Robert Rounseville

b. Robert Field Rounseville, 25 March 1914, Attleboro, Massachusetts, USA, d. 6 August 1974, New York City, New York, USA. After training as an operatic tenor, Rounseville sang in the chorus or played small roles in a succession of Broadway productions, several of which were hits: Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart's Babes In Arms (1937), Kurt Weill and Maxwell Anderson's Knickerbocker Holiday (1938), and Rodgers and Hart's Higher And Higher (1940). In the early 50s he appeared as Hoffman in the British film production of Jacques Offenbach's The Tales Of Hoffman (1951), in which he co-starred with Moira Shearer, and he sang the role of Count Danilo on a Columbia Records studio recording of The Merry Widow, with Dorothy Kirsten in the title role. In 1952 Rounseville was in a Broadway season of operettas by W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan. Alongside his successful Broadway career, Rounseville frequently played with touring companies and also sang operatic roles, including appearing in a production in the mid-50s of Italo Montemezzi's masterpiece, L'Amore Dei Tre Re (The Love Of Three Kings), staged in New Orleans and which also starred Kirsten. In 1956 Rounseville took the role of Mr. Enoch Snow in the film version of Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II's Carousel. He then returned to Broadway to play the title role in Leonard Bernstein and John Latouche's Candide (1956), and the following year was in a brief revival of Brigadoon. On television, Rounseville was in the NBC Opera Theatre presentation of Francis Poulenc's Dialogues Of The Carmelites (1957) and he played Nanki-Poo in Bell Telephone Hour's The Mikado (1960). The producer of this star-studded performance was Gilbert and Sullivan veteran Martyn Green and the cast also included Stanley Holloway, Dennis King, Groucho Marx, Barbara Meister and Helen Traubel. In the 60s Rounseville played Padre Perez in Joe Darion and Mitch Leigh's Broadway success, Man Of La Mancha (1965), returning for the show's 1972 revival.
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