Les Misérables

Alain Boublil conceived the musicals, La Révolution Française (the first-ever staged French rock opera) and Les Misérables. He is the author of the librettos and original lyrics for those works as well as for Miss Saigon, Martin Guerre and The Pirate Queen, all in collaboration with lifelong creative partner, composer Claude-Michel Schönberg.  He also co-produced with Claude-Michel the original cast albums of all his shows. He co-wrote the screenplay of the Golden Globe-winning and Oscar nominated film Les Misérables. He is the author/lyricist of Abbacadabra, a fairytale musical including ABBA classic songs, of the stage adaptation of the Demy / Legrand film, Les Demoiselles de Rochefort, as well as author of the musical play, Manhattan Parisienne, and the play, The Diary of Adam and Eve, which Alain is rewriting as a musical, scored by Maxime Pretends.

His many awards include two Tonys, two Grammys, two Victoire de la Musique and two Molière Awards for Les Misérables (1991 and 2025) as well as an Evening Standard Drama Award for Miss Saigon, an Olivier Award for Martin Guerre and a New York Chapter Honors Grammy for his outstanding contribution to the creative community. He received a Best Song Oscar nomination for Suddenly from the movie version of Les Misérables.

The re-creation of Les Misérables in Paris at the end of 2024 in a new French production created the opportunity for Alain to re-write and fine-tune parts of the original French lyrics which he had not looked into for 30 years. Alain and Claude-Michel, in recognition of this new French production, completed a book of reminiscences of their amazing 50-year collaboration and friendship, published in October 2024 in France and entitled J’avais rêvé…

Alain devised the Do You Hear The People Sing? concerts, a symphonic promenade through Boublil and Schönberg musical history and creative process, which regularly plays at major venues around the world including Carnegie Hall as honorees of the New York Pops 33^rd Birthday Gala and, most recently, for an unforgettable starry night at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles.

He is long married to singer, actress and director Marie Zamora, the Paris Cosette of 1991, and is the father of four sons.  Alain was nominated on 14 July 2024 to the Légion d’Honneur in France in recognition of his service to the arts in the world.

Born in 1944 to Hungarian parents, Claude-Michel Schönberg began his career in France as a singer, writer and producer of pop songs.

In collaboration with Alain Boublil, he is the book co-writer and the composer of La Révolution Française, Les Misérables, Miss Saigon, Martin Guerre and The Pirate Queen. In 2008, his musical Marguerite, in collaboration with Alain Boublil, Michel Legrand and Herbert Kretzmer, opened at the Haymarket Theatre in London.

Schönberg has supervised overseas productions and co-produced several international cast albums of his shows. In 2001, he composed his first ballet score, Wuthering Heights, which was created by the Northern Ballet in 2002. His ballet Cleopatra, which opened in 2011, was his second collaboration with David Nixon and his seventh complete score.  In 2012, Schönberg co-wrote the screenplay and reconceived the music for the Les Misérables musical movie.

His shows have won many awards over the years, most recently the WhatsonStage audience awards for Best West End Show and Best Musical Revival for the London production of Miss Saigon.  Golden Globe winner, Oscar nominee and Grammy Award winner for his outstanding contribution to the creative community, Schönberg and Alain Boublil were honoured at a New York Pops gala concert in Carnegie Hall celebrating their 40-year collaboration.

Schönberg was appointed Visiting Professor of Contemporary Theatre at St. Catherine’s College, Oxford University and is now an Emeritus Fellow. He is an Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Music where he is a guest Professor. Schönberg married the English ballerina, Charlotte Talbot, in 2003.  He is the father of one son and two daughters.

Herbert Kretzmer was born in South Africa, where he began a career in journalism writing the commentary for a weekly cinema newsreel. He came to live in London in 1954, and pursued twin careers as newspaperman and songwriter. He was feature writer on The Daily Sketch and a profile writer on The Sunday Despatch. He joined The Daily Express in 1960 and later became its drama critic, a post he held for 18 years, covering about 3,000 first nights. From 1979 to 1987, he wrote television criticism for The Daily Mail, winning, in this capacity, two national press awards. As a lyric writer he wrote weekly songs for That Was The Week That Was and the later Ned Sherrin television shows. He won an Ivor Novello Award for the Peter Sellers/Sophia Loren comedy song  Goodness Gracious Me . Other award-winning songs include two written with, and for, Charles Aznavour:  Yesterday When I Was Young and the chart-topping  She . Herbert Kretzmer wrote the book and lyrics for the West End musical Our Man Crichton, which starred Kenneth More and Millicent Martin, and the lyrics for The Four Musketeers, which ran for over a year at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, starring Harry Secombe as D Artagnan. He also supplied the lyrics for the Anthony Newley musical film Can Heironymous Merkin Ever Forget Mercy Humppe and Find True Happiness? He was the co-lyricist for Kristina which he wrote with Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson (ABBA), premiered at Carnegie Hall, New York, in September 2009. Herbert Kretzmer s latest work is Marguerite, written with Michel Legrand, Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg.

Jerry Lee is Sierra Rep’s Artistic Director. He’s appeared in the SRT productions of Misery, Sunday in the Park with George, Elf The Musical, Shrek The Musical, Camelot, Cabaret, Route 66, Intimate Apparel, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Man of La Mancha, Rodgers & Hammerstein’s State Fair, and The Drowsy Chaperone. As an actor: I Love You…Change, Forbidden Broadway (California Musical Theatre); Life Could Be a Dream, A Christmas Carol (CenterREP); A Little Princess, The Fantasticks (Sacramento Theatre Company); West Side Story (Mountain Play); Orlando, An Iliad, A Tale of Two Cities (SacImpulse Theatre). As a soloist: Rodgers and Hammerstein Celebration (Sacramento Choral Society); Billy Bigelow in Carousel in Concert (Sacramento Philharmonic). As a director: HAIR, Little Shop of Horrors, Mean Girls JR., Sh-Boom! A Christmas Miracle (World Premiere), Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella, Twelfth Night, Jersey Boys, Clue, Disney’s Winnie the Pooh KIDS, Elvis The Musical (West Coast Premiere), Dogfight, Disney’s The Little Mermaid, Steel Magnolias, Roald Dahl’s Willy Wonka KIDS, I Love You…Change, The Wizard of Oz, Holiday Jukebox, Irving Berlin’s White Christmas, The Robber Bridegroom (SRT); I Love You…Change (STC). Lee began his association with Sierra Rep in 2010 when he stepped in as a replacement in Guys and Dolls.

In 2019, Lee created SRT in Schools, a touring program that brings live professional theatre to Tuolumne County schools at no cost to the schools, students, or their families. In 2023, the program branched out to include Stanislaus and Calaveras counties.