Kitty Carlisle Hart
Actress and singer Kitty Carlisle Hart was honored for her tireless crusade for funding for the arts when the New York State Theater in Albany was named after her. Raised in Europe by a mother who hoped to marry her into the nobility, Hart studied at the Sorbonne and the London School of Economics as well as the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. After returning to America in 1932, she began performing on both stage and screen, including the American premiere of The Rape of Lucrecia and the Marx Brothers movie A Night at the Opera. She married playwright Moss Hart in 1946. In 1967 she branched out into opera, performing in Die Fledermaus at the Metropolitan Opera. From 1956 until 2000, she was a regular panelist on the game show To Tell the Truth, and played herself on a reenactment of the show in the 2002 movie Catch Me If You Can. She also served on the New York State Council of the Arts from 1976–1996. Her last role was in the play Wit and Wisdom in 2003, 70 years after her debut.