Idina Menzel (/ɪˈdiːnə mɛnˈzɛl/– correct pronunciation, thank you very much) rose to prominence for her performance as Maureen Johnson in the Broadway musical Rent, a role which she reprised for the 2005 film version. In 2004, she won a Tony Award for the role of Elphaba in Wicked. And you probably recognize her as playing Lea Michele’s biological mother on Glee.
In case you missed it, and just for fun, here is Idina Menzel performing “Let it Go” with Jimmy Fallon and The Roots.
Menzel will be returning to Broadway this year in the musical If/Then.
Ironically, the Menzel version was more popular in radio airplay.
Since Frozen’s premiere and Let it Go’s popularity, numerous covers of the song have popped up all over Youtube. One of the more interesting: The Piano Guys’ cover version mixes parts of Antonio Vivaldi’s Concerto No. 4 in F minor, Op. 8, RV 297, “L’inverno” (Winter) from The Four Seasons into the original. Watch Here.
And why did John Travolta, who introduced Menzel’s performance of “Let it Go” at the Academy Awards, mispronounce her name (“the one and only Adele Dazeem”)? According to E! Online it was possibly nerves. Our theory: the text on the teleprompter was incorrect. Other names were mispronounced during the show — Ellen introduced Kristen Bell as “Kristen Bi-el”.
 Credit: The Wall Street Journal.
 Credit: PR Newswire. 22 October 2013.