Providing a special Broadway-themed sparkler for Independence Day 2017, Laura Osnes, co-star of the Broadway musical Bandstand, will be a featured performer on the 37th edition of A Capitol Fourth, the annual televised celebration of the Fourth of July on PBS.
Osnes who’s been nominated twice for Tony Awards, in Bonnie and Clyde and Rodgers + Hammerstein’s Cinderella. is scheduled to sing a medley of patriotic music including George M. Cohan’s showtunes “You’re a Grand Old Flag“ and and “The Yankee Doodle Boy” (a.k.a. “Yankee Doodle Dandy.”). She will also perform “This is My Country.”
The show will be hosted by Broadway and TV actor John Stamos (Bye Bye Birdie, Gore Vidal’s The Best Man) and will include performances by The Blue Brothers, The Beach Boys, Mark McGrath, Kellie Pickler, The Four Tops, Chris Blue, and the National Symphony Orchestra. Sofia Carson will sing “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
A Capitol Fourth will be broadcast live 8–9:30 PM (ET) July 4 from the West Lawn of the U.S. Capitol in Washington D.C. The show will be broadcast live over National Public Radio stations worldwide, live-streamed online on Facebook Live and PBS.org/a-capitol-fourth, and will be available as Video on Demand July 4–18.
Osnes has played starring roles in Grease as Sandy, South Pacific as Nellie Forbush, Anything Goes as Hope Horcourt, Bonnie and Clyde as Bonnie Parker, and in the title role of Rodgers + Hammerstein’s Cinderella. She currently stars in Bandstand at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre.
Osnes has been a special guest performer on Playbill’s Broadway on the High Seas cruises. Cabins are available for Playbill’s Rhine River cruise in August 2017, featuring Seth Rudetsky, Andréa Burns, Faith Prince, Terrence Mann, Charlotte d’Amboise, and Santino Fontana. Playbill Travel is now also booking Broadway on the Danube River with Michael Feinstein for November 2017, also featuring Carmen Cusack, Julia Murney, Christopher Fitzgerald, Marc Kudisch, Christopher Sieber, Brandon Uranowitz, and Rudetsky, as well as other exciting talent to be announced. Visit PlaybillTravel.com for booking and information.
