Tommy Tune Biography

Thomas James "Tommy" Tune (born February 28, 1939) is an American actor, dancer, singer, theatre director, producer, and choreographer. Over the course of his career, he has won nine Tony Awards and the National Medal of Arts.

Biography

Early years

Tune was born in Texas to oil rig worker, horse trainer and restaurateur Jim Tune and Eva Mae Clark (the family name was shortened from "Tunesmith"). He attended Lamar High School in Houston and the Methodist-affiliated Lon Morris College in Jacksonville, Texas. He studied dance with Patsy Swayze in Houston. He also studied dance with Kit Andree in Boulder Colorado. He went on to earn his Bachelor's degree from the University of Texas at Austin in 1962, and took graduate courses at the University of Houston. Tune later moved to New York to start his career.

Career

In 1965, Tune made his Broadway debut as a performer in the musical Baker Street. His first Broadway directing and choreography credits were for the original production of The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas in 1978. He has gone on to direct and/or choreograph eight Broadway musicals. He directed a new musical titled Turn of the Century, which premiered at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago on September 19, 2008 and closed on November 2, 2008.

Off-Broadway, Tune has directed The Club and Cloud Nine. Tune toured the United States in the Sherman Brothers musical Busker Alley in 1994-1995 and in the stage adaptation of the film Dr. Dolittle in 2006.

Tune is the only person to win Tony Awards in the same categories (Best Choreography and Best Direction of a Musical) in consecutive years (1990 and 1991), and the first to win in four categories. He has won nine Tony Awards.

On television, Tune was a recurring guest star and assistant choreographer from 1969-70 on The Dean Martin Show and its summer replacement series, Dean Martin Presents The Golddiggers.

Tune appeared in a 1975 TV special titled Welcome to the "World" along with Lucie Arnaz and Lyle Waggoner to promote the opening of Space Mountain at Walt Disney World.

Tune's film credits include Ambrose in Hello, Dolly! (1969), and The Boy Friend with Twiggy (1971). Tune released his first record album, Slow Dancing, in 1997 on the RCA label, featuring a collection of his favorite romantic ballads.

In 1999, he made his Las Vegas debut as the star of EFX at the MGM Grand Las Vegas.

Tune staged an elaborate musical entitled Paparazzi for the Holland America Line cruise ship the Oosterdam in 2003. He works often with The Manhattan Rhythm Kings, for example touring in a Big Band revue entitled Song and Dance Man and White Tie and Tails (2002).

Tune has been performing in his musical revue, Steps in Time: A Broadway Biography in Song and Dance, in Boston in April 2008 and continuing in various venues from Bethesda, Maryland in January 2009 to California in February 2009.

The Tommy Tune Awards, presented annually by Theatre Under The Stars (TUTS) honor excellence in high school musical theatre in Houston. The current home of the Tommy Tune Awards is the Hobby Center for the Performing Arts in Houston, Texas.

In 2013, he appeared as Argyle Austero in the revived fourth season of Arrested Development on Netflix.

Personal life

When not performing, he runs an art gallery in Tribeca that features his own work. In Tune's 1997 memoir Footnotes, he writes about what drives him as a performer, choreographer and director, offers stories about being openly gay in the world of theatre, his partners David Wolfe and Michael Stuart, about his days with Twiggy in My One and Only and meeting and working with his many idols.

Before leaving Texas in the 1960s for a Broadway career in New York, Tune worked with Mary Highsmith, mother of crime novelist Patricia Highsmith, at the Point Summer Theatre. In a letter to her daughter, Highsmith referred to Tune as her "adopted boy" whom she called "Romano." Tune later praised Highsmith for helping him develop his talents: "She was an opening for me; she opened a little bit of my tight fabric so that I might peer through."

Stage productions

• A Joyful Noise (1966) (performer)
• How Now, Dow Jones (1967) (performer)
• Seesaw (1973) (performer, associate choreographer)
• A Day in Hollywood / A Night in the Ukraine (1980) (director, choreographer)
• Nine (1982) (director)
• My One and Only (1983) (performer, choreographer)
• Stepping Out (1987) (director)
• Grand Hotel (1989) (director, choreographer)
• The Will Rogers Follies (1991) (director, choreographer)
• Tommy Tune Tonite! (1992) (performer)
• Bye Bye Birdie (1992) touring production (performer)
• The Best Little Whorehouse Goes Public (1994) (director, choreographer)
• Grease (1994 revival) (production supervisor)
• Turn of the Century (2008) Chicago (director)

Awards and nominations

Awards

• 1974 Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical - Seesaw
• 1978 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Musical - The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
• 1980 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Choreography - A Day in Hollywood / A Night in the Ukraine
• 1980 Tony Award for Best Choreography - A Day in Hollywood / A Night in the Ukraine
• 1982 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Musical - Nine
• 1982 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Play - Cloud Nine
• 1982 Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical - Nine
• 1983 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Choreography - My One And Only
• 1983 Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical - My One And Only
• 1983 Tony Award for Best Choreography - My One And Only
• 1990 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Choreography - Grand Hotel
• 1990 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Musical - Grand Hotel
• 1990 Tony Award for Best Choreography - Grand Hotel
• 1990 Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical - Grand Hotel
• 1991 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Choreography - The Will Rogers Follies
• 1991 Tony Award for Best Choreography - The Will Rogers Follies
• 1991 Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical - The Will Rogers Follies
• 2003 National Medal of Arts
• 2003 Texas Cultural Trust's Texas Medal of Arts.
• 2008 Fred & Adele Astaire Lifetime Achievement Award
• 2008 Actors' Fund of America Julie Harris Lifetime Achievement Award
• 2009 Inducted into the National Museum of Dance's Mr. & Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney Hall of Fame

Nominations

• 1977 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Musical - The Club
• 1978 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Choreography - The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
• 1979 Tony Award for Best Choreography - The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
• 1979 Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical - The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
• 1980 Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical - A Day in Hollywood / A Night in the Ukraine
• 1983 Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical - My One And Only
• 2003 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Choreography - Tommy Tune: White Tie and Tails