Segerstrom's Cabaret Series Opens With Broadway's Leading Lady Betty Buckley

Tony Award-winning Broadway legend Betty Buckley returns to Segerstrom Center for the Arts with her new show, "Story Songs," October 27-29 in the Samueli Theater.

A renowned interpreter with an eclectic taste for songs from all genres, Buckley will share a collection of tunes by Radiohead as well as theater greats Stephen Schwartz and Jason Robert Brown. The evening will also include works by members of the new generation of exciting young theater composers like Joe Iconis. Buckley will be joined by her longtime Musical Director and arranger, jazz pianist Christian Jacob, as well as guitar great Oz Noy, drummer Ray Brinker and bassist Trey Henry.

In an award-winning career that has encompassed TV, film, stage and concert work around the globe, Betty Buckley is probably best known as one of theater's most respected leading ladies. She is an actress/singer whose career spans theater, film, television and concert halls around the world. She was a 2012 Theatre Hall of Fame inductee.

Buckley won a Tony Award for her performance as Grizabella, the Glamour Cat, in Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Cats." She received her second Tony Award nomination for Best Actress in a musical for her performance as Hesione in "Triumph of Love," and an Olivier Award nomination for her critically acclaimed interpretation of Norma Desmond in the London production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Sunset Boulevard," which she repeated to more rave reviews on Broadway.

Her other Broadway credits include "1776," "Pippin," "Song and Dance," "The Mystery of Edwin Drood" and "Carrie." Off-Broadway credits include the world premiere of Horton Foote's "The Old Friends," for which she received a Drama Desk Nomination in 2014, "White's Lies," Lincoln Center's "Elegies," the original NYSF production of "Edwin Drood," "The Eros Trilogy," "Juno's Swans" and "Getting My Act Together and Taking it on the Road."

Regional credits include "The Perfectionist," "Gypsy," "The Threepenny Opera," "Camino Real," "Buffalo Gal," "Arsenic and Old Lace," "The Old Friends" at Houston's Alley Theatre and "Grey Gardens" at the Bay Street Theatre in Sag Harbor, NY and The Ahmanson Theater in Los Angeles.

In London, she starred in "Promises, Promises," receiving a nomination for An Evening Standard Award and in 2013 the British premiere of "Dear World." Buckley just completed shooting the new M. Night Shyamalan film "Split," starring James McAvoy. The film will be released in January 2017.

Her other films include her debut in Brian de Palma's screen version of Stephen King's "Carrie," Bruce Beresford's "Tender Mercies," Roman Polanski's "Frantic," Woody Allen's "Another Woman," Lawrence Kasden's "Wyatt Earp" and M. Night Shyamalan's "The Happening."

On television, Buckley most recently guest starred in the HBO series "The Leftovers" and "Getting On." She appeared in "The Pacific" also for HBO and twice on the Kennedy Center Honors. She also starred for three seasons in the HBO series "Oz" and as Abby Bradford in the hit series "Eight Is Enough." She has appeared as a guest star in numerous television series, miniseries and films for television including "Evergreen," "Roses for the Rich," "Without a Trace," "Law & Order: SVU" and "Pretty Little Liars."

Buckley tours in concert worldwide with her ensemble of musicians and recently was featured in the Royal Albert Hall concert of Follies in celebration of Stephen Sondheim's 85th birthday. She has recorded 16 CDs: most recently "Ghostlight" produced by T Bone Burnett released in 2014.