Barbra Streisand biography

In her 1983 directorial debut, the film received five Academy Award nominations, and Streisand received Golden Globe Awards as both Best Director and producer of the Best Picture (musical comedy). The film also produced a Top 10 soundtrack.

In 1985, The Broadway Album returned Barbra Streisand to the top of the charts. Continuing to integrate all of her talents, in 1987, Streisand followed up Yentl with Nuts. She not only starred in the film,

but also produced and wrote the music. For her second directorial outing in 1991, Streisand made the movie Prince of Tides, a story based on the Pat Conroy novel. The film garnered seven Academy Award nominations and a nomination from the Directors Guild of America for her direction, making her only the third woman ever so honored. In 1996, Streisand tried her hand at direction again, with the film The Mirror Has Two Faces.

Charity Work

After a 27-year absence, Barbra Streisand returned to the concert stage in 1994. Her performance resulted in the Top 10, million-selling album, The Concert. The tour itself generated over $10 million for charities, including AIDS organizations, women and children in jeopardy, Jewish/Arab relations, and agencies working to improve relations between African-Americans and Jews. Streisand's philanthropy and activism also extends to her Barwood Film's productions, such as The Long Island Incident, which inspired a national debate on gun control.

Streisand is an outspoken Democrat, and has used her talents and fame to support multiple candidates and causes, including Al Gore, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. Prior to her 27-year stage absence, Streisand devoted her unpaid live concert performances exclusively to the benefit of the causes she supports. Her Barbra Streisand: One Voice concert has, to date, channeled $7 million in profits to charities through The Streisand Foundation, which continues to occupy much of the artist's energy and resources.

Most recently, Barbra Streisand recorded the 2000 album, Timeless: Live in Concert at her Las Vegas show on New Years Eve, and released both on CD and DVD. A year later, a new holiday album, Christmas Memories arrived. It was the artist's first full-length studio album since 1999's A Love Like Ours. In a sequel to 1985's The Broadway Album, The Movie Album appeared in 2003. In 2005, a deluxe CD/DVD reissue of the original Guilty was followed a month later by Guilty Pleasures, a new album that reunited Streisand with Barry Gibb. In 2006, she returned to the concert stage, documented in the 2007 Live in Concert. And in a long awaited return to film, Streisand appeared in 2006's Meet the Fockers.

In Recent Years

Streisand released the albums Love Is the Answer (which reached gold-selling status in the U.S.) and What Matters Most in 2009 and 2011, respectively.

In the fall of 2012, Streisand announced that she would be releasing a new album: Release Me, an album of unreleased material from several sessions over Streisand's career, is slated to be released on October 9, 2012.