*Famed theater director and educator Lloyd Richards, who served as a mentor for Pulitzer Prize-winning playwrights August Wilson and Lorraine Hansberry, has died of heart failure.
Richards directed six of Wilson’s plays on Broadway: starting with “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” in 1984 and continuing through “Fences” (1987), “Joe Turner’s Come and Gone” (1988), “The Piano Lesson” (1990), “Two Trains Running” (1992) and “Seven Guitars” (1996). Richards won a Tony Award for his direction of “Fences.”
He made his Broadway directorial debut in 1959 with Hansberry’s “A Raisin in the Sun.” Its success propelled Richards into a career teaching drama, first at Hunter College and then New York University.
Richards died on Thursday, his birthday, at New York’s Mount Sinai Hospital. Always secretive about his age, he was believed to be in his mid-80s.
*Several Broadway shows have changed their schedules to accommodate the holiday tomorrow.
Sarah Jones’ one-woman Tony-winner “Bridge and Tunnel” has cancelled its performance on July 4, but a show will be added Wednesday, July 5, at 2 p.m. “The Color Purple” has also nixed its July 4th staging. “The Lion King” has cancelled July 4th’s 8 p.m. show as well as its July 9th 3 p.m. performance. But, the production has added shows for 1 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. July 9th. No changes were announced for the Maurice-Hines-choreographed “Hot Feet,” which features the music of Earth Wind & Fire.