Gilbert Moses III was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 stage

Stage (theatre)

In theatre or performance arts, the stage is a designated space for the performance productions. The stage serves as a space for actors or performers and a focal point for the members of the audience...

, screen

Film

A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...

, and television

Television

Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

 director.

Early life and career

Born in Cleveland, Ohio

Cleveland, Ohio

Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Cuyahoga County, the most populous county in the state. The city is located in northeastern Ohio on the southern shore of Lake Erie, approximately west of the Pennsylvania border...

, Moses was the co-founder of the Free Southern Theater company, an important pioneer of African-American theatre

Theatre

Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...

. His 1971 Broadway

Broadway theatre

Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...

 debut, Ain't Supposed to Die a Natural Death

Ain't Supposed to Die a Natural Death

Ain't Supposed to Die a Natural Death is a musical with a book, music, and lyrics by Melvin Van Peebles. The musical contains some material also on three of Van Peebles' albums, Br'er Soul, Ain't Supposed to Die a Natural Death and As Serious as a Heart-Attack, some of which were yet to come...

, won him a Tony Award

Tony Award

The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. The awards are given for Broadway...

 nomination and the Drama Desk Award

Drama Desk Award

The Drama Desk Awards, which are given annually in a number of categories, are the only major New York theater honors for which productions on Broadway, Off-Broadway, Off-Off-Broadway compete against each other in the same category...

 for Most Promising Director. In 1976, he and George Faison

George Faison

George Faison is an African-American dancer and choreographer.-Biography:Faison was born in Washington, D.C. where he studied dance with the Jones-Haywood Capitol Ballet and Carolyn Tate of Howard University while attending Dunbar High School, and appeared with The American Light Opera Company in...

 teamed to co-direct and choreograph the ill-fated Alan Jay Lerner

Alan Jay Lerner

Alan Jay Lerner was an American lyricist and librettist. In collaboration with Frederick Loewe, he created some of the world's most popular and enduring works of musical theatre for both the stage and on film...

-Leonard Bernstein

Leonard Bernstein

Leonard Bernstein August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...

 musical

Musical theatre

Musical theatre is a form of theatre combining songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...

 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue (musical)

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is a 1976 musical with music by Leonard Bernstein and book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner. It is considered to be a legendary Broadway flop, running only seven performances...

, which closed after seven performances.

Moses' off-Broadway

Off-Broadway

Off-Broadway theater is a term for a professional venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, and for a specific production of a play, musical or revue that appears in such a venue, and which adheres to related trade union and other contracts...

 work as a director won him an Obie Award

Obie Award

The Obie Awards or Off-Broadway Theater Awards are annual awards given by The Village Voice newspaper to theatre artists and groups in New York City...

 for Amiri Baraka

Amiri Baraka

Amiri Baraka , formerly known as LeRoi Jones, is an American writer of poetry, drama, fiction, essays, and music criticism...

's Slave Ship (1969) and the New York Drama Critics' Circle

New York Drama Critics' Circle

The New York Drama Critics' Circle is made up of 24 drama critics from daily newspapers, magazines and wire services based in the New York City metropolitan area. The organization was founded in 1935 at the Algonquin Hotel by a group that included Brooks Atkinson, Walter Winchell, and Robert Benchley...

 Award for The Taking of Miss Janie (1975). Among Moses' television credits are Benson

Benson (TV series)

Benson is an American television sitcom which aired from September 13, 1979, to April 19, 1986, on ABC. The series was a spin-off from the soap opera parody Soap ; however, Benson discarded the...

, Ghostwriter

Ghostwriter (TV series)

Ghostwriter is an American television program created by Liz Nelson and produced by the Children's Television Workshop and BBC One. It began airing on PBS on October 4, 1992, and the final episode aired on February 13, 1995...

, The Paper Chase

The Paper Chase (TV series)

The Paper Chase is a television series based on a 1970 novel by John Jay Osborn, Jr., as well as a 1973 film based on the novel. It follows the lives of law student James T. Hart and his classmates at Harvard Law School.-Production:...

, Law & Order

Law & Order

Law & Order is an American police procedural and legal drama television series, created by Dick Wolf and part of the Law & Order franchise. It aired on NBC, and in syndication on various cable networks. Law & Order premiered on September 13, 1990, and completed its 20th and final season on May 24,...

, several episodes of the mini-series Roots

Roots (TV miniseries)

Roots is a 1977 American television miniseries based on Alex Haley's fictional novel Roots: The Saga of an American Family. Roots received 36 Emmy Award nominations, winning nine. It also won a Golden Globe and a Peabody Award. It received unprecedented Nielsen ratings with the finale still...

, and a number of television movie

Television movie

A television film is a feature film that is a television program produced for and originally distributed by a television network, in contrast to...

s. His only feature films were Willie Dynamite

Willie Dynamite

Willie Dynamite is a 1974 blaxploitation film starring Roscoe Orman, Joyce Walker, Thalmus Rasulala, and Diana Sands. Willie Dynamite is a pimp in NYC who strives to be number one in the city...

(1974) and The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh

The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh

The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh is an American sports/fantasy comedy film that was released in 1979. The movie was directed by Gilbert Moses and co-produced by David Dashev and Gary Stromberg. It was produced by Lorimar and distributed by United Artists. The rights to the film are currently owned by...

(1979).

Personal life and death

Moses was married three times, to actress Denise Nicholas

Denise Nicholas

Denise Nicholas is an American actress and social activist who was involved in the American Civil Rights Movement...

, Wilma Butler, and Dee Dee Bridgewater

Dee Dee Bridgewater

Dee Dee Bridgewater is an American Jazz singer. She is a three-time Grammy Award winning singer-songwriter, as well as a Tony Award - winning stage actress and host of National Public Radio's syndicated radio show JazzSet with Dee Dee Bridgewater...

, and had two daughters, Tsia and China. He died of multiple myeloma

Multiple myeloma

Multiple myeloma , also known as plasma cell myeloma or Kahler's disease , is a cancer of plasma cells, a type of white blood cell normally responsible for the production of antibodies...

 in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

.

External links