The multi-faceted actor/singer/composer/director John Rubinstein was born in Los Angeles in 1946, the same year his father, the internationally renown Polish concert pianist Artur Rubinstein, became an American citizen. John naturally gravitated toward a career in music. Slim and sensitive-looking, he attended UCLA before making his 1972 Broadway debut as the baby-faced, curly-haired title role in ...
show all The multi-faceted actor/singer/composer/director John Rubinstein was born in Los Angeles in 1946, the same year his father, the internationally renown Polish concert pianist Artur Rubinstein, became an American citizen. John naturally gravitated toward a career in music. Slim and sensitive-looking, he attended UCLA before making his 1972 Broadway debut as the baby-faced, curly-haired title role in the popular musical "Pippin" for which he received a Theater World Award. As a composer he put the film scores of Robert Redford 's "The Candidate (1972)" and "Jeremiah Johnson (1972)" together, and got off to an OK start on-camera in the movies "Getting Straight (1970)" and "Zachariah (1971)" (title role). Though he never achieved out-and-out stardom, John biggest claim to fame would occur on Broadway later in the 1970s when he starred in "Children of a Lesser God,", which won him the Tony, Drama Desk and L.A. Drama Critics Circle Awards. A bigger movie marquee name, William Hurt , would reenact his role when the play transferred to film. Other Big Apple appearances would include "Fools", "The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial" (Drama Desk nomination), "Hurlyburly", and "M. Butterfly", and he originated the male counterpart in the popular two-person play "Love Letters" in 1989. As he matured, John grew into stronger corporate roles, some deceptively cunning and decisively slick, notably on TV, wherein he essayed the role of MGM mogul Irving Thalberg in the mini-movie "Silent Lovers, The (1980) (TV)". He won an Emmy Award nomination for his recurring ex-husband role on the popular drama series _"Family" (1976/III) (qv), for which is was also responsible for the music. John went on to compose, orchestrate and conduct the scores to over 50 TV shows and mini-movies. A prolific stage and TV director notwithstanding, he co-helmed the L.A. revival of Elmer Rice's Counsellor-At-Law, in which he also played the title role, as well as a number of established musicals including "Into the Woods" and "A Little Night Music." He has directed TV episodes of "Nash Bridges" (1996)" and "High Tide" (1994)", among others and in recent years, has appeared in fine stage form in "Ragtime" and "Enigmatic Variations.". Married twice, John has four children.
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