Kim Criswell is an American musical entertainer and actress born on July 19, 1957 in Hampton, Virginia.Criswell grew up in Chattanooga, Tennessee. After she graduated from high school, she studied musical theatre at the University of Cincinnati's College Conservatory of Music. She then moved to New York where she landed a role in the touring company of Annie. She made her Broadway debut in The First in 1981. In September, 1991 she presented her one-woman show Doin What Comes Naturally, at the Shaw Theatre in London. She has lived in London since 1992 when she was invited to play Annie Oakley in Irving Berlin's musical Annie Get Your Gun. She has been in numerous musicals and has appeared with some of America's leading symphony orchestras as the featured soloist . She won the Helen Hayes Award for her performance in Side By Side By Sondheim.