to make it more distinctive.^{[citation needed]}

In 1962 Streisand first appeared on Broadway, in the small but star-making role of Miss Marmelstein in the musical I Can Get It for You Wholesale. She also signed her first recording contract that year with Columbia Records.^{[citation needed]} She appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1962 with Liberace, and this brought Streisand to the attention of Liberace, who featured her in his acts in Las Vegas.^{[citation needed]}

On Monday, September 9, 1963, Barbra Streisand appeared as the opening act for piano virtuoso Liberace at Harrah's Lake Tahoe South Shore Room. She was touted as "the nation's newest singing sensation . . . who comes to Tahoe from a record-smashing engagement at Hollywood's Cocoanut Grove." In July, Streisand had first performed with Liberace at the Riviera Hotel in Las Vegas.^{[citation needed]}

Her first album, The Barbra Streisand Album, won two Grammy Awards in 1963. Her recording success continued, and at one time Streisand's first three albums appeared simultaneously on Billboard's pop albums Top Ten - an unusual feat considering it was at a time when rock and roll and The Beatles dominated the charts.^{[citation needed]}

One notable TV special was a documentation of her 1967 free concert in New York's Central Park, at which she sang to a crowd of some 135,000 people.^{[citation needed]}

Singing career

Streisand has recorded more than 60 albums, almost all with the Columbia Records label. Streisand has stamped nearly every song she has sung with her unique style of interpretation. Her early works in the 1960s (her debut, The Second Barbra Streisand Album, The Third Album, My Name Is Barbra, etc.) are considered classic renditions of theater and nightclub standards, including her version of "Happy Days Are Here Again". She performed this in a duet on The Judy Garland Show. Garland referred to her as one of the last great belters. Beginning with My Name Is Barbra, her albums were often medley-filled keepsakes of her television specials.

Starting in 1969, Streisand tackled contemporary songwriters, but like many "talented" singers of the day, she found herself a fish out of water in attempts to tackle rock. But her vocal talents prevailed, and she gained newfound success with the pop and ballad-oriented Richard Perry-produced album Stoney End in 1971. The title track, written by Laura Nyro, was a big hit for Streisand.

During the 1970s, she was also highly prominent in the pop charts, with number-one records like "The Way We Were", "Evergreen", "No More Tears (Enough Is Enough)" (with Donna Summer) and "Woman in Love"; some of these came from soundtrack records to her films.

As the 1970s ended, Streisand was named the most successful female singer in the U.S. - only Elvis Presley and The Beatles had sold more albums.^[4] In 1982, New York Times music critic Stephen Holden wrote that Streisand was "the most influential mainstream American pop singer since Frank Sinatra."^{[citation needed]}

Streisand returned to her musical-theater roots with 1985's The Broadway Album, which was unexpectedly successful, holding the coveted #1 Billboard position for 3 straight weeks, and being certified 4x Platinum. The album featured songs reworked by Stephen Sondheim especially for this recording, was critically acclaimed, nominated as Album of the Year and landed Streisand her 8th Grammy as Best Female Vocalist.

In 1991, a four-disc box set, Just for the Record, was released, spanning Streisand's entire career. It featured over 70 tracks, including live material, greatest hits, and rarities, from her early recordings up to 1991.

Streisand's concert fundraising events helped propel former President Bill Clinton into the spotlight and into office.^[5] Streisand later introduced Clinton at his inauguration in 1992. Streisand's music career, however, was on hold. A tour was suggested, and she debated it for two years because of her stage fright. A year later, Streisand landed another #1 Back to Broadway. This album included the duet medley I Have A Love / One Hand, One Heart with the legendary Johnny Mathis whom Streisand said is one of her favorite singers.

In September 1993, Streisand made global news, announcing her first public concert tour in 27 years. Tickets to the limited tour were sold out in under one hour. Streisand also hit the cover of major magazines, in anticipation of what Time magazine named "The Music Event of the Century". The tour was one of the biggest all-media merchandise parlays in history. Ticket prices ranged from $50 to $1,500 - making Streisand the highest paid concert performer in history. Barbra Streisand: The Concert went on to be the top grossing concert of the year, earned five Emmy Awards and the Peabody Award, and the taped broadcast on HBO is, to date, the highest rated concert special in HBO's 30 year history.

On New Year's Eve 1999, she returned to the concert stage, giving the highest grossing single concert in Las Vegas history to date. At the end of the last millennium, she was the number one female singer in the US, with at least two #1 albums in each decade since she began performing.

Her most recent albums have been Christmas Memories (2001), a collection of somber holiday songs, and The Movie Album (2003), featuring famous movie themes and backed by a large symphony orchestra. Guilty Pleasures (called Guilty Too in the UK), a collaboration with Barry Gibb and a sequel album to their previous Guilty, was released worldwide in 2005.

In February 2006, Streisand recorded the song Smile alongside Tony Bennett at Streisand's Malibu home. The song is included on Tony Bennett's 80th Birthday Album, Duets. In September 2006, the pair filmed a live performance of the song for a special directed by Rob Marshall entitled Tony Bennett: An American Classic. The special aired on NBC Television November 21, 2006, and was released on DVD the same day. Streisand's duet with Bennett opens the special.

In advance of four concerts (two each in Los Angeles and New York) in September 2000, Streisand announced she was retiring from future paying public concerts. Her performance of the song People was broadcast on the Internet via America Online.

In 2006, Streisand came out of retirement and announced her intent to tour again, in an effort to raise money and awareness for multiple issues. After four days of rehearsal at the Sovereign Bank Arena in Trenton, New Jersey, the tour began on October 4 at the Wachovia Center in Philadelphia and concluded at Staples Center in Los Angeles on November 20, 2006. Special guests Il Divo were interwoven throughout the show. On stage closing night, Streisand hinted that six more concerts may follow on foreign soil. The show was known as Streisand: The Tour.

On October 9, 2006, Streisand performed a concert at the Madison Square Garden, featuring a skit that made fun of President George W. Bush. When one heckler continued to yell repeated taunts during and long after the skit had ended, Streisand responded by shouting "Shut the fuck up!" She later apologized, but added that "The artist's role is to disturb."^[6] Ultimately, Streisand endured negative reaction to the sketch at only two out of her twenty concert dates. It was thought that an audience member in Fort Lauderdale threw liquid from a cup at her because of the skit, but the incident was found to be non-political.^[7]

Streisand's 20-concert tour set record box office numbers. At the age of 64, well past the prime of most performers, she grossed $92,457,062 and set house gross records in 14 of the 16 arenas played on the tour. She set the third place record for her October 9, 2006 show at Madison Square Garden, the first and second place records of which are held by her two shows in September 2000. She set the second place record at the MGM Grand Garden Arena, with her December 31, 1999 show being the house record and the highest grossing concert of all time. This led many people to openly criticize Streisand for price gouging, as many tickets sold for upwards of 1,000 dollars.

A collection of performances culled from different stops on this tour, Live in Concert 2006, debuted at #7 on the Billboard 200, making it Streisand's 29th Top 10 album.^[8] In the summer of 2007, Streisand gave concerts for the first time in continental Europe. The first concert took place in Zürich (June 18), then Vienna (June 22), Paris (June 26), Berlin (June 30), Stockholm (July 4, cancelled), Manchester (July 10) and Celbridge, near Dublin (July 14), followed by three concerts in London (July 18, 22 & 25), the only European city where Streisand had performed before 2007. Tickets for the London dates cost between £100.00 and £1,500.00 and for the Ireland date between €118.00 and €500.00. The tour included a 58 piece orchestra, made up of many musicians on Broadway shows. This created a "mild economic boom" as 58 subs were needed for the 7 weeks of the tour for the shows, which include Legally Blonde the Musical and Spamalot.^{[citation needed]}

In February 2008, Forbes Magazine listed Streisand as the #2 richest woman (as a singer) in 2007, with assets worth $60,000,000.[1]

Film career

Her first film was a reprise of her Broadway hit, Funny Girl (1968), an artistic and commercial success, for which she won the 1968 Academy Award for Best Actress, sharing it with Katharine Hepburn (The Lion in Winter), the first time there was a tie in this Oscar category. Her next two movies were also based on musicals, Jerry Herman's Hello, Dolly! (1969) and Alan Jay Lerner's and Burton Lane's On a Clear Day You Can See Forever (1970), while her fourth film was based on the Broadway play The Owl and the Pussycat (film) (1970).

She also starred in the original screwball comedies, including What's Up, Doc? (1972), with Ryan O'Neal, and For Pete's Sake (1974), and the drama The Way We Were (1973) with Robert Redford. Her second Academy Award was for Best Original Song as composer of the song "Evergreen", from A Star Is Born (1976); this was the first time a woman had received this award.

Along with Paul Newman and Sidney Poitier, Streisand formed First Artists Production Company in 1969 so the actors could secure properties and develop movie projects for themselves. Streisand's initial outing with First Artists was the personal Up the Sandbox (1972).

In 1970, she had a topless scene in The Owl and the Pussycat. She regretted the move and requested that director Herbert Ross delete the scene from the movie. Years later, High Society magazine obtained the original negative from the film, which included the topless scene. When they published the photos of her bare breasts, Streisand took action to remove the magazine from the stands.^{[citation needed]} The Owl and the Pussycat is also notable for being the first Hollywood film in which a major Hollywood star (Streisand) uttered the word "fuck."^{[citation needed]}

From a period beginning in 1969 and ending in 1980, Streisand appeared in the annual motion picture exhibitors poll of Top 10 Box Office attractions a total of 10 times, often as the only woman on the list. But after the disappointment of All Night Long in 1981, Streisand's film output decreased considerably. She has only acted in five films since.

Streisand produced a number of her own films, setting up Barwood Films in 1972. For Yentl (1983), she was producer, director, writer, and star, an experience she repeated for The Prince of Tides (1991). Steven Spielberg called Yentl a masterpiece, and both won critical acclaim. There was controversy when Yentl received five Academy Award nominations but none for the major categories of Best Picture, Actress, or Director.^[9] Prince of Tides received even more nominations, including Best Picture, but the director was not nominated.

In 2004, Streisand made a return to film acting, after an eight-year hiatus, in the comedy Meet the Fockers (a sequel to Meet the Parents), playing opposite Dustin Hoffman, Ben Stiller, Blythe Danner and Robert De Niro. Meet the Fockers is the highest grossing comedy film in history.

Barbra has made only 17 films in her 40 year movie career, this however hasn't stopped her accumulative worldwide box office total being over 1.3 billion US Dollars.^{[citation needed]}

Politics

Streisand has long been an active supporter of the Democratic Party and many of its causes, such as working against global warming, supporting gun control (she executive-produced the film The Long Island Incident, about a mass shooting on the Long Island Railroad), getting more useful aid for victims of Hurricane Katrina, and questioning the motives behind the 2003 invasion of Iraq. She also strongly supports women's reproductive rights. Barbra Streisand performed both at Lyndon B. Johnson's (1965) and Bill Clinton's (1993) inauguration galas. On November 27, 2007, Streisand endorsed 2008 presidential candidate Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.^[10]

SLAPP lawsuit

Streisand sued Kenneth Adelman, an aerial photographer who displayed a photo of her Malibu home (amongst photos of the entire California coast) on the website of the California Coastal Records Project. Her suit was dismissed under the anti-SLAPP provisions of California law. Streisand v. Adelman Et al, in California Superior Court; Case SC077257 ^[11][12] The publicity generated by her efforts to suppress the photograph has given rise to the term Streisand effect.

Awards

^[13]

Awards in music

20 wins, 31 nominations

Awards in other

Other recognitions (for career, political woman...) / 42 wins and 29 nominations

Personal life

Barbra Streisand has been married twice. Her first husband was actor Elliott Gould to whom she was married from 1963 to 1971. They have one child, Jason Gould. Her second husband is actor James Brolin, whom she married on July 1, 1998. The wedding was reported regularly in the celebrity gossip media. While they have no children together, Brolin has two children from his first marriage and one child from his second marriage. Both of her husbands starred in the 1970s conspiracy thriller Capricorn One.

Streisand allegedly dated Ryan O'Neal, Tom Smothers, Warren Beatty, Jon Voight, former Prime Minister of Canada Pierre Trudeau, producer Jon Peters, Omar Sharif, Don Johnson,Dodi Al-Fayed, Steve McQueen, Kris Kristofferson, Andre Agassi, and news anchor Peter Jennings. Jon Peters' daughters, Caleigh Peters and Skye Peters, are her goddaughters.

On a Season 8 episode of Friends, Brolin is mentioned in the script. In the same episode, Gould appears on the show as Ross and Monica's father.

Streisand shares a birthday with Shirley MacLaine, and they celebrate together every year.

References in popular culture

Streisand's iconic status has been parodied on the sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live in the recurring skit Coffee Talk where character Linda Richman, played by Mike Myers, hosts a talk show dedicated to, among other things, the adoration of Streisand. Streisand, in turn, made an unannounced guest appearance on the show, surprising Myers and guests, Madonna, and Roseanne Barr.

Streisand has been repeatedly satirized in the animated series South Park, most notably the episode "Mecha-Streisand", where she is portrayed as self-important and turns into a gigantic robotic dinosaur in order to conquer the universe, before being defeated by Robert Smith of The Cure. On another occasion, the Halloween episode "Spookyfish" was promoted for a week as being done in "Spooky-Vision", which involved Streisand's face seen at times during the episode in the four corners of the screen. At the end of the feature film South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut, her name is used as a powerful curse word, a gag repeated in the episode "Osama bin Laden Has Farty Pants".

Streisand is the favorite of the character Howard Brackett, played by Kevin Kline, in the film In & Out, who finally admits to being gay while standing at the altar. His unfortunate bride-to-be, played by Joan Cusack, cries out in frustration to family and friends present, "Do you know how many times I've had to sit through Funny Lady?" In an earlier scene, Howard is taunted by a friend during an argument at a bar with a jeering, "The studio thought that Barbra was too ol-l-ld to play Yentl." Barbra's signature tune, "People", is played by a school orchestra in honor of teacher Howard as the story wraps. This and similar references refer to her popularity among gay men.

Streisand is mentioned many times in Fran Drescher's The Nanny, where Fran Drescher played Fran Fine who, along with her entire family, is obsessed with the performer.

In 1993 Robin Williams' Mrs. Doubtfire, while trying different looks to apply to the Mrs. Doubtfire character, Williams uses a wig "a la Streisand" and sings some lines from "Don't Rain On My Parade", but discarded the idea.

Streisand is referenced in at least two episodes of Friends. In The One Where Chandler Can't Remember Which Sister, Monica names a sandwich at her 50's-styled restaurant after Barbra. A soup is also named after Barbra's movie Yentl. Meanwhile, in The One After 'I Do', Phoebe pretends she is pregnant with James Brolin's baby, to which Chandler Bing responds "[A]s in Barbra Streisand's husband, James Brolin?"

Streisand is referenced in at least three episodes of The Simpsons. Outside Springfield Elementary School, announcing Lisa's jazz concert, is an advertisement for a Streisand concert in the same venue for the following day, with tickets still on sale. In another episode, after Marge undergoes therapy, she informs the therapist that whenever she hears the wind blow, she'll hear it saying "Lowenstein", Streisand's therapist character in The Prince of Tides, despite Marge's therapist having a completely different name. Another reference comes in Sleeping with the Enemy when Bart exclaims after seeing Lisa make a snow-angel in a cake on the kitchen table, "At least she's not singing Streisand".

In The In-Laws, Michael Douglas's character borrows Streisand's jet, and in the bathroom "The Way We Were" is playing on the speaker system and Albert Brooks finds a large drawer full of nail polish, referencing her signature long fingernails.

In the movie Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas a teenage runaway (played by Christina Ricci) paints images of Streisand while being administered large amounts of LSD by Hunter Thompson's Samoan attorney.

In the Broadway Musical Spamalot, the song "You can't succeed on Broadway" references lines from "People" and "Papa, Can You Hear Me?".

In the internet cartoon and subsequent movie Queer Duck, the character is obsessed with Streisand. In the film he undergoes Christian-based conversion therapy to be made straight, and only Barbra's magic nose can return him to his gayness.

In a Family Guy episode, where Peter is a bartender, Lois does a cabaret act and sings "Don't Rain On My Parade," only slowed down and jazzier, as an act of defiance to Peter.

In a Family Guy episode, Peter received life insurance after Lois died. Peter then claimed that he has more money than Barbra Streisand. This was followed by a cut scene showing Streisand and her husband in their home. The husband asked for money and Streisand pressed one nostril of her nose and dollar bills came out the other nostril.

In Chicken Little, Chicken's best friend Runt's mom says, after she thinks he is lying about seeing an alien spaceship, "Don't make me take away your Streisand collection!" and Runt returns with, "Mother, you leave Barbra out of this!"

Appearances

Broadway performances

Television specials

Discography

Main article: Barbra Streisand discography

Filmography

References

Further reading

• Andersen, Christopher. (2006). Barbra: the way she is. Harper-Collins. ISBN 0-06-056256-0 ISBN 978-0-06-056256-4

• Spada, James. (1995). Streisand: Her Life. Crown Publishers, Inc. ISBN 0-517-59753-5

External links

• Official Site
• BarbraNews.com
• Barbra Archives
• Barbra Streisand Music Guide
• German language site
• Guilty Pleasures Blog
• Barbra Streisand at the Internet Movie Database
• Barbra Streisand at the Internet Broadway Database
• The Irreverent Guide to Barbra Streisand
• SimplyStreisand.com

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