The 2010-2011 Annenberg Theater season will resume again with the Opening Night Benefit Concert starring international recording star Petula Clark! - 11.06.10 6:00 PM

Petula Clark is an internationally famous singer, actress, and composer whose career has spanned seven decades. She has sold well in excess of 68 million records and recorded more than 1,000 songs.  She has appeared in more than 30 British and American films and is known for her best-selling songs, Downtown, Don’t Sleep in the Subway, This is My Song and I Couldn’t Live Without Your Love.

Clark’s career started in World War II when as a child she entertained the troops on radio and in concert and became known as the British "Shirley Temple." She was even given the honor of performing at the victory celebration at Trafalgar Square. In the early sixties, she reinvented herself as a French chanteuse, even rivaling the legendary Piaf.  Urged by her friends in Britain to record something in English, she recorded Downtown which skyrocketed to number 1 in the United States, launching her American career and earning her a Grammy in 1964. She quickly followed with I Know A Place which went to number 3 and earned Petula her second Grammy in 1965. Numerous top 40 hits followed. All told, she has had 15 top 40 hits in the USA (two #1 hits).

She has starred in two Hollywood musicals (Finian's Rainbow and Goodbye Mr. Chips) and has made numerous TV appearances both as a guest star and as the host of two popular variety series for British television, as well as three of her own American TV specials. She also continued a highly successful concert career, beginning with a sellout season at the Copacabana in 1966, at Caesar's Palace in Vegas and at the Cocoanut Grove in Los Angeles before a star-studded audience that included Barbra Streisand and Frank Sinatra.

In the seventies she gave a series of concerts in France and Canada, made appearances on European TV, hosted two more popular variety series in England (for which she was awarded "Most Popular TV Star" by the TV Times) and continued to be a much sought after guest star on American television.  In the eighties she found fame as a country recording star with her top-10 hit Natural Love, before starting her highly successful stage career in London's West End, beginning with the role of “Maria” in The Sound of Music and continuing with the production of her own musical Someone Like You, for which she wrote the music. She made her Broadway debut, starring opposite David and Shaun Cassidy in the highly successful production of Blood Brothers followed by a well-received American tour of the same production. In 1998 Petula returned to England, where she was presented with a prestigious CBE by her Majesty the Queen of England, in honor of her legendary career.  In 2000, she took to the stage again in Andrew Lloyd Webber's Sunset Boulevard, in the starring role of “Norma Desmond,” a role she has now played more than any other actress to date. After appearing at the Adelphi Theatre in London's West End she embarked on a national tour of most major cities in the U.S. with the musical.

For tickets for this special benefit performance, contact the museum’s Box Office at 760.325.4490.