Audra Mc Donald

Audra McDonald's talent is unparalleled in its breadth and diversity in her roles as a performer, singer as well as an actor. As the winner of an incredible seven Tony Awards (two Grammy Awards) and an Emmy Award, McDonald was named to Time magazine's list for 100 most influential people of 2015. The president also awarded her Barack Obama's National Medal of Arts for her work. She is equally at home in film, television as well as Broadway. Her luminous soprano makes her a natural on the stage. Alongside her theatrical work she is also a prominent performer as a concert and recording artist who performs regularly at most prestigious venues in the world. McDonald, who was born in Fresno California to a music family, began her training in classical singing at New York's Juilliard School. She was awarded her initial Tony Award in 1994 for the most outstanding performance by an Actress in a musical called Carousel in the Lincoln Center Theater. The following four years, she won two additional Tony Awards for the category of a featured actress. She was in Broadway premieres Terrence McNally's musical Ragtime as well as Terrence McNally's production of Master Class in 1996. This was an incredible amount of three Tony Awards by the time she reached the age of 30. In 2004, she won her fourth Tony by starring in A Raisin in the Sun with Sean Diddy Combs. Then in 2013, she brought her fifth Tony, and also her first award in the Leading actress category. In her role as the Tony Awards' most decorated performer, she had the chance to make Broadway historical records when she won her sixth Tony Award for the role of Billie Holiday as Lady Day at Emerson's Bar & Grill. This part also gave her the opportunity to make the Olivier Award nominee 2017 London West End debut. Not only did she set the record for most wins in an award-giving area by an actor she was also the first person ever to receive awards in the four acting categories. McDonald has also appeared in The Secret Garden (1993), Marie Christine (1999), Henry IV (2004) as well as 110 In The Shade (2007 Twelfth night (2009) and the musical Shuffle Along: the Making of the Musical Shock of 1921 and All That Followed (2016). She was the first to make her Public Theater Shakespeare in the Park debut on Twelfth night (2009). McDonald was first seen on TV as a character actor in the Peabody Award winner CBS series Having Our Say - The Delany Sisters' First 100 Years. The actress then starred with Kathy Bates and Victor Garber in the lauded 1999 remake by ABC and Disney of Annie and, in 2000, played a regular role on the NBC's hit show Law & Order Special Victims Unit. McDonald, who was awarded an Emmy Award nomination for 1999 for her performance as a character in an HBO adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play Wit directed and starring Emma Thompson, returned with the company in 2003 to star in the political drama Mister Sterling. The film was written and produced by Emmy Award-winning Lawrence O'Donnell Jr. The Bedford Diaries, a WB television series that debuted in 2006. Then she had an recurring role on NBC's Kidnapped during the following year. McDonald's character in HBO film Lady Day At Emerson Bar and Grill earned her four times an Emmy nomination in the year 2016. The following year, McDonald starred alongside Taylor Schilling and Steven Pasquale as part of The Bite, a pandemic film produced by Spectrum Originals and CBS Studios. Having first appeared in the role of U.S. attorney Liz Lawrence in 2009 on CBS's medical drama The Good Wife in 2018 McDonald took on the character (now known as Liz Reddick) as a season regular of The Good Fight on Paramount+ receiving 3 Critics Choice Award nominations for her performance. The actress also appeared on Julian Fellowes historical drama The Gilded Age.