And LIFE magazine photographers were there. Gjon Mili, such a wonderful documenter of the arts, is responsible for a great many pictures here, but Gordon Parks, George Silk, Bill Ray and many others all took their swings. Their pictures capture artists at work—including actors who would later become familiar faces on television, such as Jerry Orbach (Law & Order). Angela Lansbury (Murder, She Wrote) , Barbara Bel Geddes (Dallas) and Julie Newmar (Batman).

The thrill of theater is, of course, being there. This photos are the next best thing.

Nineteen-year-old Barbra Streisand played Miss Marmelstein in the 1962 Broadway play “I Can Get It For You Wholesale.”

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Barbra Streisand, 1962.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Marlon Brando and Kim Hunter in “A Streetcar Named Desire,” 1947.

Eliot Elisofon / The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Jessica Tandy as Blanche Dubois in Tennessee Williams’ “A Streetcar Named Desire,” 1947.

Eliot Elisofon /The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A 1943 production of “Oklahoma!”

Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Pearl Bailey during a curtain call for the Broadway production of Hello, Dolly! in 1967.

John Dominis/Life Picture Collection/Shuttertstock

Jerry Orbach (left) and an unidentified actress in a scene from the off-Broadway production of ‘Scuba Duba,’ October 1967.

Ralph Morse/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Angela Lansbury opened on Broadway in “Mame” to a standing ovation, 1966.

Bill Ray/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A 1953 production of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, featuring Madeline Sherwood (rear, second from left), Arthur Kennedy (right) and Walter Hampden (second from right).

Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Paul Newman (left) and Geraldine Page in the Tennessee Williams play Sweet Bird of Youth, 1959.

Gordon Parks/Life PIcture Collection/Shutterstock

Sidney Poitier on the set of Porgy and Bess, 1959.

Gjon Mili Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Sidney Poitier in a scene from “Porgy and Bess,” 1959.

Gjon Mili The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.

Gjon Mili The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

ason Robards Jr. (L) and Farrell Pelly (R) in a scene from the Eugene O’Neill play “The Iceman Cometh,” 1956.

Gordon Parks/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Mary Martin and her fellow cast members soared in the 1954 Broadway production of the musical Peter Pan.

Allan Grant/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A scene from “All My Sons,” 1947, starring Karl Malden.

Eileen Darby The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Julie Newmar, right, with Claudette Colbert in a scene from the Broadway play “The Marriage-Go-Round,” 1958.

Photo by Ralph Morse/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation

Barbara Bel Geddes in the Tennessee Williams play “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.”

Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A scene from Death of a Salesman, 1949, with Lee. J. Cobb as Willy Loman.

W. Eugene Smith The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Patrick O’Neal (right) and Margaret Leighton in the play ‘The Night of the Iguana’ by Tennessee Williams, 1962.

Leonard McCombe/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Hair, the original Broadway cast, 1968

Ralph Morse The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

In Jesus Christ Superstar, Jeff Fenholt, as Jesus, was elevated with angels while Judas, played by Ben Vereen, was on a wing-shaped set platform.

John Olson/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation

The post LIFE’s Images of Classic Broadway appeared first on LIFE.

Bloomgarden was a theatrical producer and a force behind of such enduring classics as Death of a Salesman and The Music Man, along with many other prominent titles, including The Diary of Anne Frank, Look Homeward, Angel, and Equus.

His success explains why LIFE, for a story its December 22, 1958 issue titled “People at the Top of the Entertainment World,” shone its spotlight on Bloomgarden. Wrote LIFE, “Little known to the public, Bloomgarden is unsurpassed at the complex job of choosing plays, directors, actors, and meshing them all together smoothly,”

Bloomgarden’s influence also explains the many stars that appear alongside him in the pictures taken by LIFE photographer Robert W. Kelley. Luminaries shown with Bloomgarden include actor Anthony Perkins, who starred in Look Homeward Angel before moving on to his career-defining role in Psycho. The man who Bloomgarden chose to direct Perkins in that play was George Roy Hill, seen here lunching with Bloomgarden, would go on to direct such movies as Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

But the most glamorous figures in Bloomgarden’s orbit were undoubtedly Arthur Miller and Marilyn Monroe. Bloomgarden had not only produced Miller’s classic Death of a Salesman but also another play of his, A View from the Bridge, in 1955.

And Bloomgarden was connected to Monroe not only through Miller but also through her close friend Susan Strasberg, who was photographed separately by Kelley and had starred in Bloomgarden’s production of The DIary of Anne Frank. In addition to being an actress, Strasberg was the daughter of Lee Strasberg, the legendary acting coach who taught Monroe. In 1992 Susan Strasberg wrote the memoir Marilyn & Me: Sisters, Rivals and Friends.

Kelley’s photos Monroe and Miller hosting Bloomgarden in their Manhattan apartment, sitting in the living room and gathering around the piano for a light-hearted shoot. When these photos were taken, Miller and Monroe were in the middle of what would be a five-year marriage, and they look very much the happy couple. It’s telling of Bloomgarden’s position in his world that he looked very much at home with the most glamorous couple in America—even if the former accountant stayed in his coat and tie.

Broadway producer Kermit Bloomgarden with Arthur Miller (left) and Marilyn Monroe in their Manhattan apartment, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Broadway producer Kermit Bloomgarden with Marilyn Monroe in her Manhattan apartment, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Marilyn Monroe poured a drink in her Manhattan apartment with theatrical producer Kermit Bloomgarden and her husband Arthur Miller in the background, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

In her Manhattan apartment Marilyn Monroe poured a drink with her husband, playwright Arthur Miller (mostly obscured, at extreme left) and theatrical producer Kermit Bloomgardensit in the background, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Theatrical producer Kermit Bloomgarden (right) visiting with playwright Arthur Miller his wife, actress Marilyn Monroe, in their Manhattan apartment, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Marilyn Monroe hugging her husband, Arthur Miller in their apartment in New York, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Kermit Bloomgarden visited Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller at their apartment in New York, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Theatrical producer Kermit Bloomgarden visited Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller at their apartment in New York, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Theatrical producer Kermit Bloomgarden with Marilyn Monroe at her New York apartment, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Theatrical producer Kermit Bloomgarden posed in his New York office, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Kermit Bloomgarden visited with Anthony Perkins, who starred in Bloomgarden’s stage production of Look Homeward, Angel.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

New York producer Kermit Bloomgarden (right) hugged actress Susan Strasberg in 1958; she played the title role in his production of The Diary of Anne Frank.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Producter Kermit Bloomgarden and Susan Strasberg, who had starred in his production of The Diary of Anne Frank, walked in New York City, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

New York producer Kermit Bloomgarden (center) had lunch in 1958 with director George Roy Hill (left) and playwright Ketti Frings (right), who both worked on Bloomgarden’s production of Look Homeward, Angel. The play would earn Frings the Pulitzer Prize.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

New York producer Kermit Bloomgarden (R) having dinner with actor Robert Preston (left, and star of Bloomgarden’s The Music Man) and his wife, actor Peter Ustinov (third from left) and actress Celeste Holm (center) at George M. Cohan Corner, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

New York producer Kermit Bloomgarden (center) auditioned dancers, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

New York producer Kermit Bloomgarden (center) auditioned dancers, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The post Marilyn, Arthur Miller and More: A Star Producer’s Spectacular Orbit appeared first on LIFE.

Miller met Monroe in 1951, while he was married to his first wife and she was in between her first and second marriages. After a brief affair, they kept up a correspondence throughout Monroe’s brief marriage to Joe DiMaggio and Miller’s separation from his wife. On June 29, 1956, the pair married at the Westchester County Court House in a civil ceremony with exactly two witnesses and zero photojournalists.

But shortly after the wedding—which was followed two days later by an intimate Jewish ceremony—LIFE’s Paul Schutzer photographed the couple as they drove with a friend to Connecticut, where Miller lived. Schutzer’s photographs capture a carefree affection that would soon give way to darker times, the happy beginning to a five-year marriage that would end just 19 months before Monroe’s death.

The union would come to be plagued by an assortment of strains, which perhaps began when Monroe discovered a notebook in which Miller had scribbled his misgivings about having married her. Tormented by repeated miscarriages and the many inner demons to which she would ultimately succumb, Monroe turned to barbiturates. And Miller turned to another woman, photographer Inge Morath, whom he met on the set of The Misfits—a film he had written to offer Monroe her first dramatic role and whom he would marry in 1962, shortly after divorcing Monroe.

Miller, who remained mum on the subject of Monroe for many years, would later say that their differences, at least in the beginning, drew them closer. “The very inappropriateness of our being together was to me the sign that it was appropriate,” he said in a 1987 interview, “that we were two parts, however remote, of this society, of this life.”

Liz Ronk, who edited this gallery, is the Photo Editor for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter @lizabethronk.

Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller 1956

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller 1956

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller 1956

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller 1956

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller 1956

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller 1956

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller 1956

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

The post See Photos From the Day Arthur Miller Married Marilyn Monroe appeared first on LIFE.