Donald Clark "Donny" Osmond (born December 9 1957 in Ogden, Utah) is an American entertainment personality. He is a singer, ex-teen idol and has worked as a talk show and game show host, actor and record producer.

Born to parents Olive and George Osmond, Donny is best known for being half of the brother-sister singing act Donny & Marie. He is the brother of Alan , Jay , Jimmy , Merrill , Wayne , Marie, Tom , and Virl Osmond . The two oldest children, Tom and Virl, were hearing-impaired; Alan, Jay, Merrill, Wayne, and Donny were members of the popular singing group The Osmond Brothers. Donny became a teen idol in the early 1970s when he broke away from his older brothers to become a solo act.

In the mid '70s, Donny was paired up with his younger sister, Marie. The duo recorded several albums together before and while starring in their own television variety series, Donny & Marie which aired on ABC from 1976-1979. He married Debra Glenn in 1978.

When Donny and Marie ended, Donny tried to reinvent himself as a solo artist. Donny spent several years as a performer before returning to the U.S. charts with the song "Soldier of Love" and its followup "Sacred Emotion".

Donny also found success on the musical theater stage when he starred in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. During this period, he suffered from Social Anxiety Disorder. He was the cohost of a talk show with Marie in 1998 also called Donny and Marie. The show ran for two seasons, and marked the first time the brother and sister had been together professionally in twenty years. Donny went on to host Pyramid, a syndicated television game show, which ran from 2002 until cancellation in 2004.

Donny, like the rest of his family, is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He received some criticism from members for not serving a mission like his religion encourages, but most of the furor over this lack of service has died down.

In 2004, Donny Osmond returned to the UK Top 10 for the first time as a solo artist since 1973, with the George Benson-sampling "Breeze On By", co-written with fellow former teen idol (in many countries but never the United States) Gary Barlow, of 1990s UK boy band Take That.

External links

• donny.com