THEATRE: Broadway star Lillias White performs "The Oldest Profession" from 'The Life'

Get into this fierce performance of 'The Oldest Profession' (from the musical 'The Life') by Tony-winner Lillias White. I adore this woman! Just saw her in a new production of 'Joe Turner's Come and Gone' (here in L.A., and directed by Tony-winner Phylicia Rashad) at the Mark Taper Forum!

Her voice is beyond powerful! Check her out:

Lillias White (born July 21, 1951) is a Tony Award winning American singer and actress.

The Brooklyn, New York native made her Broadway debutin Barnum in 1981. She understudied the role of Effie in the original 1981 production of Dreamgirls and played the part in the 1987 revival. White has appeared on Broadway in Cats, Carrie, Once on This Island, How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Chicago, and in benefit concert versions of Funny Girl, Hair, and Dreamgirls, reprising her role as Effie, for which she won the Drama League Award for Best Actress in a Musical. For her role in Cy Coleman's The Life, she won the Tony, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle Awards for her portrayal of a world-weary, no-nonsense, streetwise hooker named Sonja.

The Life is a musical with a book by David Newman, Ira Gasman and Cy Coleman, music by Coleman, and lyrics by Gasman.

Based on an original idea by Gasman, the show explores the underbelly of Times Square's 42nd Street, inhabited by pimps and prostitutes, druggiesand dealers, and runaways and street people in the era prior to its Disneyfication.