Lara Teeter

Lara Teeter, born February 3, 1955, in Guthrie, Oklahoma, is an American dancer, actor, singer, theater director, and college professor whose Broadway career spanned from 1980 to 1998. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Oklahoma City University before embarking on a professional career that would encompass Broadway, opera, regional theater, recording, and academia.

Teeter made his Broadway debut in the 1980 musical Happy New Year, a production that closed after a short run. His second Broadway appearance came in 1982 with Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, a stage adaptation that lasted only five performances. His third Broadway credit, however, brought him significant recognition: the 1983 revival of On Your Toes, in which he played "The Hoofer" and "Junior," roles originally performed by Ray Bolger in the show's 1936 premiere. The production ran for 505 performances and earned Teeter a Tony Award nomination for Best Featured Actor in a Musical, as well as the 1983 Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Debut Performance. Additional Broadway credits include The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas and a chorus role in The Pirates of Penzance.

Beyond Broadway, Teeter accumulated an extensive list of credits in opera, touring productions, and regional theater. He appeared with the New York City Opera in 1979 as "Private Silas Slick" in Naughty Marietta and performed the role of "Herman" in The Most Happy Fella at Lincoln Center in 1991. In 1998, he played the Scarecrow in a New York production of The Wizard of Oz, a cast recording of which received a Grammy Award nomination. He portrayed Henry Higgins in a Lerner and Loewe tribute at Carnegie Hall in 2000 and made his Lyric Opera of Chicago debut in 2001 as Steve Sankey in Street Scene. National touring credits include Oklahoma! and The Wizard of Oz, while other notable stage work includes She Loves Me as Kodaly at the Ahmanson Theatre in 1987, My Fair Lady as Henry Higgins at the North Shore Music Theatre in Beverly, Massachusetts in 1999, Little Shop of Horrors, The Robber Bridegroom, and Follies in 2005 as "Buddy."

Teeter has maintained a long association with the St. Louis Municipal Opera Theatre, known as The Muny, performing in numerous productions there, including the role of Don in Singin' in the Rain in 1995 and "Scuttle" in The Little Mermaid in 2011, the latter production in which his daughter Elizabeth appeared as "Flounder." His regional directing work includes My Fair Lady for Opera Pacific in 1989, The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas for the Fullerton Civic Light Opera in 1994, Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris at the Hollywood Cinegrill, and multiple productions of The Pirates of Penzance at the San Bernardino Civic Light Opera and Light Opera Works of Chicago in 2002. Beginning in August 1999, Teeter served as artistic director of Light Opera Works in Evanston, Illinois, where he directed productions including The Gondoliers in 2000, Ragtime in 2003, and Candide in 2004.

His recordings include the 1983 Broadway Revival Cast recording of On Your Toes, the 1992 studio cast recording of Lady, Be Good! on Roxbury Recordings, the 1997 compilation The Musicality of Rodgers & Hart, and the Grammy-nominated 1998 cast recording of The Wizard of Oz.

Teeter has held academic positions at California State University, Fullerton, where he was an associate professor in the theatre and dance department and helped establish a pilot BFA program in Musical Theatre, as well as at Northwestern University and Shenandoah University. Since 2007 he has been a faculty member at the Conservatory of Theatre Arts at Webster University in St. Louis, Missouri, serving as associate professor of theatre and head of musical theatre. He and his wife Kristen, a dancer and teacher of jazz and contemporary dance, were married in 1998 at a Sonoma Valley winery, with cast members from The Wizard of Oz tour in attendance. They have four children.