A musical theater actress who parlayed her stage stardom into film, television, and recording, Annaleigh Ashford first made an impression on Broadway in 2007, a year when she originated the starring role of Margot in the Broadway musical adaptation of the Reese Witherspoon blockbuster Legally Blonde, and had a stint playing Glinda in Wicked on Broadway. From there, Ashford worked constantly, earning her first Tony nomination for Lauren in Kinky Boots and winning the award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for her appearance in the revival of You Can't Take It with You in 2014. On the heels of the honor, Ashford branched out, releasing Lost in the Stars: Live at 54 Below in 2015, then starring in American Crime Story: Impeachment and the sitcom B Positive. Ashford remained a Broadway star, receiving another Tony nomination for starring as Mrs. Lovett in the 2023 production of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. A native of Denver, Colorado, Annaleigh Amanda Swanson was born on June 25, 1985. She started performing at a young age, taking dance lessons and acting in local productions. When she was nine, she got her big break when she was cast in a Denver production of Ruthless! The Musical. She acted regularly throughout her teens, heading to Marymount Manhattan College after graduating from Wheat Ridge High School when she was 16. While at Marymount, Swanson appeared as Rosa Bud in The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Rupert Holmes, the play's author, suggested that she use her mother's maiden name Ashford as her surname, advice she took to heart. During the mid-2000s, Ashford frequently appeared as a dancer at the Lady Starlight's English Disco parties and continued to act in and out of school as well. After her graduation, Ashford was cast as Pfanne in the First National Tour of Wicked; she also was an understudy for the lead role of Glinda. Once that stint wrapped up in 2006, she was cast as Margot in Legally Blonde: The Musical, appearing on the show's accompanying cast recording. After Legally Blonde: The Musical, Ashford played Glinda on Wicked on Broadway and in a Chicago production in 2008, the same year she received small parts in Jonathan Demme's Rachel Getting Married and Sex and the City: The Movie. After appearing in the 2010 Broadway revival of Hair, she directed a concert for her castmate Jay Armstrong Johnson, then appeared as Veronica Sawyer in a musical adaptation of the black comedy Heathers. Ashford spent 2012 in Off-Broadway stagings of Rent and Dogfight, then landed a breakthrough role as Lauren in Kinky Boots, a musical by Cyndi Lauper and Harvey Fierstein. Kinky Boots snagged Ashford a Tony nomination for Best Featured Actress in a Musical and helped her get a recurring part on Showtime's series Masters of Sex, as well as a minor voice role in the Disney blockbuster Frozen. In 2014, just prior to finishing her run in Kinky Boots, Ashford released her debut single, "Another Time (Andrew's Song)." By the end of the year, she'd appeared in the acclaimed Broadway revival of You Can't Take It with You, winning the Tony for Best Featured Actress in a Play for her performance. On the heels of her win, Ashford released Lost in the Stars: Live at 54 Below, her first album, in 2015; that year, she also played the titular character in the Broadway production Sylvia. Ashford co-starred alongside Jake Gyllenhaal in a 2016 revival of Sunday in the Park with George, which was staged first at the New York City Center then spent ten weeks on Broadway in 2017. Late in 2016, she played Columbia as part of Fox's live television staging of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, which also featured Laverne Cox as Dr. Frank N Furter. Ashford spent the first part of 2017 in the Shakespeare in the Park staging of A Midsummer Night's Dream, then filmed roles in Woody Allen's A Rainy Day in New York and the Ryan Murphy mini-series The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story. Further film and television work came in 2018, including an appearance in Jennifer Lopez's Second Act and a pilot for a sitcom called Southern Hospitality; the latter show was not picked up. Between 2020 and 2021, she was a lead on the CBS sitcom B Positive, for which she also sang the theme song. Two prominent limited series -- American Crime Story: Impeachment, where she played Paula Jones, and Welcome to Chippendales -- arrived in the next two years. A revival of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street took Ashford back to Broadway in 2023; she stayed with the production through 2024. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Rovi

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Annaleigh Ashford

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