Joseph Anthony

Joseph Anthony, born Joseph Deuster on May 24, 1912, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, was an American actor, playwright, and director whose career spanned stage and film from the 1930s through the 1970s. He died on January 20, 1993, at the age of 80, in a nursing home in Hyannis, Massachusetts.

Anthony prepared for a career in the theater at the Pasadena Playhouse between 1931 and 1935, then continued his training at the Daykarhanova School from 1935 to 1937. Still performing under his birth name, Joseph Deuster, he made his professional stage debut in 1935 playing Rizzio in a production of Mary of Scotland. Two years later he appeared in a touring production of Dead End, and in 1939 he made his first New York City stage appearance with the Federal Theatre Project Company, taking the title role in Professor Mamlock at Daly's 63rd Street Theatre. Anthony married Perry Wilson on August 2, 1942, in New York City, and shortly afterward entered the United States Army, serving from 1942 to 1946 and training at Camp Ritchie and its Composite School Unit.

Following his return from World War II, Anthony resumed his stage career under the name Joseph Adams, appearing at the Belasco Theatre as the Second Man in a 1946 production of Truckline Cafe. He first performed under the name Joseph Anthony in January 1948 at the Maxine Elliott Theatre in Skipper Next to God. His Broadway acting credits from 1937 to 1954 also included Liberty Jones, Peer Gynt, A Ship Comes In, The Country Girl at the Lyceum Theatre in 1951, Flight into Egypt in 1952, Camino Real in 1953, and Anastasia in 1954.

Anthony made his New York City directorial debut in April 1948, staging a production of Celebration at the Maxine Elliott Theatre. In 1954 he directed the original Broadway production of The Rainmaker, and in 1955 he directed The Lark. Between March 1960 and March 1961, he opened four original Broadway productions that ran simultaneously: The Best Man at the Morosco Theatre, Under the Yum Yum Tree at Henry Miller's Theatre, Rhinoceros at the Longacre Theatre, and Mary, Mary at the Helen Hayes Theatre. Mary, Mary proved to be his longest-running production, accumulating more than 1,500 performances over nearly four years. He went on to direct Romulus in 1962, Slow Dance on the Killing Ground in 1964, the unsuccessful Breakfast at Tiffany's in 1966, and Jimmy in 1969. His directorial work earned him a Tony Award nomination for Best Direction of a Play in 1961 and a Tony Award nomination for Best Direction of a Musical in 1964, and he received five Tony nominations for direction in total across his career.

Anthony's work extended to film as well. He made his screen acting debut in Hat, Coat, and Glove in 1934, and subsequently appeared in She in 1935, Shadow of the Thin Man in 1941, and Joe Smith, American in 1942. His film directing career began with the 1956 adaptation of The Rainmaker, the same play he had staged on Broadway two years earlier. He followed that with The Matchmaker in 1958, Career in 1959, All in a Night's Work in 1961, and Tomorrow in 1972.