This day in 2000, rumors became fact as it was revealed by Reba McEntire’s camp that she was officially in negotiations to play Annie Oakley in the Broadway revival of “Annie Get Your Gun.”

Annie Get Your Gun is a musical with lyrics and music by Irving Berlin and a book by Dorothy Fields and her brother Herbert Fields. The story is a fictionalized version of the life of Annie Oakley (1860–1926), a sharpshooter who starred in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West, and her romance with sharpshooter Frank E. Butler.

Reba made her Broadway debut as Annie from January 26, 2001 to June 22, 2001 opposite Brent Barrett as Frank. On June 23, 2001, Crystal Bernard, who had been playing Annie in the national tour of Annie Get Your Gun, assumed the role of Annie in the Broadway production.