Donny Osmond Biography

Singer

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Name at birth: Donald Clark Osmond

Former child star Donny Osmond has made a grown-up name for himself as a cheery and persistent singer, actor, TV personality and (as of 2009) dancer. At age five, Donny joined The Osmonds, the clean-cut singing group formed by his older brothers Alan, Wayne, Merrill, and Jay. As with Michael Jackson and the Jackson Five, Donny became the young darling who moved beyond the group. He had solo hits with "Go Away, Little Girl" (1971) and "Puppy Love" (1972) and was a regular face in Tiger Beat and other teen magazines. He and his sister Marie cemented their family-friendly, white-toothed image in Donny and Marie, a TV variety show that ran from 1976-79. During the 1980s Donny hung in there, struggling to shed his post-teenybopper image, and in 1990s he landed a six-year run as Joseph in a touring revival of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Osmond continued to trade on his famous name, working as a TV presenter and a correspondent for Entertainment Tonight, appearing on game shows, and making a celebrity summer run as The Beast in the long-running Broadway musical Beauty and the Beast. In 2008 he and Marie took up residence at the Flamingo Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas; in 2009 he agreed to appear on the TV show Dancing With the Stars. He published a memoir, Life Is Just What You Make It, in 1999.

Extra credit: Osmond married the former Debbie Glenn in 1978. They have five sons: Donald Jr. (b. 1979), Jeremy (b. 1981), Brandon (b. 1985), Christopher (b. 1990), and Joshua (b. 1998)... Osmond's siblings are, in order: George Jr. (b. 1945), Thomas (b. 1947), Alan (b. 1949), Melvin (known as Wayne, b. 1951), Merrill (b. 1953), Jay (b. 1955), Donny (b. 1957), Marie (b. 1959), and James (known as Jimmy, b. 1963). George Jr. and Thomas were born hearing-impaired, and were not part of the Osmond Brothers group.

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