Broadway is mourning this week one of its most iconic singers, Chita Rivera, whose death at the age of 91 has just been confirmed by her daughter in a press release.
“I wouldn’t trade my life in the theater for anything in the world, because theater is life“she declared in 2018 during the ceremony of Tony Awards during which he was given a special prize to honor his entire career. Chita Rivera could not do without singing or dancing. She finally passed away January 30, 2024at the age of 91 years old, according to a press release signed by his daughter Lisa Mordente. The child of the iconic figure of Broadway specifies that she leaves us following a “brief illness” the origin or extent of which it does not reveal.
Chita Rivera was born on January 23, 1933 in Washington, where she quickly aspired to a career working on singing, piano and ballet, before passing auditions during which she stood out for her Hispanic originscompared to other blonde and slender women. “And there I was, little, dark-skinned, in a black skirt and a leotard, with a nose that looked like nothing”she recalled for the purposes of her autobiography published in 2023.
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60 years of career and a shower of distinctions
Chita Rivera made her theater debut in 1950 in comedy Guys and Dolls, as a replacement dancer. After landing several roles as the titular character, she finally made it to the casting of West Side Storylanding the role of Anita for the performances of the musical at the Winter Garden Theater in 1957. Without knowing it, the artist, aged just over 20 at the time, had just laid the foundations for a great career which saw him glow until he was 80 years old. “I wouldn’t know what to do if I didn’t move, or tell a story, or sing a song. That’s the spirit of my life, and I’m really lucky to be able to do what I love.even at this time of my life”she was keen to emphasize in 2015 at theAssociated Press.
After West Side StoryChita Rivera has had a string of successes like Chicago (1975), in the skin of the heroine Velma Kelly, and The Rink, nine years later. Her performance allowed her to win a Tony Award against Liza Minnelli with whom she shared the poster. Jumbled together, the artist has played in no less than ten films including the last, Tick tick…Boom! by Lin-Manuel Miranda and starring Andrew Garfield, was released just two years ago. She was also seen in several series at the same time, making her a star of cinema, the small screen and Broadway.
Awarded numerous times during her long career, Chita Rivera had been decorated with the highest civilian honor in the United States in 2009, the Medal of Freedom, from the hands of Barack Obama.
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