George and Marty in the show “Has Anyone Seen Our Ship?” at the Manhattan Theatre Club in 1975. (Photo Provided)

NEW YORK — George and Marty Lee have enjoyed careers in show business that have taken them across the globe.

Marty (Morris) Lee is a 1967 graduate of Parkersburg High School. George Lee is a native of Milwaukee. George and Marty were married in 1976.

“We were wed while doing a production of ‘Oklahoma,’ playing Laurey and Curly and getting married every night on stage,” Marty said. “Then the morning of Monday, September 6, 1976 (our day off), we drove up into the Rocky Mountains and were married, for real! Cast and crew members and family celebrated with us in Genesee Park near the Continental Divide!” she said in an email.

George and Marty met in New York City in October 1972 while working in the Broadway show “Comedy.” They have worked together in theater shows all over the country and Canada.

As an actor, George used the name George Lee Andrews. As an actress, Marty was known as Marty Morris.

George and Marty perform in the Arizona Theatre Company’s production of a new American play “Custer” in 1980. (Photo Provided)

One of the highlights of George’s career was a 23-year run, beginning in 1988, in the musical “The Phantom of the Opera.” He holds the Guinness World Record for the most performances by an actor (9,382) in the same Broadway show.

After “The Phantom of the Opera,” George was cast in “Evita” with Ricky Martin in 2012.

Marty said she feels fortunate to have worked in the “golden years of theater” featuring prominent people such as composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim and composer Leonard Bernstein. She worked for theatrical producer and director Hal Prince.

Marty and George both worked for Prince and did numerous productions of the musical “A Little Night Music.” Marty said she also worked in Prince’s revival of “Candide.”

George performed in “On the Twentieth Century” for Prince on Broadway. Off-Broadway, George performed in “Starting Here, Starting Now,” the Richard Maltby and David Shire show.

George and Marty Lee on vacation in Iceland last July. (Photo Provided)

After graduating from West Virginia University in December 1971, Marty moved to New York City. After three months of auditions, Marty said, she was cast as Luisa in Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt’s off-Broadway production of “The Fantasticks” at the Sullivan Street Theatre in Greenwich Village.

“That work was hard and rewarding and also like living in a dream,” Marty said.

“Live theater is hard work,” Marty said, remembering performing in eight shows a week with one day off.

Marty said it is important for actresses and actors to believe in themselves.

“Work as hard as you can,” she said. “Audition and do the best you can.”

Marty as Fredrika in the first national tour of “A Little Night Music” with Margaret Hamilton as Madame Armfeldt, her grandmother, in 1974. (Photo Provided)

Actors should enjoy playing a character in a show, Marty said. “Anchor yourself to the characters; you must plug into the character,” she said.

George said an actor must find a place to act, whether in community theater or another venue, and then “compete.”

“Get in front of an audience,” George said. “Don’t worry about the venue.”

After getting an agent, Marty said, she worked in commercials, industrial shows and in musicals and plays across the country.

She appeared in a television commercial for Ivory Liquid with actor/broadcaster Durward Kirby.

George and Marty Lee backstage at “My Fair Lady” on Broadway last spring. (Photo Provided)

Marty provided a list of some of their performances:

* The Lees appeared in Doug Henning’s Broadway musical “Merlin” with Chita Rivera and Nathan Lane and performed the opening number from that show on the Tony Awards in 1983.

* Marty’s first Broadway show was “Alice in Wonderland” with Eva Le Gallienne, Kate Burton as Alice and Mary Stuart Masterson as her understudy at the Virginia Theatre.

* The Lees performed a two-person Noel Coward revue at the Manhattan Theatre Club in the spring of 1975.

* The Lees went to Johannesburg, South Africa, where George was asked by Hal Prince to direct a production of “A Little Night Music” at His Majesty’s Theatre with an international cast. Marty assisted George.

George and Marty Lee at their house in Pennsylvania last spring. (Photo Provided)

* In 1980-81, the Lees performed for the season of plays and musicals at the Arizona Theatre Company in Tucson and Phoenix.

Parkersburg played an important role in Marty’s cultural upbringing, she said.

She said her mother and father, Mary Alice and Virgil Morris, were her first inspirations for music. “They both sang in church choirs, as did our whole family,” Marty said.

Marty said she was fortunate to sing in the Parkersburg High School A Cappella Choir directed by Esther Cunningham. Cunningham also was Marty’s piano teacher.

She performed in musicals and talent shows at PHS. Marty said the teachers were inspiring at PHS. She had “wonderful opportunities at a young age for acting and speaking.”

She performed in “The Boyfriend” at the Actors Guild of Parkersburg.

The Morrises lived across from VanDevender Junior High School.

At WVU, Marty had theater roles in “West Side Story,” “My Fair Lady,” “The Fantasticks” and “The Three Penny Opera.”

During summer breaks at WVU, Marty worked at the St. Louis Municipal Opera, singing in the chorus, acquiring her Equity card (actors association) and beginning a professional career in theater, she said.

“I worked with and learned from the most amazing Broadway and Hollywood actors over three seasons at the ‘Muny,’ 1969, ’70 and ’71,” Marty said. The three summers in St. Louis were a springboard to Marty working in New York theater, she said.

Although the Lees are “pretty much” retired from show business, the two have recently enjoyed doing staged readings, Marty said.

“George did a new musical workshop about Alan Jay Lerner with Susan Stroman. He also did a concert of Sondheim music with Steve Sondheim and Alexander Gemignani and Michael Cerveris at Lincoln Center Jazz,” Marty said.

“I did a staged reading of ‘The Trojan Women,’ playing Hecuba,” she said.

Living in the Upper West Side of Manhattan allows them to attend theater, orchestra and dance performances and enjoy various art venues around town, Marty said.

The Lees said they enjoy spending time with their children and grandchildren.

George and Marty traveled to Monterey, Calif., in October as Marty and other members of the Parkersburg High School Class of 1967 celebrated their 70th birthdays.

Paul LaPann can be reached at plapann@newsandsentinel.com