NEW YORK (AP) — Three-time Tony Award-winner Charles Strouse, Broadway’s industrious, grasp melody-maker who composed the music for such basic musical theater hits as “Annie,” “Bye Bye Birdie” and “Applause,” died Thursday. He was 96.
Strouse died at his residence in New York Metropolis, his household stated by the publicity company The Press Room.
In a profession that spanned greater than 50 years, Strouse wrote greater than a dozen Broadway musicals, in addition to movie scores and the tune “Those Were the Days,” the theme tune for the sitcom “All in the Family.”
Strouse turned out such standard — and catchy — present tunes as “Tomorrow,” the optimistic anthem from “Annie,” and the equally cheerful “Put on a Happy Face” from “Bye Bye Birdie,” his first Broadway success.
“I work every day. Activity — it’s a life force,” the New York-born composer instructed The Related Press throughout an interview on the eve of his eightieth birthday in 2008. “When you enjoy doing what you’re doing, which I do very much, I have something to get up for.”
Deep into his 90s, he was visiting excursions of his reveals and assembly casts. Jenn Thompson, who appeared within the first “Annie” as Pepper and directed a touring model of “Annie” in 2024, recollects Strouse coming to auditions and shedding a tear when a younger lady sang “Tomorrow.”
“He was tearing up and he put his hand on mine,” she recalled. “And he leaned in to me and very quietly said, ‘That was you. That used to be you.’ And I thought I would die. I thought my heart would drop out of my shoes.”
She added: “He’s so gorgeously generous and kind. He has always been that way.”
