Tuesday, December 21, 2004

Famous Relatives? Me? Nawww....

Ok, I have to blog this. For several years now I had heard that my grandpa's sister's daughter was some kind of a movie actress, but not having seen her name or any of the movies she had been in, I really didn't think much about it anymore. Well, I was in KC last weekend, and my Aunt Diane had found an old home video of a bunch of B-day parties and Christmases from waaaay bcak (from 12 years ago). At the end of the tape was a recording of an Oprah Winfrey show on which my cousin appeared. Turns out, she was April O'Neill on Broadway w/ the TMNT. Anyway, last night I did some more thorough web searching and found out that my cousin was much more of a Broadway star than movies. She has been in The Almost Perfect Bank Robbery (1999), and Marci X (2002 w/Lisa Kudrow), but I guess her theatre performances are more noteworthy. She was Amneris in the show Aida from 2000 to 2004, and she has performed in several othe musicals , such as Grease, as well. Here is some more info:
http://www.broadway.com/gen/Buzz_Star_File.aspx?CI=40824 (sorry, but stupid link shortcut thingy didn't work). Michelle also sent me two songs from the Original Cast Recording for Aida that have Sherie on them. Thanx to Mitch!
Now for the kicker.
I called my Aunt Pauline, who is the resident family tree expert, because I didn't remember if Sherie's mom was my grandma or grandpa's sister. Well, she also told me someone else in my family tree is famous. For those 80's rock fans out there, you may know of Gary Richrath, a founding member and lead gutarist for REO Speedwagon fom 1971 to 1988? Believe it, he is a cousin of mine as well.
Anyway, I was so excited to find out somebody from my family is actually cool that I couldn't hold back.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I learned some things watching that video, too. :)