Susan Stroman

One of Broadway's brightest lights in the new millennium, innovative choreographer Susan Stroman made a smashing entrance to the directing ranks with the original dance drama "Contact" (which she co-created) and the revival of "The Music Man" both premiering to raves on the Great White Way in the spring of 2000. Receiving four Tony nods for directing and choreographing the two shows, she joined Michael John LaChuisa (who also garnered four nominations that year for the books and scores of "The Wild Party" and "Marie Christine") as the first quadruple honorees since Elizabeth Swados in 1978. Exposed to show tunes by her piano-playing salesman father, Stroman acted in community theater in her home town of Wilmington, Delaware but really got the bug when a touring version of "Seesaw" came to the Wilmington Playhouse with Tommy Tune in clogs leading a chorus line of girls festooned with balloons. Inspired by the combination of a "great love story" and lots of choreography, she moved to New York and toured in the original productions of Bob Fosse's "Chicago" and the revue "Sugar Babies."