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Whoopi Goldberg

Caryn Elaine Johnson (born November 13, 1955),  known professionally as Whoopi Goldberg, is an American actor, comedian, author, and television personality. A recipient of numerous accolades, she is one of 19 entertainers to receive the complete EGOT series of awards (i.e., an Emmy Award, Grammy Award, Academy Award, and Tony Award). In 2001, she received the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor.

Goldberg began her career on stage in 1983 with her one-woman show, Spook Show, which transferred to Broadway under the title Whoopi Goldberg, running from 1984 to 1985. She won a Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album for the recording of the show. Her film breakthrough came in 1985 with her role as Celie, a mistreated woman in the Deep South, in Steven Spielberg's period drama film The Color Purple, for which she won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama. For her role as an eccentric psychic in the romantic fantasy film Ghost (1990), she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and a second Golden Globe Award. She starred in the comedy Sister Act (1992) and its sequel Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit (1993), becoming the highest-paid actress at the time. She also starred in Jumpin' Jack Flash (1986), Clara's Heart (1988), Soapdish (1991), Ghosts of Mississippi (1996), and Till (2022). She also is known for voicing roles in The Lion King (1994) and Toy Story 3 (2010).

On stage, Goldberg has starred in the Broadway revivals of Stephen Sondheim's musical A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum and August Wilson's play Ma Rainey's Black Bottom. She won a Tony Award as a producer of the musical Thoroughly Modern Millie. In 2011 she received her third Tony Award nomination for the stage adaptation of Sister Act (2011). On television, Goldberg portrayed Guinan in the science fiction series Star Trek: The Next Generation (1988–1993), and Star Trek: Picard (2022). Since 2007, she has co-hosted and moderated the daytime talk show The View, for which she won the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Talk Show Host. She has hosted the Academy Awards ceremony four times.

Early life
Caryn Elaine Johnson was born in Manhattan, New York City, on November 13, 1955,  the daughter of Emma Johnson (née Harris; 1931–2010), a nurse and teacher, and Robert James Johnson Jr. (1930–1993), a Baptist clergyman. She was raised in a public housing project, the Chelsea-Elliot Houses, in New York City.

Goldberg described her mother as a "stern, strong, and wise woman" who raised her as a single mother with her brother Clyde (c. 1949 – 2015). She attended a local Catholic school, St Columba's. Her more recent forebears migrated north from Faceville, Georgia; Palatka, Florida; and Virginia. She dropped out of Washington Irving High School.

She has stated that her stage forename ("Whoopi") was taken from a whoopee cushion: "When you're performing on stage, you never really have time to go into the bathroom and close the door. So if you get a little gassy, you've got to let it go. So people used to say to me, 'You're like a whoopee cushion.' And that's where the name came from."

About her stage surname, she claimed in 2011, "My mother did not name me Whoopi, but Goldberg is my name—it's part of my family, part of my heritage, just like being black," and "I just know I am Jewish. I practice nothing. I don't go to temple, but I do remember the holidays." She has stated that "people would say 'Come on, are you Jewish?' And I always say 'Would you ask me that if I was white? I bet not.'" One account suggests that her mother, Emma Johnson, thought the family's original surname was "not Jewish enough" for her daughter to become a star. Goldberg has said that her family is "Jewish, Buddhist, Baptist, and Catholic."

Researcher Henry Louis Gates Jr. found that all of Goldberg's traceable ancestors were black, that she had no known German or Jewish ancestry, and that none of her ancestors were named Goldberg. Results of a DNA test, revealed in the 2006 PBS documentary African American Lives, traced part of her ancestry to the Papel and Bayote people of modern-day Guinea-Bissau of West Africa. The show identified her great-great-grandparents as William and Elsie Washington, who had acquired property in northern Florida in 1873, and mentions they were among a very small number of black people who became landowners through homesteading in the years following the Civil War. The show also mentions that her grandparents were living in Harlem, and that her grandfather was working as a Pullman porter.

According to an anecdote told by Nichelle Nichols in Trekkies (1997), a young Goldberg was watching Star Trek, and on seeing Nichols's character Uhura, exclaimed, "Momma! There's a black lady on television and she ain't no maid!" This spawned Goldberg's lifelong Star Trek fandom. Goldberg lobbied for and was eventually cast in a recurring guest starring role as Guinan on Star Trek: The Next Generation.

In the 1970s, Goldberg moved to San Diego, California, where she became a waitress, then to Berkeley, where she worked odd jobs, including as a bank teller, a mortuary cosmetologist, and a bricklayer. She joined the avant-garde theater troupe the Blake Street Hawkeyes and gave comedy and acting classes; Courtney Love was one of her acting students. Goldberg was also in a number of theater productions. In 1978, she witnessed a midair collision of two planes in San Diego, causing her to develop a fear of flying and post-traumatic stress disorder.

1980s
Goldberg trained under acting teacher Uta Hagen at the HB Studio in New York City. She first appeared onscreen in Citizen: I'm Not Losing My Mind, I'm Giving It Away (1982), an avant-garde ensemble feature by San Francisco filmmaker William Farley.

In 1983 and 1984, she "first came to national prominence with her one-woman show" in which she portrayed Moms Mabley, Moms, first performed in Berkeley, California, and then at the Victoria Theatre in San Francisco; the Oakland Museum of California preserves a poster advertising the show.

She created The Spook Show, a one-woman show composed of different character monologues in 1983. Director Mike Nichols "discovered" her when he saw her perform. In an interview, he recalled that he "burst into tears", and that he and Goldberg "fell into each other's arms" when they first met backstage. Goldberg considered Nichols her mentor. Nichols helped her transfer the show to Broadway, where it was retitled Whoopi Goldberg. The show ran from October 24, 1984, to March 10, 1985, and was taped and broadcast by HBO as Whoopi Goldberg: Direct from Broadway. The recording of the special was awarded the Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album, making Goldberg the first Black female comedian to win the Grammy.

Goldberg's Broadway performance caught the eye of director Steven Spielberg while she performed in The Belly Room at The Comedy Store. Spielberg gave her the lead role in his film The Color Purple, based on the novel by Alice Walker. It was released in late 1985, and was a critical and commercial success. Film critic Roger Ebert described Goldberg's performance as "one of the most amazing debut performances in movie history". It was nominated for 11 Academy Awards, including a nomination for Goldberg as Best Actress. She won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama for her portrayal of Celie, becoming the first Black actress to win in this category.

Between 1985 and 1988, Goldberg was the busiest female star, making seven films. She starred in Penny Marshall's directorial debut Jumpin' Jack Flash (1986) and began a relationship with David Claessen, a director of photography on the set; they married later that year. The film was a modest success, and during the next two years, three additional motion pictures featured Goldberg: Burglar (1987), Fatal Beauty (1987), and The Telephone (1988). Though they were not as successful, Goldberg garnered awards from the NAACP Image Awards. Goldberg and Claessen divorced after the poor box office performance of The Telephone, in which she was contracted to perform. She tried unsuccessfully to sue the film's producers. Clara's Heart (1988) did poorly at the box office, though her own performance was critically acclaimed. As the 1980s concluded, she hosted numerous HBO specials of Comic Relief with fellow comedians Robin Williams and Billy Crystal.

1990s
In January 1990, Goldberg starred with Jean Stapleton in the situation comedy Bagdad Cafe (inspired by the 1987 film of the same name). The sitcom ran for two seasons on CBS. Simultaneously, she starred in The Long Walk Home, portraying a woman in the US civil rights movement. She played a psychic in the film Ghost (1990) and became the first black woman to win the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in nearly 50 years, and the second black woman to win an Academy Award for acting (the first being Hattie McDaniel for Gone with the Wind in 1940). She also won the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role and the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture. Premiere named her character Oda Mae Brown in its list of Top 100 best film characters.

Goldberg starred in Soapdish (1991) and had a recurring role on Star Trek: The Next Generation between 1988 and 1993 as Guinan, a character she reprised in two Star Trek films. She made a cameo in the Traveling Wilburys 1991 music video "Wilbury Twist". On May 29, 1992, the film Sister Act was released. It grossed well over US$200 million (equivalent to $ million in ), and Goldberg was nominated for a Golden Globe Award. That year, she starred in The Player and Sarafina!. She also hosted the 34th Annual Grammy Awards, receiving praise from the Sun-Sentinel's Deborah Wilker for bringing to life what Wilker considered "stodgy and stale" ceremonies. During the next year, Goldberg hosted a late-night talk show, The Whoopi Goldberg Show, and starred in two more films: Made in America and Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit. With an estimated salary of $7–12 million for Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit (1993), she was the highest-paid actress at the time. From 1994 to 1995, she appeared in Corrina, Corrina, The Lion King (voice), Theodore Rex, The Little Rascals, The Pagemaster (voice), Boys on the Side, and Moonlight and Valentino, and guest-starred on Muppets Tonight in 1996.

In 1994, Goldberg became the first black woman to host the Academy Awards ceremony starting with the 66th Oscar telecast. She hosted it again in 1996, 1999, and 2002, and has been regarded as one of the show's best hosts.

Goldberg starred in four motion pictures in 1996: Bogus (with Gérard Depardieu and Haley Joel Osment), Eddie, The Associate (with Dianne Wiest), and Ghosts of Mississippi (with Alec Baldwin and James Woods). During the filming of Eddie, she began dating co-star Frank Langella, a relationship that lasted until early 2000. In October 1997, she and ghostwriter Daniel Paisner cowrote Book, a collection featuring Goldberg's insights and opinions.

Also in 1996, Goldberg replaced Nathan Lane as Pseudolus in the Broadway revival of Stephen Sondheim's musical comedy A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. Greg Evans of Variety regarded her "thoroughly modern style" as "a welcome invitation to a new audience that could find this 1962 musical as dated as ancient Rome". The Washington Post's Chip Crews deemed Goldberg "a pip and a pro", and that she "ultimately [...] steers the show past its rough spots".

From 1998 to 2001, Goldberg took supporting roles in How Stella Got Her Groove Back with Angela Bassett, Girl, Interrupted with Winona Ryder and Angelina Jolie, Kingdom Come, and Rat Race with an all-star ensemble cast. She starred in the ABC-TV versions of Cinderella, A Knight in Camelot, and Call Me Claus. In 1998 she gained a new audience when she became the "Center Square" on Hollywood Squares, hosted by Tom Bergeron. She also served as executive producer, for which she was nominated for four Emmy Awards. She left the series in 2002. In 1999, she voiced Ransome in the British animated children's show Foxbusters by Cosgrove Hall Films. AC Nielsen EDI ranked her as the actress appearing in the most theatrical films in the 1990s, with 29 films grossing $1.3 billion in the U.S. and Canada (equivalent to $ billion in ).

2000s
Goldberg hosted the documentary short The Making of A Charlie Brown Christmas (2001). In 2003, she returned to television in Whoopi, which was canceled after one season. On her 46th birthday, she was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She also appeared alongside Samuel L. Jackson and Angela Bassett in the HBO documentary Unchained Memories (2003), narrating slave narratives. During the next two years, she became a spokeswoman for Slim Fast and produced two television series: Lifetime's original drama Strong Medicine, which ran six seasons; and Whoopi's Littleburg, a children's television series on Nickelodeon.

In 2002, Goldberg completed the EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony Awards) when she received the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Special Class Special as a producer of Beyond Tara: The Extraordinary Life of Hattie McDaniel and the Tony Award for Best Musical for producing Thoroughly Modern Millie. She is the first Black woman to be an EGOT recipient.

Goldberg returned to the stage in 2003, starring as blues singer Ma Rainey in the Broadway revival of August Wilson's historical drama Ma Rainey's Black Bottom at the Royale Theatre. She was also one of the show's producers.

Goldberg was involved in controversy at a fundraiser for John Kerry at Radio City Music Hall in New York in July 2004 when she made a sexual joke about President George W. Bush by waving a bottle of wine, pointed toward her pubic area, and said, "We should keep Bush where he belongs, and not in the White House." As result, Slim-Fast dropped her from their ad campaign. Later that year, she revived her one-woman show at the Lyceum Theatre on Broadway in honor of its 20th anniversary; Charles Isherwood of The New York Times called the opening night performance an "intermittently funny but sluggish evening of comic portraiture". Goldberg made guest appearances on Everybody Hates Chris as elderly character Louise Clarkson.

From August 2006 to March 2008, Goldberg hosted Wake Up with Whoopi, a nationally syndicated morning radio talk and entertainment program. In October 2007, Goldberg announced on the air that she was going to retire from acting because she was no longer sent scripts, saying, "You know, there's no room for the very talented Whoopi. There's no room right now in the marketplace of cinema". On December 13, 2008, she guest starred on The Naked Brothers Band, a Nickelodeon rock- mockumentary television series. Before the episode premiered, on February 18, 2008, the band performed on The View and the band members were interviewed by Goldberg and Sherri Shepherd. That same year, Goldberg hosted 62nd Tony Awards.

2010s
In 2010, she starred in the Tyler Perry movie For Colored Girls, alongside Janet Jackson, Phylicia Rashad, Thandie Newton, Loretta Devine, Anika Noni Rose, Kimberly Elise, Kerry Washington, and Macy Gray. The film received generally good reviews from critics and grossed over $38 million worldwide. The same year, she voiced Stretch in the Disney/Pixar animated movie Toy Story 3. The movie received critical acclaim and grossed $1.067 billion worldwide.

Goldberg had a recurring role on the television series Glee during its third and fourth seasons as Carmen Tibideaux, a renowned Broadway performer and opera singer and the dean at a fictional performing arts college NYADA (New York Academy of the Dramatic Arts). In 2011, she had a cameo in The Muppets. In 2012, Goldberg guest starred as Jane Marsh, Sue Heck's guidance counselor on The Middle. She voiced the Magic Mirror on Disney XD's The 7D. In 2014, she also portrayed a character in the superhero film Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2014). She also appeared as herself in Chris Rock's Top Five and starred in the romantic comedy film Big Stone Gap.

In 2016, Goldberg executive produced a reality television series called Strut, based on transgender models from the modeling agency Slay Model Management in Los Angeles. The series aired on Oxygen. In 2017, she voiced Ursula, the Sea Witch and Uma's mother, in the TV movie Descendants 2. In 2018, she starred in the Tyler Perry's film Nobody's Fool, alongside Tiffany Haddish, Omari Hardwick, Mehcad Brooks, Amber Riley, and Tika Sumpter. That same year, she also starred in the comedy-drama film Furlough, alongside Tessa Thompson, Melissa Leo, and Anna Paquin.

In 2019, Goldberg's voice was used for the role of the Giant's Wife in the Hollywood Bowl production of Into the Woods.

2020s
In an appearance on The View on January 22, 2020, Patrick Stewart invited Goldberg to reprise her role as Guinan during the second season of Star Trek: Picard. She immediately accepted his offer. Goldberg also starred in The Stand, a CBS All Access miniseries based on the 1978 novel of the same name by Stephen King, portraying Mother Abagail, a 108-year-old woman. In 2020, it was announced Goldberg was set to return in Sister Act 3 with Tyler Perry producing. The film is slated to debut on Disney+.

Goldberg also stars in the biographical film Till, written and directed by Chinonye Chukwu, which she also produced. The film debuted at the 60th New York Film Festival.

Goldberg guest starred on the Disney Channel show Amphibia as the character Mother Olms.

Influences
Goldberg has stated that her influences are Richard Pryor, George Carlin, Moms Mabley, Lenny Bruce, Joan Rivers, Eddie Murphy, Bill Cosby, Sidney Poitier, and Harry Belafonte.

The View
On September 4, 2007, Goldberg became the new moderator and co-host of The View, replacing Rosie O'Donnell. Goldberg's debut as moderator drew 3.4 million viewers, 1 million fewer than O'Donnell's debut ratings. However, after 2 weeks, The View was averaging 3.5 million total viewers under Goldberg, a 7-percent increase from 3.3 million under O'Donnell the previous season.

Goldberg has made controversial comments on the program on several occasions. One of her first appearances involved defending Michael Vick's participation in dogfighting as a result of "cultural upbringing". In 2009, she opined that Roman Polanski's rape conviction of a thirteen-year-old in 1977 was not "rape-rape". She later clarified that she had intended to distinguish between statutory rape and forcible rape. The following year, in response to alleged comments by Mel Gibson considered racist, she said: "I don't like what he did here, but I know Mel and I know he's not a racist".

In 2015, Goldberg was initially a defender of Bill Cosby from the rape allegations made against him, questioning why Cosby had never been arrested or tried for them. She later changed her stance, stating that "all of the information that's out there kinda points to 'guilt'." After learning that the statute of limitations on these allegations had expired and thus Cosby could not be tried, she also stated her support for removing the statute of limitations for rape.

On January 31, 2022, Goldberg drew widespread criticism for stating on the show that the Holocaust was not based on race but "about man's inhumanity to man", telling her co-hosts: "This is white people doing it to white people, so y'all going to fight amongst yourselves." She apologized on Twitter later that day. She maintained that the Nazis' issue was with ethnicity and not race on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert that same day, which drew further criticism. Goldberg issued another apology on air the following day. She was subsequently suspended from The View for two weeks over the comments.

Media appearances
Goldberg performed the role of Califia, the Queen of the Island of California, for a theater presentation called Golden Dreams at Disney California Adventure Park, the second gate at the Disneyland Resort, in 2000. The show, which explains the history of the Golden State (California), opened on February 8, 2001, with the rest of the park. Golden Dreams closed in September 2008 to make way for the upcoming Little Mermaid ride planned for DCA. In 2001, Goldberg co-hosted the 50th Anniversary of I Love Lucy.

In July 2006, Goldberg became the main host of the Universal Studios Hollywood Studio Tour, in which she appears multiple times in video clips shown to the guests on monitors placed on the trams.

She made a guest appearance on the situation comedy 30 Rock during the series' fourth season, in which she played herself, counseling Tracy Jordan on winning the "EGOT", the coveted combination of Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony Awards. On July 14, 2008, Goldberg announced on The View that from July 29 to September 7, she would perform in the Broadway musical Xanadu. On November 13, 2008, Goldberg's birthday, she announced live on The View that she would be producing, along with Stage Entertainment, the premiere of Sister Act: The Musical at the London Palladium.

She gave a short message at the beginning of the Junior Eurovision Song Contest 2008 wishing all the participants good luck, and stressing the importance of UNICEF, the official charity of the Junior Eurovision Song Contest. Since its launch in 2008, Goldberg has been a contributor for wowOwow.com, a new website for women to talk culture, politics, and gossip.

Goldberg has been a frequent guest narrator at Disney's Candlelight Processional at Walt Disney World. She made a guest appearance in Michael Jackson's short film for the song "Liberian Girl". She also appeared on the seventh season of the cooking reality series Hell's Kitchen as a special guest. On January 14, 2010, Goldberg made a one-night-only appearance at the Minskoff Theatre to perform in the mega-hit musical The Lion King. That same year, she attended the Life Ball in Austria.

Goldberg made her West End debut as the Mother Superior in a musical version of Sister Act for a limited engagement set for August 10–31, 2010, but prematurely left the cast on August 27 to be with her family; her mother had had a severe stroke. However, she later returned to the cast for five performances. The show closed on October 30, 2010.

Entrepreneurship
Goldberg co-founded Whoopi & Maya, a company that made medical cannabis products for women seeking relief from menstrual cramps. Goldberg says she was inspired to go into business by "a lifetime of difficult periods and the fact that cannabis was literally the only thing that gave me relief". The company was launched in April 2016 but announced in February 2020 that it was ceasing operations. In 2021, Goldberg announced the launch of a new line of cannabis products, "Emma & Clyde", named for her late mother and brother.

Philanthropy and activism
In 2006, Goldberg appeared during the 20th anniversary of Comic Relief. Goldberg is an advocate for human rights, moderating a panel at the Alliance of Youth Movements Summit on how social networks can be used to fight violent extremism in 2008, and also moderating a panel at the UN on human rights, children and armed conflict, terrorism, and reconciliation in 2009. On an episode of The View that aired on May 9, 2012, Goldberg stated she is a member of the National Rifle Association of America.

On April 1, 2010, Goldberg joined Cyndi Lauper in the launch of her Give a Damn campaign to bring a wider awareness of discrimination of the LGBT community and to invite straight people to ally with the gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender community. Her high-profile support for LGBT rights and AIDS activism dates from the 1987 March on Washington, in which she participated. In May 2017, she spoke in support of transgender rights at the 28th GLAAD Media Awards.

Goldberg is on the Board of Selectors of Jefferson Awards for Public Service. She also serves on the National Council Advisory Board of the National Museum of American Illustration. She was a speaker at the 2017 Women's March in New York City and was such again at the following year's event.

On January 24, 2021, Goldberg appeared with Tom Everett Scott as guests on the AmAIRican Grabbuddies marathon fundraising episode of The George Lucas Talk Show, where she spoke of her time working on Snow Buddies and raised money for the ASPCA.

Personal life
Goldberg has been married three times. She was married to drug counselor Alvin Martin from 1973 to 1979; to cinematographer David Claessen from 1986 to 1988; and to union organizer Lyle Trachtenberg from 1994 to 1995. She has had live-in relationships with actor Frank Langella and playwright David Schein. Her other ex-boyfriends include businessman Michael Visbal, orthodontist Jeffrey Cohen, camera operator Edward Gold, and actors Timothy Dalton and Ted Danson. Danson controversially appeared in blackface during his 1993 Friars Club roast; Goldberg wrote some of his jokes for the event and defended Danson after a media furor.

She has stated that she has no plans to marry again: "Some people are not meant to be married and I am not meant to. I'm sure it is wonderful for lots of people." In a 2011 interview with Piers Morgan, she explained that she was never in love with the men she married and commented: "You have to really be committed to them...I don't have that commitment. I'm committed to my family."

On May 9, 1974, Goldberg gave birth to a daughter, Alexandrea Martin, who also became an actress and producer. Through her daughter, Goldberg has three grandchildren and a great-granddaughter. On August 29, 2010, Goldberg's mother, Emma Johnson, died after having a stroke. She left London at the time, where she had been performing in the musical Sister Act, but returned to perform on October 22, 2010. In 2015, Goldberg's brother Clyde died of a brain aneurysm.

In 1991, Goldberg spoke out about her abortion in The Choices We Made: Twenty-Five Women and Men Speak Out About Abortion. In that book, she spoke about using a coat hanger to terminate a pregnancy at age 14. She said she had had six or seven abortions by the age of 25 and that birth control pills failed to stop several of her pregnancies. After the 2022 Kansas abortion referendum, Goldberg claimed that God would support abortion rights because he gave women freedom of choice.

Goldberg has stated that she was once a "functioning" drug addict. She has stated that she smoked marijuana before accepting the Best Supporting Actress award for Ghost in 1991.

Goldberg has dyslexia. She has lived in Llewellyn Park, a neighborhood in West Orange, New Jersey, saying she moved there to be able to be outside in private. She maintains an additional summer residence on the coast of Sardinia. She has expressed a preference for defining herself by the gender-neutral term "actor" rather than "actress", saying: "An actress can only play a woman. I'm an actor–I can play anything." In March 2019, Goldberg revealed that she had been battling pneumonia and sepsis, which caused her to take a leave of absence from The View.

On a season 9 episode of PBS's "Finding Your Roots", featuring Pro Football Hall of Fame tight end Tony Gonzalez, it was revealed Goldberg and Gonzalez are distant cousins.

Awards and honors
Having acted in over 150 films, Goldberg is one of the 19 people to achieve the EGOT, having won the four major American awards for professional entertainers: an Emmy (Television), a Grammy (Music), an Oscar (Film), and a Tony (Theater). She is the first black woman to have achieved all four awards.

Goldberg has received two Academy Award nominations, for The Color Purple and Ghost, winning for Ghost. She is the first African-American actor to have received Academy Award nominations for both Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress. She has received three Golden Globe nominations, winning two (Best Actress in 1986 for The Color Purple, and Best Supporting Actress in 1991 for Ghost). For Ghost, she also won a BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role in 1991.

She won a Grammy Award for Best Comedy Recording in 1985 for "Whoopi Goldberg: Direct from Broadway", becoming only the second solo woman performer—not part of a duo or team—at the time to receive the award, and the first African-American woman. Goldberg is one of only three single women performers to receive that award. She won a Tony Award in 2002 as a producer of the Broadway musical Thoroughly Modern Millie. She has received eight Daytime Emmy nominations, winning two. She has received nine Primetime Emmy nominations. In 2009, Goldberg won the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Talk Show Host for her work on The View. She shared the award with her then co-hosts Joy Behar, Sherri Shepherd, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, and Barbara Walters.

Goldberg is the recipient of the 1985 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding One-Person Show for her solo performance on Broadway. She has won three People's Choice Awards. She has been nominated for five American Comedy Awards with two wins (Funniest Supporting Actress in 1991 for Ghost and Funniest Actress in 1993 for Sister Act). She was the three-time (and inaugural) winner of the Kids' Choice Award for Favorite Movie Actress. In 2001, she became the first African-American female to receive the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor.

In 1990, Goldberg was officially named an honorary member of the Harlem Globetrotters exhibition basketball team by the members. In 1999, she received the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation Vanguard Award for her continued work in supporting the gay and lesbian community, as well as the Women in Film Crystal Award for outstanding women who, through their endurance and the excellence of their work, have helped to expand the role of women within the entertainment industry. In July 2010, the Ride of Fame honored Goldberg with a double-decker tour bus in New York City for her life's achievements. In 2017, Goldberg was named a Disney Legend for her contributions to the Walt Disney Company.

Discography

 * 1985: Original Broadway Recording (Geffen/Warner Bros. Records)
 * 1985: The Color Purple (Qwest/Warner Bros. Records)
 * 1988: Fontaine: Why Am I Straight? (MCA Records)
 * 1989: The Long Walk Home (Miramax Films)
 * 1992: Sarafina (Qwest/Warner Bros. Records)
 * 1992: Sister Act – Soundtrack (Hollywood/Elektra Records)
 * 1993: Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit – Soundtrack (Hollywood/Elektra Records)
 * 1994: Corrina Corrina (New Line Cinema)
 * 2001: Call Me Claus (One Ho Productions)
 * 2005: Live on Broadway: The 20th Anniversary Show (DRG Records)

title: Whoopi Goldberg


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What is "Battle Item Museum" and why was these images uploaded to wikipedia? I can't think of how this might be encyclopedic so please explain why it is. --maveric149

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

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Assembly

Assembly may refer to:

Organisations and meetings

 * Deliberative assembly, a gathering of members who use parliamentary procedure for making decisions
 * General assembly, an official meeting of the members of an organization or of their representatives
 * House of Assembly, a name given to the legislature or lower house of a bicameral legislature
 * National Assembly, either a legislature or the lower house of a bicameral legislature in some countries
 * National Assembly (disambiguation)
 * Popular assembly, a localized citizen gathering to address issues of importance to the community
 * Qahal, or assembly, an Israelite organizational structure
 * People's Assembly (disambiguation)
 * Assembly of Experts, the deliberative body empowered to designate and dismiss the Supreme Leader of Iran
 * Freedom of assembly, the individual right to come together and collectively express, promote, pursue and defend common interests
 * School assembly, a gathering of all or part of a school

Science, technology and manufacturing

 * Assembly, the act of combining components in manufacturing, or the resulting assemblage
 * Assembly modelling, technology and methods used by computer-aided design and product visualization software
 * Assembly line, a manufacturing process in which parts are added to a product in a sequential manner
 * Self-assembly, a process in which disordered components form an organized structure without external direction
 * Sequence assembly, a process to reconstruct a long DNA sequence from numerous fragments
 * Assembly rules, set of controversial rules in ecology proposed by Jared Diamond to explain species community composition
 * Assembly of a virion (Virology)

Computing

 * Assembly language, a programming language providing symbolic representation of machine code
 * Assembly (programming), a runtime unit of types and resources with the same version
 * Assembly (CLI), an XML wrapper around a compiled code library (the XML-wrapped-library itself is also sometimes referred to as an assembly) used for deployment, versioning, and security
 * Assembly (demo party), an annual computer event in Finland

Arts and entertainment

 * Assemble (collective), a London-based collective active in art, architecture and design
 * Assembly (events promoter), one of the main programmers at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe
 * Assembly (film), a 2007 Chinese war drama
 * Assembly (TV series), a 2015 television series

Music

 * Assemble (album), an album by Grown at Home
 * Assembly (bugle call), a call used to bring in a group of soldiers
 * Assembly (John Foxx album), 1992
 * Assembly (Theatre of Tragedy album)
 * The Assembly, a synth pop project started in 1983
 * Assembly, a 2021 compilation album by Joe Strummer

Other uses

 * Assembly station, a rapid transit station in Boston, Massachusetts, US
 * Assembly Bristol, an office block in England, UK

title: Assembly


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What is "filelist.PHP" and why was this uploaded to wikipedia? This file doesn't appear to be the kind we alow on our servers. Please explain how this is being used for wikipedia. --maveric149
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Marillion

Marillion are  a British neo prog band, formed in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, in 1979. They emerged from the post-punk music scene in Britain and existed as a bridge between the styles of punk rock and classic progressive rock, becoming the most commercially successful neo-prog band of the 1980s.

Marillion released their debut single "Market Square Heroes" in 1982, followed by their first album Script for a Jester's Tear in 1983. They have released 20 studio albums in total. The band's history is generally regarded in two distinct eras, separated by the departure of original lead singer Fish in late 1988 and the arrival of his replacement Steve Hogarth in early 1989. Marillion achieved eight Top 10 UK albums between 1983 and 1994, including a No. 1 album in 1985 with Misplaced Childhood. The album also produced two UK Top 10 singles in "Kayleigh" (No. 2) and "Lavender" (No. 5), while the follow-up album, 1987's Clutching at Straws (the last studio album with Fish), included another UK Top 10 single "Incommunicado" (No. 6). Altogether, during the Fish era, Marillion scored 11 Top 40 hits on the UK Singles Chart. "Kayleigh" also entered the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States.

Marillion's first album with Hogarth, 1989's Seasons End, was another Top 10 hit, and albums continued to chart well until their departure from EMI Records following the release of their 1996 live album Made Again and the dissipation of the band's mainstream popularity in the late 1990s; save for a resurgence in the mid- to late-2000s, they have essentially been a cult act since then. Since the arrival of Hogarth, Marillion have achieved a further 12 Top 40 hit singles in the UK, including 2004's "You're Gone" from the album Marbles, which charted at No. 7 and is the biggest hit of the Hogarth era. In 2016, the album Fuck Everyone and Run (F E A R) returned them to the UK Albums Chart Top 10 for the first time since 1994's Brave. Their most recent album, 2022's An Hour Before It's Dark, entered the UK Albums Chart at No. 2, their highest chart position since Clutching at Straws in 1987. Marillion continue to tour internationally, becoming ranked 38th in Classic Rock's "50 Best Live Acts of All Time" in 2008.

Despite unpopularity in the mainstream media and a consistently unfashionable status within the British music industry, Marillion have maintained a very loyal international fanbase, becoming widely acknowledged as playing a pioneering role in the development of crowdfunding and fan-funded music. They have sold over 15 million albums worldwide.

Formation and early years (1978–1982)
In 1977, drummer Mick Pointer joined Electric Gypsy, which also included Doug Irvine on bass, Alan King on vocals and Andy Glass (later of Solstice) on guitar. Pointer and Irvine left to form their own band, Silmarillion, named after J.R.R. Tolkien's book The Silmarillion, in late 1978. They played one London show as an instrumental band with Neil Cockle (keys) and Martin Jenner (guitar). 1979 saw a new line-up of Mick Pointer, Steve Rothery (guitar), Doug Irvine (bass/vocals) and Brian Jelliman (keys). They played their first concert at Berkhamsted Civic Centre, Hertfordshire, on 1 March 1980. According to Pointer, it was at this stage that the name was shortened to Marillion.

Other sources have that the band name was shortened to Marillion in 1981 to avoid potential copyright conflicts, at the same time as singer Fish and bassist William 'Diz' Minnitt replaced original bassist/vocalist Doug Irvine following an audition at Leyland Farm Studios in Buckinghamshire on 2 January 1981. The line-up of Rothery, Pointer, Jelliman, Fish, and Minnitt performed their first gig at the Red Lion Pub at 35 Market Square in Bicester on 14 March 1981. Many years after his departure from Marillion, Irvine eventually joined the band Steam Shed.

By the end of 1981, Mark Kelly had replaced Jelliman on keyboards, with Pete Trewavas replacing Minnitt on bass in 1982. Minnitt later formed Pride of Passion and went on to perform with Zealey and Moore.

Marillion's first recordings were two demos recorded in March and the summer of 1980, before Fish and Minnitt joined the band. Two versions of the Spring demo circulate amongst collectors; the first has four tracks; "The Haunting of Gill House", "Herne the Hunter", an untitled track known as "Scott's Porridge", and "Alice". The second version has an instrumental version of "Alice" in place of "Scott's Porridge". All tracks are instrumental apart from "Alice", with vocals by Doug Irvine. The summer demo has three tracks; "Close" (parts of which were later rewritten into "The Web", "He Knows You Know" and "Chelsea Monday"), "Lady Fantasy" (an original based on an earlier Electric Gypsy song), and another version of "Alice". Both were recorded at The Enid's studio in Hertfordshire. Following Irvine's departure and replacement by Fish and Minnitt, the band recorded another demo tape, produced by Les Payne, in July 1981 that included early versions of "He Knows You Know", "Garden Party", and "Charting the Single".

The group attracted attention with a radio session for the Friday Rock Show. They were subsequently signed by EMI Records. They released their first single, "Market Square Heroes", in 1982, with the 17-minute epic "Grendel" on the B-side of the 12" version. Following the single, the band released their first full-length album in 1983.

Script for a Jester's Tear and Fugazi (1983–1984)
The music on their debut album, Script for a Jester's Tear, was born out of the intensive performances of the previous years. Featuring a dark and progressive rock sound, the album was a commercial success, peaking at No. 7 on the UK album chart and producing the singles "He Knows You Know" (No. 35) and "Garden Party" (No. 16). Although they were accused of being Genesis soundalikes, the album reached the Platinum certification and has been credited with giving a second life to progressive rock bands from the previous era.

In April 1983, following the UK tour to promote Script for a Jester's Tear, Mick Pointer was dismissed due to Fish's dissatisfaction with what he later described as the drummer's "awful" timing and failure to develop as a musician with the rest of the band. Over the next six months, three drummers passed through the band - original Camel drummer Andy Ward, followed by John 'Martyr' Marter, followed by Jonathan Mover - before Ian Mosley, who had played for acts including Darryl Way's Wolf, Trace, Gordon Giltrap, and Steve Hackett, was secured in October 1983. The second album Fugazi, released in early 1984, was written during this period of upheaval in the band's lineup, with the recording beset by production problems. Despite this, the album built upon the success of Script for a Jester's Tear, with a more streamlined hard rock sound. It improved on the chart placing of its predecessor by reaching the Top 5 and produced the singles "Punch and Judy" (No. 29) and "Assassing" (No. 22).

In November 1984, Marillion released their first live album, Real to Reel, featuring songs from Fugazi and Script for a Jester's Tear, as well as "Cinderella Search" (B-side to "Assassing") and the debut single "Market Square Heroes", which had not been available on album until that point. Real to Reel entered the UK album charts at No. 8.

Misplaced Childhood and international success (1985–1986)
Their third and commercially most successful studio album was Misplaced Childhood, which had a more mainstream sound. The lead single from the album, "Kayleigh", received major promotion by EMI and gained heavy rotation on BBC Radio 1 and Independent Local Radio stations as well as television appearances, bringing the band to the attention of a much wider audience. "Kayleigh" reached No. 2 in the UK and "Lavender" reached No. 5; these remain the only singles by the band to enter the Top 5.

Following the exposure given to "Kayleigh" and its subsequent chart success, the album became their only No. 1 in the UK, knocking Bryan Ferry's Boys and Girls off the top spot and holding off a challenge from Sting, whose first solo album, The Dream of the Blue Turtles, entered the chart in the same week. The third single from the album, "Heart of Lothian", became another Top 30 hit for the band, reaching No. 29. The album came sixth in Kerrang! magazine's "Albums of the Year" in 1985. "Kayleigh" also gave Marillion its sole entry on the Billboard Hot 100, reaching No. 74. In the summer of 1986, the band played to their biggest ever audience as special guests to Queen at a festival in Germany attended by a crowd of over 150,000 people. They were also offered the Highlander soundtrack but turned it down because of their world tour, a missed opportunity which Rothery later said he regretted.

Clutching at Straws and the departure of Fish (1987–1988)
The fourth studio album, Clutching at Straws, shed some of its predecessor's pop stylings and retreated into a darker exploration of excess, alcoholism, and life on the road, representing the strains of constant touring that would result in the departure of Fish to pursue a solo career. It did continue the group's commercial success, however; lead single "Incommunicado" charted at No. 6 in the UK, gaining the band an appearance on Top of the Pops, and the album entered the UK album chart at No. 2. "Sugar Mice" and "Warm Wet Circles" also became hit singles, both reaching No. 22. Fish has also stated in interviews since that he believes this was the best album he made with the band. The album came sixth in Kerrang! magazine's "Albums of the Year" in 1987, equalling the ranking given to Misplaced Childhood. It was also included in Q magazine's "50 Best Recordings of the Year". Fish made the decision to leave the group after this tour, explaining his reasons for departing in a 2003 interview:

"'By 1987 we were over-playing live because the manager was on 20 per cent of the gross. He was making a fantastic amount of money while we were working our asses off. Then I found a bit of paper proposing an American tour. At the end of the day the band would have needed a £14,000 loan from EMI as tour support to do it. That was when I knew that, if I stayed with the band, I'd probably end up a raging alcoholic and be found overdosed and dying in a big house in Oxford with Irish wolfhounds at the bottom of my bed.'"

Fish gave the band a choice to continue with either him or the manager, John Arnison. They sided with the manager and Fish left for a solo career. His last live performance with Marillion was at Craigtoun Country Park on 23 July 1988. The band's second live album, The Thieving Magpie, was released in late 1988, marking the end of an era.

Aftermath
Owing to lengthy legal battles, informal contact between Fish and the other four band members apparently did not resume until 1999. Fish would disclose in the liner notes to the remastered edition of Clutching at Straws that he and his former bandmates had met up, discussed the demise of the band and renewed their friendship. They had come to the consensus that an excessive touring schedule and too much pressure from the band's management led to the rift.

Although reportedly now on good personal terms, both camps had always made it very clear that the oft-speculated-upon reunion would never happen. When Fish headlined the 'Hobble on the Cobbles' free concert in Aylesbury's Market Square on 26 August 2007, the attraction of playing their debut single in its spiritual home proved strong enough to overcome any lingering bad feeling between the former bandmates, and Kelly, Mosley, Rothery, and Trewavas replaced Fish's backing band for an emotional encore of "Market Square Heroes".

In a press interview following the event, Fish denied this would lead to a full reunion, saying that: "Hogarth does a great job with the band. We forged different paths over the 19 years."

Seasons End and Holidays in Eden (1989–1992)
After the split, the band found Steve Hogarth, the former keyboardist and vocalist of the Europeans and the duo How We Live. Hogarth first sang with the band in Pete Trewavas' garage on 24 January 1989, and the first public pictures together were released in Kerrang! magazine issue 230 on 18 March 1989. Hogarth was a significant contrast to Fish, coming from a new wave musical background instead of progressive rock, and possessing a very different vocal style, image and stage presence. He had also never owned a Marillion album before joining the band.

The group had already recorded some demos of the next studio album, which was eventually titled Seasons End, just prior to the split. With Fish taking his lyrics with him, Hogarth set to work crafting new words to existing songs, collaborating with lyricist and author John Helmer. The demo sessions of the songs from Seasons End with Fish vocals and lyrics can be found on the bonus disc of the remastered version of Clutching at Straws, while those lyrics found their way into various Fish solo albums, such as his first album Vigil in a Wilderness of Mirrors, some snippets on his second album Internal Exile, and even a line or two found its way to his third album Suits.

The first time Marillion would appear in public with Steve Hogarth as the new singer was under the banner of Low Fat Yoghurts, at the Crooked Billet pub in Stoke Row, on 8 June 1989. Only about 100 fans attended that Crooked Billet show, while considerably more attended Hogarth's official introduction to fans at the recording of the promo video for "Hooks in You" at London's Brixton Academy on 1 August that year. Hogarth's first proper concert with Marillion was at the Palais des Sports in Besançon, France on 5 October following the release of Seasons End. The band ended 1989 with their traditional Christmas show at London's Hammersmith Odeon, and kicked off 1990 with the beginning of the Seasons End world tour, in front of 180,000 people at Hollywood Rock Festival in Rio de Janeiro in January, then rolling through Canada and North America before returning to Europe. The tour would prove to be the longest that Hogarth has thus far undertaken with Marillion. The tour ended in the UK in July, with a sold out show at Wembley Arena, highlighting how successful the shift from Fish to the new frontman Hogarth had been.

Hogarth's second album with the band, Holidays in Eden, was the first he wrote in partnership with the band from the beginning, and includes the song "Dry Land", which Hogarth had written and recorded with his earlier duo, How We Live. As quoted from Steve Hogarth, "Holidays in Eden was to become Marillion's "pop"est album ever, and was greeted with delight by many, and dismay by some of the hardcore fans". EMI also wanted Marillon to deliver three hit singles from the album.

Marillion returned to their pseudonym Low Fat Yoghurts in December 1990 to preview their forthcoming album at the Moles club in Bath, Somerset. Holidays in Eden wouldn't be released until June 1991, and was followed by a headlining appearance at the second and final Cumbria Rock Festival at Derwent Park in Workington 13 July 1991. The Cumbria appearance kick-started another lengthy world tour that would see the band course through the UK, before venturing through Europe and returning to the UK for some Christmas shows. At the beginning of 1992 the band built their own recording and rehearsal studio, The Racket Club, in Buckinghamshire. March and April 1992 saw Marillion back touring Canada and America, before returning to the UK for an exclusive and intimate 10th Anniversary show at London's Borderline for members of their The Web fan club on 9 May 1992, followed by another European tour in August.

Marillion returned to the UK to headline Wembley Arena, for what would ultimately be the final time for the band, on 5 September 1992. The 1992 tour wound up in Baltimore, USA on 23 October. 1992 also saw the release of a 10th anniversary compilation album, A Singles Collection: Six of One, Half A Dozen of the Other, so-titled as it included six tracks from the Fish era and six from the two albums with Hogarth. It also included two new recordings, "I Will Walk on Water" and a cover of Rare Bird's "Sympathy". "Sympathy" was also released as a single and it reached No. 17 in the UK charts, the first time the band had been inside the singles Top 20 since "Incommunicado". Marillion would play only one live show in 1993, a fan club gig at Tivoli Theatre in Utrecht on 19 June, as a duo with only Hogarth and Trewavas. The band spent most of 1993 recording what would become one of the most significant albums of their history.

Brave, Afraid of Sunlight and split with EMI Records (1993–1995)
Brave was released on 7 February 1994. A dark and richly complex concept album inspired by a true news story, it took the band 18 months to write and record and marked the start of their longtime relationship with producer Dave Meegan.

Some of the material had been aired at that sole 1993 show in Utrecht, and was also previewed at low-key gigs in the Netherlands, Italy, and Germany before Marillion kicked off the Brave world tour at Liverpool's Royal Court Theatre on 20 February 1994. The Brave tour was another lengthy one, and the band undertook the move to perform the whole of their new album in its entirety (as they had done with Misplaced Childhood just under a decade earlier). However, this meant the inevitable relegating of some Fish-era songs from the set. After a series of summer shows in Japan, the Brave tour wound its way down to Mexico in September. An independent film based on the album, which featured the band, was also released in February 1995. The film was directed by Richard Stanley.

The band's next album, Afraid of Sunlight, was released June 1995. It would be Marillion's last studio album with EMI Records. It received limited promotion, no mainstream radio airplay and the sales were disappointing for the band. Despite this, it was one of their most critically acclaimed albums and was included in Q's 50 Best Albums of 1995. A particularly notable track on the album is "Out of This World", a song about Donald Campbell, who died while trying to set a speed record on water. The song inspired an effort to recover both Campbell's body and the "Bluebird K7", the boat which Campbell crashed in, from the water. The recovery was finally undertaken in 2001, and both Steve Hogarth and Steve Rothery were invited. In 1998, Steve Hogarth said he considered Afraid of Sunlight the best album he made with the band.

On 2 August 1995, Marillion began their Afraid of Sunlight tour in USA at the Bayou in Washington DC. They returned to the UK and Europe before ending the tour in Krakow, Poland on 21 November 1995.

This Strange Engine, Radiation and marillion.com (1996–1999)
The band's independent status was confirmed with signing a deal to the UK-based Castle. The first album to be released through Castle was the band's third live album (the first with Hogarth) Made Again. Not only did it release Marillion from its obligations with EMI (as the fifth album in a five-album deal), as well as paying off the debts without creating new ones, it marked a certain symmetry with the first seven years of the band. Mark Kelly noted: "Our first four studio albums were followed by a double live album that signalled the end of a chapter. Now, after another four studio albums, followed by a live album, we move from EMI." Featuring Brave in its entirety, Made Again was released 25 March 1996 as the final EMI-era Marillion release in the UK, with Castle handling the release in mainland Europe and the US. The release was followed by a brief tour with four dates in Europe at the end of April.

In the months prior, Rothery, Hogarth and Mosley used the break from Marillion to record separate solo projects. Mosley's project, IRIS, with French guitarist Sylvian Gouvernaire and Trewavas, released Crossing the Desert, on 22 April 1996. Rothery's project with the female singer Hannah Stobart, drummer Paul Craddick (from Enchant) and Trewavas, called The Wishing Tree, released their album Carnival of Souls in September 1996. Hogarth released his solo album Ice Cream Genius in February 1997.

This Strange Engine was the following Marillion album released in April 1997 in the UK, and in October in the US, with limited promotion from their new label Castle. Marillion could not afford to make tour stops in the United States. Their dedicated US fan base decided to solve the problem by raising some $60,000 themselves online to give to the band to come to the US. The band's loyal fanbase (combined with the Internet) would eventually become vital to their existence. Following the completion of the extensive 1997 tour (including Marillion's one-thousandth gig, on 27 October at the Amsterdam Paradiso), the band returned to their own studio, The Racket Club, in November. During 1997 to 1999, EMI issued 2-CD remastered editions of Marillion's first eight studio albums (Script for a Jester's Tear through Afraid of Sunlight), each with a second CD of non-album tracks and other archival recordings.

The band's tenth album, Radiation, released on 21 September 1998, saw them taking a different approach and was received by fans with mixed reactions. The short Radiation tour, with only dates in the UK and mainland Europe, ended on 18 November 1998 at the Élysée Montmartre in Paris.

marillion.com was the follow-up, released on 18 October 1999, and showed progression in a new musical direction. However, the band were still unhappy with their record label situation. Under the terms of the deal, this was to be the third and final album distributed on the Castle label. The Dot Com tour, again with dates only in the UK and mainland Europe, started on 13 October at the MCM Cafe in Paris, and ended with a special Christmas show for the Web fanclubs worldwide in Aachen, Germany on 5 December 1999. For the whole of 2000, the band were writing the next album at the Racket Club and in November 2000 they played 2 Charity gigs at Bass Museum in Burton-on-Trent, before playing some more Christmas shows for their European fan clubs. Marillion needed a new strategy, and following the release of three albums via Castle, they came up with a novel approach for their next album.

Anoraknophobia and Marbles (2000–2006)
The band decided that they would try a radical experiment by asking their fans if they would help fund the recording of the next album by pre-ordering it before recording even started. The result was 12,674 pre-orders, which raised enough money to record and release Anoraknophobia in the beginning of May 2001. As a 'thank-you' gesture to the fans who pre-ordered it, their names were credited in the sleeve notes and the pre-order "Special Edition" came in a deluxe 48-page hard-bound case with an extra enhanced CD. The band was able to strike a deal with EMI to also help distribute the album. This allowed Marillion to retain all the rights to their music while enjoying commercial distribution. The band went on tour which started in May 2001. A second leg of the tour (with a setlist largely decided by a poll of the fans) reached places that had never been played before, such as in the Azores at Ponta Delgada 22 September 2001. A US Tour was still not a possibility. A four-part BBC documentary 'The Future Just Happened' aired in the UK on BBC2 in the Summer 2001. Featured in Episode 3 was Marillion's revolutionary internet pre-order campaign for Anoraknophobia. The band released its fourth live album, entitled Anorak in the UK, in 2002.

April 2002 marked a new era of Marillion fandom. The band decided to book out a holiday camp and invite their fanbase to enjoy three entire days of Marillion with three concerts, signing sessions, and more. The hallmark of the weekend was the first night which hosts the entire rendition of an album of Marillion's choice. The Marillion weekends began at Pontin's Holiday Park, Brean Sands in the West Country, to which fans would fly in from all over the world. In March 2003 they continued and held the Marillion weekend at Butlin's Minehead.

The success of Anoraknophobia allowed the band to start recording their next album, but they decided to leverage their fanbase once again to help raise money towards marketing and promotion of a new album. The band put up the album for pre-order in mid-production. This time fans responded by pre-ordering 18,000 copies.

Marbles was released at the end of April 2004 with a 2-CD version that was only available at Marillion's website. The pre-order version (known as the Deluxe Campaign Edition) of Marbles was packaged as a 128-page hard-bound book, packed in a rigid slip case. Those who purchased the Deluxe Campaign Edition by the end of 31 December 2003 were directly helping the Campaign Fund, and as a "Thank You" their name was printed in the album credits (like with the previous album, Anoraknophobia). The band's management organised the biggest promotional schedule since they had left EMI and Steve Hogarth secured interviews with prominent broadcasters on BBC Radio, including Matthew Wright, Bob Harris, Stuart Maconie, Simon Mayo and Mark Lawson. Marbles also became the band's most critically acclaimed album since Afraid of Sunlight, prompting many positive reviews in the press. The band released "You're Gone" as the lead single from the album. Aware that it was unlikely to gain much mainstream radio airplay, the band released the single in three separate formats and encouraged fans to buy a copy of each to get the single into the UK Top Ten. The single reached No. 7, making it the first Marillion song to reach the UK Top 10 since "Incommunicado" in 1987 and the band's first Top 40 entry since "Beautiful" in 1995. The second single from the album, "Don't Hurt Yourself", reached No. 16. Following this, they released a download-only single, "The Damage (live)", recorded at the band's sell-out gig at the London Astoria. All of this succeeded in putting the band back in the public consciousness, making the campaign a success. In September 2004, Marillion returned for shows in Mexico, USA and ended in Canada Quebec City on 13 October 2004.

Marillion continued to tour throughout 2005, playing several summer festivals and embarking on acoustic tours of both Europe and the United States, followed up by the "Not Quite Christmas Tour" of Europe throughout the end of 2005.

A new DVD, Colours and Sound, was released in February 2006, documenting the creation, promotion, release, and subsequent European tour in support of the album Marbles.

Somewhere Else and Happiness is the Road (2007–2008)
In February 2007, the Marillion weekend was held abroad for the first time in the Netherlands at Center Parcs, Port Zélande.

April 2007 saw Marillion release their fourteenth studio album Somewhere Else, their first album in 10 years to make the UK Top 30. The success of the album was further underscored by that of the download-only single "See it Like a Baby", making UK No. 45 (March 2007) and the traditional CD release of "Thankyou Whoever You Are" / "Most Toys", which made UK No. 15 and No. 6 in the Netherlands during June 2007. The Somewhere Else tour started in Gibraltar 14 April 2007, and they also played in some places they had never been before like Bratislava.

In July 2008, the band posted a contest for fans to create a music video for the soon-to-be released single "Whatever is Wrong with You", and post it on YouTube. The winner would win £5,000.

Happiness Is the Road, released in October 2008, again featured a pre-order Deluxe Edition with a list of the fans who bought in advance, and a more straightforward regular release. It is another double album, with one disc based on a concept and the second containing the other songs that are not a part of the theme. Before the album's release, on 9 September 2008, Marillion pre-released their album via p2p networks themselves. Upon attempting to play the downloaded files, users were shown a video from the band explaining why they had taken this route. Downloaders were then able to opt to purchase the album at a user-defined price or select to receive DRM-free files for free, in exchange for an email address. The band explained that although they do not support piracy, they realised their music would inevitably be distributed online anyway, and wanted to attempt to engage with p2p users and make the best of the situation.

Less is More and Sounds That Can't Be Made (2009–2014)
In April 2009, they took their Marillion weekend to Montreal for the first time.

The band's sixteenth studio album (released 2 October 2009) was an acoustic album featuring new arrangements of previously released tracks (except one, the new track "It's Not Your Fault") entitled Less Is More. In October Marillion started an acoustic European tour which ended with a show in Istanbul 4 March 2010.

Their seventeenth studio album, titled Sounds That Can't Be Made, was released in September 2012. Two versions of the album were released: A two-disc Deluxe Edition that included a DVD with 'making-of' features and sound-check recordings and a single CD jewel case version. The Deluxe Edition also included a 128-page book that incorporated lyrics, artwork and, as was the case with Anoraknophobia, Marbles and Happiness is the Road, the names of people who pre-ordered the album. Parts of the album were recorded at Peter Gabriel's Real World Studios in 2011.

Marillion were awarded "Band of the Year" at the annual Progressive Music Awards in 2013.

Fuck Everyone And Run (F E A R) and An Hour Before It's Dark (2015–present)
In September 2015, Marillion announced that they were working on a new album, provisionally titled M18 and later confirmed as Fuck Everyone And Run (F E A R). As with several of their previous releases, the recording of the album was to be funded by fan pre-orders, this time through direct-to-fan website PledgeMusic. The album was released on 23 September 2016 debuting at No. 4 in the official UK charts of 30 September 2016, their highest placing since Clutching at Straws nearly three decades earlier. In November 2016, they announced their first ever show at the Royal Albert Hall in London, in October 2017. The gig sold out in just 4 minutes and was filmed for DVD release. They also won "UK Band of the Year" at the 2017 Progressive Music Awards.

In May 2017, Marillion took their Marillion Weekend to Santiago, Chile for the first time. In February 2018 Marillion returned to tour in the US and also played shows in Japan in September. In March 2018, the film of the Royal Albert Hall gig was premiered at cinemas around the UK, before the DVD launch, with the band attending the showing in London. On 6 April the concert was released as All One Tonight – Live at the Royal Albert Hall.

In March 2018, Hogarth was involved with fellow musician Howard Jones in helping to unveil a memorial to David Bowie, which is situated close to Aylesbury's Market Square. The memorial was the inspiration of promoter David Stopps, who booked Bowie to appear at the Friars Aylesbury where he debuted his Ziggy Stardust persona. The bulk of the funds for the memorial were raised at a gig held at the Waterside Theatre in Aylesbury on the evening of the unveiling which Marillion headlined, alongside Jones, John Otway and the Dung Beatles, all of whom have close association to Aylesbury and in particular, the Friars.

In early 2019, Marillion entered the studio with the intention to record songs from their catalogue with friends from the orchestra who played with the band at the Royal Albert Hall shows in 2017. With Friends from the Orchestra was recorded at The Racket Club and Peter Gabriel's Real World Studios and features reimagined versions of songs accompanied by the In Praise of Folly String Quartet with Sam Morris on French horn and Emma Halnan on flute. The album was released 29 November 2019. In November and December 2019, the orchestra followed Marillion on tour in the UK, returning for two nights at the Royal Albert Hall, and they also played shows in the Netherlands, France, Italy and Germany.

On 3 August 2021, Marillion announced their new pre-order campaign for a new studio album, entitled An Hour Before It's Dark. The album was released on 4 March 2022.

In 2021, Marillion asked their fans to insure their 10-date Light at the End of the Tunnel Tour in November. Manager Lucy Jordache said: "We're asking our fans to pledge money that will be held in escrow and if it all goes Covid free, it will be returned to them at the end of the tour. But if we do have to cancel, then their money will be used to pay the band's unavoidable expenses." The band had already invested more than £150,000 on preparations, but risked losing it all if just one member tested positive for COVID-19 and was forced to isolate. The tour was a success, and the donations were refunded to the fans who were named "Lightsavers".

Line-up, influences and sound changes
Marillion's music has changed stylistically throughout their career. The band themselves stated that each new album tends to represent a reaction to the preceding one, and for this reason their output is difficult to 'pigeonhole'. Although the band has featured two very distinct and different vocalists, the core instrumental line-up of Steve Rothery (lead guitar, and the sole 'pre-Fish' original member), Pete Trewavas (bass), Mark Kelly (keyboards) and Ian Mosley (drums) has been unchanged since 1984.

Their 1980s sound (with Fish on vocals) was guitar and keyboard-led neo-prog. They have been described at their outset as "a bridge between punk and classic progressive rock". Guitarist Steve Rothery wrote most of the music during the period Fish was in the band. Iron Maiden guitarist Janick Gers commented, "What I love so much about Marillion is that they could be very strong and powerful and have very quiet passages, but the powerful stuff was really edgy and heavy... I just thought he (Fish) wrote good lyrics, and they wrote good music, and it fit together effortlessly."

They were often compared unfavourably by critics during the Fish era with the Peter Gabriel era of Genesis, although the band had many other influences. Fish was influenced by a wide range of artists and his favourite albums were by artists such as Van der Graaf Generator, Joni Mitchell, the Who, Pink Floyd, John Martyn, Yes, Lowell George, Led Zeppelin, Roy Harper, the Faces, the Beatles and Supertramp. Rothery's main influences were Jimi Hendrix, Carlos Santana, David Gilmour, Andrew Latimer of Camel, Steve Hackett, Jeff Beck and Joni Mitchell, with Gordon Giltrap also an early influence on the development of his playing style. Kelly's biggest inspiration was Yes keyboardist Rick Wakeman, and Trewavas' favourite bass player was Paul McCartney. Original drummer Mick Pointer was a huge fan of Neil Peart's drumming in his favourite band, Rush.

During the Steve Hogarth era, their sound has been compared, on various albums, to more contemporary acts such as U2, Radiohead, Coldplay, Muse, Talk Talk, Elbow, and Massive Attack. In 2016, Hogarth himself was quoted as describing the band: "If Pink Floyd and Radiohead had a love child that was in touch with their feminine side, they would be us." According to an interview with Rothery in 2016, many of their later albums with Hogarth had been written by jamming.

In the media
The chief music critic of The Guardian, Alexis Petridis, has described Marillion as "perennially unfashionable prog-rockers". On the subject of joining the band in 1989, Steve Hogarth said in a 2001 interview: "At about the same time, Matt Johnson of The The asked me to play piano on his tour. I always say I had to make a choice between the most hip band in the world, and the least." In the same conversation, he said: "We're just tired of the opinions of people who haven't heard anything we've done in ten years. A lot of what's spread about this band is laughable."

Much of the band's enduring and unfashionable reputation stems from their emergence in the early 1980s as the most commercially successful band of the neo-prog movement, an unexpected revival of the progressive rock musical style that had fallen out of critical favour in the mid-1970s. Some early critics were quick to dismiss the band as clones of Peter Gabriel-era Genesis due to musical similarities, such as their extended songs, a prominent and Mellotron-influenced keyboard sound, vivid and fantastical lyrics and the equally vivid and fantastical artwork by Mark Wilkinson used for the sleeves of their albums and singles. Lead singer Fish was also often compared with Gabriel due to his early vocal style and theatrical stage performances, which in the early years included wearing face paint.

As Jon Wilde summarised in Melody Maker in 1989: "At the end of a strange year for pop music, Marillion appeared in November 1982 with 'Market Square Heroes'. There were many strange things about 1982, but Marillion were the strangest of them all. For six years, they stood out of time. Marillion were the unhippest group going. As punk was becoming a distant echo, they appeared with a sound and an attitude that gazed back longingly to the age of Seventies pomp. When compared to Yes, Genesis and ELP, they would take it as a compliment. The Eighties have seen some odd phenomena. But none quite as odd as Marillion. Along the way, as if by glorious fluke, they turned out some singles that everybody quietly liked – 'Garden Party', 'Punch and Judy' and 'Incommunicado'. By this time, Marillion did not need the support of the hip-conscious. They were massive. Perhaps the oddest thing about Marillion was that they became one of the biggest groups of the decade. They might have been an anomaly but they were monstrously effective."

The band's unfashionable reputation and image has often been mentioned in the media, even in otherwise positive reviews. In Q in 1987, David Hepworth wrote: "Marillion may represent the inelegant, unglamorous, public bar end of the current Rock Renaissance but they are no less part of it for that. Clutching at Straws suggests that they may be finally coming in from the cold." In the same magazine in 1995, Dave Henderson wrote: "It's not yet possible to be sacked for showing an affinity for Marillion, but has there ever been a band with a larger stigma attached?" He also argued that if the album Afraid of Sunlight "had been made by a new, no baggage-of-the-past combo, it would be greeted with open arms, hailed as virtual genius." In Record Collector in 2002, Tim Jones argued they were "one of the most unfairly berated bands in Britain" and "one of its best live rock acts." In 2004, Classic Rock's Jon Hotten wrote: "That genre thing has been a bugbear of Marillion's, but it no longer seems relevant. What are Radiohead if not a progressive band?" and said Marillion were "making strong, singular music with the courage of their convictions, and we should treasure them more than we do." In the Q & Mojo Classic Special Edition Pink Floyd & The Story of Prog Rock, an article on Marillion written by Mick Wall described them as "probably the most misunderstood band in the world".

In 2007, Stephen Dalton of The Times stated: "The band have just released their 14th album, Somewhere Else, which is really rather good. Containing tracks that shimmer like Coldplay, ache like Radiohead and thunder like Muse, it is better than 80 per cent of this month's releases. But you are unlikely to hear Marillion on British radio, read about them in the music press or see them play a major festival. This is largely because Marillion have – how can we put this kindly? – an image problem. Their music is still perceived as bloated, bombastic mullet-haired prog-rock, even by people who have never heard it. In fairness, they did once release an album called Script for a Jester's Tear. But, come on, we all had bad hair days in the 1980s."

Despite publishing a very good review for their 1995 album Afraid of Sunlight and including it in their 50 Best Albums of 1995, Q refused to interview the band or write a feature on them. Steve Hogarth later said: "How can they say, this is an amazing record... no, we don't want to talk to you? It's hard to take when they say, here's a very average record... we'll put you on the front cover."

In 2001, the television critic of The Guardian, Gareth McLean, used his review of the Michael Lewis BBC Two documentary, Next: The Future Just Happened, to concentrate on launching a scathing attack on the band, whose appearance only constituted one segment of the programme. He described them as "once dodgy and now completely rubbish" and he characterised their fans as "slightly simple folks". He also dismissed the band's efforts to continue their career without a label by dealing directly with their fans on the Internet, writing: "One suspects that their decision occurred round about the time that the record industry decided to shun Marillion."

Rachel Cooke, a writer for The Observer and New Statesman, has repeatedly referred negatively to the band and insulted their fans in her articles.

In an interview in 2000, Hogarth expressed regret about the band retaining their name after he joined: "If we had known when I joined Marillion what we know now, we'd have changed the name and been a new band. It was a mistake to keep the name, because what it represented in the mid-Eighties is a millstone we now carry. If we'd changed it, I think we would have been better off. We would have been judged for our music. It's such a grave injustice that the media constantly calls us a 'dinosaur prog band'. They only say that out of ignorance because they haven't listened to anything we've done for the last 15 bloody years. If you hear anything we've done in the last five or six years, that description is totally irrelevant... It's a massive frustration that no-one will play our stuff. If we send our single to Radio 1 they say: 'Sorry, we don't play music by bands who are over so-many years old... and here's the new U2 single.' I suppose it's something everyone has to cope with – every band are remembered for their big hit single, irrespective of how much they change over the years. But you can only transcend that by continuing to have hits. It's Catch 22. You know, at some stage, someone has to notice that we're doing interesting things. Someday someone will take a retrospective look at us and be surprised."

The 2013 film Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa includes a joke reference to a former drummer of the band. The band were quoted: "We know Marillion are seen as 'uncool' but we were delighted to be a part of it."

Crowdfunding pioneers
Marillion are widely considered to have been one of the first mainstream acts to have fully recognised and tapped the potential for commercial musicians to interact with their fans via the internet, starting in around 1996, and are nowadays often characterised as a rock & roll 'Web Cottage Industry'. The history of the band's use of the Internet is described by Michael Lewis in the book Next: The Future Just Happened as an example of how the Internet is shifting power away from established elites, such as multinational record labels and record producers.

The band are renowned for having an extremely dedicated following (often self-termed 'Freaks'), with some fans regularly travelling significant distances to attend single gigs, driven in large part by the close fan base involvement which the band cultivate via their website, podcasts, biennial conventions and regular fanclub publications. The release of their 2001 album Anoraknophobia, which was funded by their fans through advance orders instead of by the band signing to a record company, gained significant attention and was called "a unique funding campaign" by the BBC. Writing for The Guardian, Alexis Petridis described Marillion as "the undisputed pioneers" of fan-funded music.

Touring

 * Cori Josias - backing vocals (1987)
 * Leon Parr - drums (2014)
 * Riccardo Romano - keyboards (2018)
 * Luís Jardim - percussion (2022-2023)
 * Nick Beggs – bass guitar, backing vocals (2024)

Discography

 * Studio Albums
 * Script for a Jester's Tear (1983)
 * Fugazi (1984)
 * Misplaced Childhood (1985)
 * Clutching at Straws (1987)
 * Seasons End (1989)
 * Holidays in Eden (1991)
 * Brave (1994)
 * Afraid of Sunlight (1995)
 * This Strange Engine (1997)
 * Radiation (1998)
 * marillion.com (1999)
 * Anoraknophobia (2001)
 * Marbles (2004)
 * Somewhere Else (2007)
 * Happiness Is the Road (2008)
 * Less Is More (2009)
 * Sounds That Can't Be Made (2012)
 * Fuck Everyone and Run (F E A R) (2016)
 * With Friends from the Orchestra (2019)
 * An Hour Before It's Dark (2022)

title: Marillion


text:
Mantoux test

The Mantoux test or Mendel–Mantoux test (also known as the Mantoux screening test, tuberculin sensitivity test, Pirquet test, or PPD test for purified protein derivative) is a tool for screening for tuberculosis (TB) and for tuberculosis diagnosis. It is one of the major tuberculin skin tests used around the world, largely replacing multiple-puncture tests such as the tine test. The Heaf test, a form of tine test, was used until 2005 in the UK, when it was replaced by the Mantoux test. The Mantoux test is endorsed by the American Thoracic Society and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It was also used in the USSR and is now prevalent in most of the post-Soviet states, although Soviet mantoux produced many false positives due to children's allergic reaction.

History

Tuberculin is a glycerol extract of the tubercle bacillus. Purified protein derivative (PPD) tuberculin is a precipitate of species-nonspecific molecules obtained from filtrates of sterilized, concentrated cultures. The tuberculin reaction was first described by Robert Koch in 1890. The test was first developed and described by the German physician Felix Mendel in 1908. It is named after Charles Mantoux, a French physician who built on the work of Koch and Clemens von Pirquet to create his test in 1907. However, the test was unreliable due to impurities in tuberculin which tended to cause false results.

Esmond R. Long and Florence B. Seibert identified the active agent in tuberculin as a protein. Seibert then spent a number of years developing methods for separating and purifying the protein from Mycobacterium tuberculosis, obtaining purified protein derivative (PPD) and enabling the creation of a reliable test for tuberculosis. Her first publication on the purification of tuberculin appeared in 1934. By the 1940s, Seibert's PPD was the international standard for tuberculin tests. In 1939, Russian M.A. Linnikova created a modified version of PPD. In 1954, the Soviet Union started mass production of PPD-L, named after Linnikova.

Procedure
In the Mantoux test, a standard dose of 5 tuberculin units (TU - 0.1 ml), according to the CDC, or 2 TU of Statens Serum Institute (SSI) tuberculin RT23 in 0.1 ml solution, according to the National Health Service, is injected intradermally (between the layers of dermis) on the flexor surface of the left forearm, mid-way between elbow and wrist. The injection should be made with a tuberculin syringe, with the needle bevel facing upward. When placed correctly, injection should produce a pale wheal of the skin, 6 to 10 mm in diameter. The result of the test is read after 48–96 hours, ideally after 72 hours/3rd day. This procedure is termed the 'Mantoux technique'. A person who has been exposed to the bacteria would be expected to mount an immune response in the area of skin containing the bacterial proteins. This response is a classic example of 'delayed-type hypersensitivity reaction' (DTH), a type IV of hypersensitivities. T cells and myeloid cells are attracted to the site of reaction in 1–3 days and generate local inflammation. The reaction is read by measuring the diameter of induration (palpable raised, hardened area) across the forearm (perpendicular to the long axis) in millimeters. If there is no induration, the result should be recorded as "0 mm". Erythema (redness) should not be measured. In the Pirquet version of the test tuberculin is applied to the skin via scarification.

Classification of tuberculin reaction
The results of this test must be interpreted carefully. The person's medical risk factors determine at which increment (5 mm, 10 mm, or 15 mm) of induration the result is considered positive. A positive result indicates TB exposure.
 * 5 mm or more is positive in
 * An HIV-positive person
 * Persons with recent contacts with a TB patient
 * Persons with nodular or fibrotic changes on chest X-ray consistent with old healed TB
 * Patients with organ transplants, and other immunosuppressed patients
 * 10 mm or more is positive in
 * Recent arrivals (less than five years) from high-prevalence countries
 * Injection drug users
 * Residents and employees of high-risk congregate settings (e.g., prisons, nursing homes, hospitals, homeless shelters, etc.)
 * Mycobacteriology lab personnel
 * Persons with clinical conditions that place them at high risk (e.g., diabetes, prolonged corticosteroid therapy, leukemia, end-stage renal disease, chronic malabsorption syndromes, low body weight, etc.)
 * Children less than four years of age, or children and adolescents exposed to adults in high-risk categories
 * 15 mm or more is positive in
 * Persons with no known risk factors for TB

A tuberculin test conversion is defined as an increase of 10 mm or more within a two-year period, regardless of age. Alternative criteria include increases of 6, 12, 15 or 18 mm.

False positive result
TST (tuberculin skin test) positive is measured by size of induration. The size of the induration considered to be a positive result depends on risk factors. For example, a low-risk patient must have a larger induration for a positive result than a high-risk patient. High-risk groups include recent contacts, those with HIV, those with chest radiograph with fibrotic changes, organ transplant recipients, and those with immunosuppression.

According to the Ohio Department of Health and US Department of Health, the Bacillus Calmette–Guérin (BCG) vaccine does not protect against TB infection. It does, though, give 80% of children protection against tuberculous meningitis and miliary tuberculosis. Therefore, a positive TST/PPD in a person who has received BCG vaccine is interpreted as latent TB infection (LTBI). Due to the test's low specificity, most positive reactions in low-risk individuals are false positives. A false positive result may be caused by nontuberculous mycobacteria or previous administration of BCG vaccine. Vaccination with BCG may result in a false-positive result for many years after vaccination.

False positives can also occur when the injected area is touched, causing swelling and itching. If the swelling is less than 5 mm, it is possibly due to error by the healthcare personnel causing inflammation to the area.

Another source of false positive results can be allergic reaction or hypersensitivity. Although rare (about 0.08 reported reactions per million doses of tuberculin), these reactions can be dangerous and precautions should be taken by having epinephrin available.

False negative result
Reaction to the PPD or tuberculin test is suppressed by the following conditions: This is because the immune system needs to be functional to mount a response to the protein derivative injected under the skin. A false negative result may occur in a person who has been recently infected with TB, but whose immune system hasn't yet reacted to the bacteria. In case a second tuberculin test is necessary it should be carried out in the other arm to avoid hypersensitising the skin.
 * Recent TB infection (less than 8–10 weeks)
 * Infectious mononucleosis
 * Live virus vaccine - The test should not be carried out within 3 weeks of live virus vaccination (e. g. MMR vaccine or Sabin vaccine).
 * Sarcoidosis
 * Hodgkin's disease
 * Corticosteroid therapy/steroid use
 * Malnutrition
 * Immunological compromise - Those on immuno-suppressive treatment or those with HIV and low CD4 T cell counts, frequently show negative results from the PPD test.
 * Upper respiratory virus infection

BCG vaccine and the Mantoux test
The role of Mantoux testing in people who have been vaccinated is disputed. The US recommends that tuberculin skin testing is not contraindicated for BCG-vaccinated persons, and prior BCG vaccination should not influence the interpretation of the test. The UK recommends that interferon-γ testing should be used to help interpret positive Mantoux tests of over 5 mm, and repeated tuberculin skin testing must not be done in people who have had BCG vaccinations. In general, the US recommendation may result in a larger number of people being falsely diagnosed with latent tuberculosis, while the UK approach has an increased chance of missing patients with latent tuberculosis who should be treated.

According to the US guidelines, latent tuberculosis infection diagnosis and treatment is considered for any BCG-vaccinated person whose skin test is 10 mm or greater, if any of these circumstances are present:
 * Was in contact with another person with infectious TB
 * Was born or has lived in a high TB prevalence country
 * Is continually exposed to populations where TB prevalence is high

Anergy testing
In cases of anergy, a lack of reaction by the body's defence mechanisms when it comes into contact with foreign substances, the tuberculin reaction will occur weakly, thus compromising the value of Mantoux testing. For example, anergy is present in AIDS, a disease which strongly depresses the immune system. Therefore, anergy testing is advised in cases where there is suspicion that anergy is present. However, routine anergy skin testing is not recommended.

Two-step testing
Some people who have been infected with TB may have a negative reaction when tested years after infection, as the immune system response may gradually wane. This initial skin test, though negative, may stimulate (boost) the body's ability to react to tuberculin in future tests. Thus, a positive reaction to a subsequent test may be misinterpreted as a new infection, when in fact it is the result of the boosted reaction to an old infection.

Use of two-step testing is recommended for initial skin testing of adults who will be retested periodically (e.g., health care workers). This ensures any future positive tests can be interpreted as being caused by a new infection, rather than simply a reaction to an old infection.
 * The first test is read 48–72 hours after injection.
 * If the first test is positive, consider the person infected.
 * If the first test is negative, give a second test one to three weeks after the first injection.
 * The second test is read 48–72 hours after injection.
 * If the second test is positive, consider the person infected in the distant past
 * If the second test is negative, consider the person uninfected.

A person who is diagnosed as "infected in the distant past" on two-step testing is called a "tuberculin reactor".

The US recommendation that prior BCG vaccination be ignored results in almost universal false diagnosis of tuberculosis infection in people who have had BCG (mostly foreign nationals).

The latest interpretation for Mantoux test results
According to the guidelines published by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2005, the results are re-categorized into 3 parts based on their previous or baseline outcomes:
 * Baseline test: ≥10 mm is positive (either first or second step); 0 to 9 mm is negative
 * Serial testing without known exposure: Increase of ≥10 mm is positive
 * Known exposure:
 * ≥5 mm is positive in patients with baseline of 0 mm
 * ≥10 mm is positive in patients with negative baseline or previous screening result of >0 mm

Recent developments
In addition to tuberculin skin tests such as (principally) the Mantoux test, interferon gamma release assays (IGRAs) have become common in clinical use in the 2010s. In some contexts they are used instead of TSTs, whereas in other contexts TSTs and IGRAs both continue to be useful.

The QuantiFERON-TB Gold blood test measures the patient's immune reactivity to the TB bacterium, and is useful for initial and serial testing of persons with an increased risk of latent or active tuberculosis infection. Guidelines for its use were released by the CDC in December 2005. QuantiFERON-TB Gold is FDA-approved in the United States, has CE Mark approval in Europe and has been approved by the MHLW in Japan. The interferon gamma release assay is the preferred method for patients who have had immunosuppression and are about to start biological therapies.

T-SPOT.TB is another IGRA; it uses the ELISPOT method.

Heaf test
The Heaf tuberculin skin test was used in the United Kingdom, but discontinued in 2005. The equivalent Mantoux test positive levels done with 10 TU (0.1 ml at 100 TU/ml, 1:1000) are
 * <5 mm induration (Heaf 0–1)
 * 5–15 mm induration (Heaf 2)
 * >15 mm induration (Heaf 3–4)

title: Mantoux test