Richard Cray

Richard Cray (born 1958) is an American actor and singer from Kinston, North Carolina. As a teenager, he was selected to participate in the Governor's School of North Carolina, a program for gifted students that was the first of its kind in the United States. He went on to receive formal training at the North Carolina School of the Arts and the Indiana University School of Music, where he studied voice with Walter Cassel, a 25-year veteran of the Metropolitan Opera. At Indiana University he also studied vocal jazz with Eileen Farrell and coached lieder with John Wustman. His operatic training encompassed roles including Count Almaviva in Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro, Papageno in Mozart's The Magic Flute, and Escamillo in Bizet's Carmen.

Cray began singing at age nine. Possessing a true boy soprano voice, he appeared in more than twenty plays, concerts, and musicals before the age of twelve, among them a co-starring role as Patrick Dennis alongside Broadway actress Denise Lor in Mame. Following his formal education, he spent a year performing as a solo artist aboard the Royal Viking Star, with ports of call that included Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Bangkok, Bali, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing, Japan, Hawaii, and South America.

Cray made his Broadway debut in 1985 in the New York Shakespeare Festival's Tony Award-winning production of The Mystery of Edwin Drood at the Imperial Theatre. He was cast by writer Rupert Holmes and director Wilford Leach, and placed into the show by Rob Marshall, who served as assistant to choreographer Graciela Daniele. Shortly after his Broadway debut, Cray appeared off-Broadway opposite George Hearn and Rob Morrow in the musical adaptation of Chaim Potok's novel The Chosen. During his first year in New York he also performed with Harbor Lights, a vocal quartet that opened for headliners in the Catskills. In New York, Cray studied acting at HB Studios and with John Hirsch and Sanford Meisner, with Andrew Cooke serving as his vocal coach.

Additional stage credits include Windy City at the Paper Mill Playhouse, a new musical workshop recording for Sheldon Harnick, and the role of Billy Bigelow opposite Rebecca Luker as Julie in the Lake George Opera Festival production of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Carousel. He also performed the role of the Wazir in the Long Leaf Opera Company's production of Kismet in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. In 2003, Cray starred in the title role of Maury Yeston's Phantom, directed by John Langs, in the MAPA/Maui Civic Light Opera production at the Maui Arts and Cultural Center Castle Theater. Most recently, in 2024, he performed the lead role of Don Quixote/Miguel de Cervantes in the Maui Academy of Performing Arts production of Man of La Mancha, opposite Amy Hānaialiʻi Gilliom as Aldonza/Dulcinea, directed by David C. Johnston at the same venue.

Cray's work has extended beyond the stage into emerging performance technology. In the summer of 1993, he performed as Dynamation Man at the Tomorrows Realities Gallery during the annual SIGGRAPH convention in Anaheim, California, in what was described as the first live operatic performance in digital real-time computer-generated animation, using a full upper-body Waldo and data glove with a single performing vocal artist interfaced with an animated character. That project led to a collaboration with composer Steven Bowen on a seven-minute animated musical story featuring three computer-generated characters — Pirate King, Reggae Man, and the Sunny Boy — which received coverage on CNN and in Computer Graphics World Magazine. Cray also founded the Performance Animation Society, a special interest group serving performing and creative professionals working in performance capture technology. His concert work includes a solo appearance with the San Diego Symphony in a celebration of Cole Porter's 100th birthday, conducted by Jack Everly, a guest appearance at the Crystal Cathedral, and participation in the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra's musical recording for the science fiction film Things to Come.