Ralph Nelson

Ralph Nelson (August 12, 1916 – December 21, 1987) was an American actor, director, producer, and writer born in Long Island City, New York. He began his career on the Broadway stage, appearing in productions between 1934 and 1940 that included Othello, Macbeth, Cyrano de Bergerac, The Taming of the Shrew, and the drama There Shall Be No Night. During World War II, Nelson served in the U.S. Army Air Corps as a fighter pilot and flight instructor. Before the war concluded, he had written a play that reached Broadway: The Wind Is Ninety, which ran from June to September 1945 and featured Kirk Douglas in its cast.

Nelson went on to build a substantial career in film and television as a director. Among his most recognized film credits was Lilies of the Field (1963), in which Sidney Poitier won the Academy Award for Best Actor. Nelson also directed Father Goose (1964), a comedy starring Cary Grant, and Charly (1968), an adaptation of Flowers for Algernon for which Cliff Robertson received an Academy Award. His work in the 1960s and early 1970s included several racially provocative films such as Soldier Blue, ...tick...tick...tick..., and The Wilby Conspiracy. Additional film credits include Soldier in the Rain with Jackie Gleason and Steve McQueen, the crime film Once a Thief, and The Wrath of God, which was Rita Hayworth's final film. Nelson both directed and appeared in a small role in Duel at Diablo, starring James Garner and Sidney Poitier.

Nelson's television work was equally extensive. He directed Rod Serling's Requiem for a Heavyweight in both its television and film versions, and helmed the Twilight Zone episode "A World of His Own." In 1960, he wrote and directed The Man in the Funny Suit, a television drama documenting the production of the live Requiem for a Heavyweight broadcast, in which Nelson, Serling, Red Skelton, Keenan Wynn, and Ed Wynn all appeared as themselves. Later television credits included multiple episodes of Starsky & Hutch, the horror film Embryo, A Hero Ain't Nothin' but a Sandwich, and Christmas Lilies of the Field, a sequel to Lilies of the Field starring Billy Dee Williams, Maria Schell, and Fay Hauser. Nelson died on December 21, 1987, in Santa Monica, California, at the age of 71.