The Greatest Star, written by Rene" Jordan and published in 1975, is a biography of Barbra Streisand. Barbra was born on April 24, 1942, in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. She was the first person to have won every major award: the Oscar, the Tony, the Emmy, and the Grammy. She is truly a phenomenon.
The filmmaker/entertainer was born to Diana and Emanuel Streisand. Her father passed away when Barbra was 15 months old from a cerebral hemorrhage. He was only thirty-four. Barbra experienced her first love and loss. Because her mother was deeply saddened and depressed, she unknowingly neglected her young daughter. She sometimes went without food and had to entertain herself with paper dolls. Later on, her mother married Louis Kind, who gave them a messy and abusive life. Barbra's stepfather abused her and her mother. Sometimes he would beat them as he was watching fights on television. .
As a child, Barbra attended Beis Yakov School, a Jewish school in Brooklyn. She also attended Erasmus High School in Brooklyn as an honors student.
The teenage Streisand plunged, unassisted and without encouragement into show business by winning a singing contest at a small, Manhattan club called The Lion. When she began realizing that people really liked her, it gave her encouragement to begin venturing to bigger clubs, which began hiring her. Soon she was attracting music industry attention at such spots as the Bon Soir and the Blue Angel.
The career of Barbra Streisand has been paved with bold, creative achievements and highlighted by a series of firsts. The Prince of Tides was the first motion picture directed by a female star ever to receive a Best Director nomination from the Directors Guild of America, as well as seven Academy Award nominations. Barbra Streisand produced the heralded drama, in addition to directing and starring in it. For her very first Broadway appearance in I Can Get It For You Wholesale, she won the New York Drama Critics Award and received a Tony nomination.
