内容摘要：Firefighters work from a deck as the Palisades Fire burns a beachfront property Jan. 8, 2025, in Malibu, Calif. (AP Photo/Etienne Laurent)

Firefighters work from a deck as the Palisades Fire burns a beachfront property Jan. 8, 2025, in Malibu, Calif. (AP Photo/Etienne Laurent)

Maksym Vysotskyi, a drone unit commander with Ukraine’s 82nd assault brigade, sits on a sofa near the front line in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region on Feb. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)Maksym Vysotskyi, a drone unit commander with Ukraine’s 82nd assault brigade, sits on a sofa near the front line in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region on Feb. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)

“Everyone must walk their own path, and there will be challenges along the way. You can try to escape your fate, but it will always catch up with you,” he says. “That’s why I never had regrets.”Two and a half years ago, when Capt. Oleksandr Puzikov called his wife to tell her his left arm had been severed, she thought he was joking.“I will never forget that day,” says Iryna Puzikova, her voice trembling. “When I walked into the ICU, his first words were, ‘You won’t leave me, right?’”

Oleksandr Puzikov, a captain with Ukraine’s 127th brigade who lost an arm in combat, and his wife, Iryna, look at an arm prosthesis in their apartment in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Feb. 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)Oleksandr Puzikov, a captain with Ukraine’s 127th brigade who lost an arm in combat, and his wife, Iryna, look at an arm prosthesis in their apartment in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Feb. 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)

She stayed by his side, traveling from hospital to hospital as he recovered and learned to live with a full-arm amputation.

When he decided to return to the military, she wasn’t surprised. “I never doubted for a moment that it could be any different,” she says.Brown then said, “How much do you fellas need?” and wrote out a check for $75,000 to cover the start of rehearsals. “Suddenly, the world turned Technicolor,” Strouse remembered.

The popularity of “Birdie” spawned a film (with Van Dyke, Janet Leigh and Ann-Margret) in 1963 and a television adaptation with Jason Alexander and Vanessa Williams in 1995.Strouse and Adams gave several non-musical theater stars, including Sammy Davis Jr. and Lauren Bacall, stage successes.

For “Golden Boy” (1964), based on the Clifford Odets play, Strouse and Adams had to get Davis’ OK for everything. “His agents would not let him sign the contract until he approved every word and note that Lee and I wrote,” the composer told the AP. “Which meant that we had to, at great expense to the producer, follow Sammy all over the world. ... We spent three years of our lives, a week or so each month, out in Las Vegas, playing songs for him.”“Applause” (1970) was adapted from the Mary Orr short story that became the cinema classic “All About Eve.” It was Bacall’s musical-theater debut, and the actress won a Tony for her performance, as did Strouse and Adams for their score.