Actors - Tony Azito

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	Actors - Tony Azito

Tony Azito (July 18, 1948 – May 26, 1995) was an American eccentric dancer and character actor.

Azito was part of Juilliard's famous "Group I," the first students admitted to the drama program administered by John Houseman; his fellow students included Patti LuPone. He soon fell under the influence of choreographer Anna Sokolow and began studying modern dance — although, at six-foot-three (190 cm), Azito was an unusual candidate for dance training. Azito left Juilliard without taking a degree and, as "Antonio Azito," spent two years performing in Sokolow's company.

Returning to drama, he began working in avant-garde off- and off-off-Broadway theater, including multiple shows at LaMama ETC. He made his Broadway debut in Richard Foreman's controversial revival of The Threepenny Opera, in a dancing role ("Samuel") invented just for him. Critics were intrigued by what soon became known as Azito's signature: a dancing style that made him look like a somewhat off-kilter marionette, accompanied by stylized facial expressions. This production also inaugurated Azito's association with Joseph Papp's New York Shakespeare Festival, which continued with another Brecht-Weill musical, Happy End (1977).

Azito's best-known role, however, came in yet a third production for NYSF: as the Sergeant of Police in the pop-rock revival of The Pirates of Penzance, starring Linda Ronstadt and Kevin Kline. His performance earned him a Tony Award nomination and a Drama Desk Award, and he repeated it in the 1983 film version. Azito went on to perform at Radio City Music Hall, the Mark Taper Forum, and in the abortive American National Theater company at Kennedy Center. After playing Feste in the NYSF's production of Twelfth Night (1986), Azito did only one more show in New York City, The Mystery of Edwin Drood.

He continued working in regional theater and occasional films until approximately a year before his death from AIDS.

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