Douglas Watt

Douglas Benjamin Watt (January 20, 1914 – September 29, 2009) was an American theater critic who spent nearly six decades covering Broadway theatre — and then Off Broadway and Off-Off-Broadway — for the Daily News and also reported on classical music and opera for The New Yorker. He helped establish Porgy and Bess as a classic after it failed in an earlier Broadway run and helped foster the careers of playwrights such as Eugene O'Neill and Tennessee Williams.

Early life and education Watt was born on January 20, 1914, in the Bronx. He grew up in New Jersey, in both Hackensack and Ridgewood. After graduating early from high school, he enrolled at Cornell University and graduated at age 19.

Theater critic Watt was hired as a copy boy by the Daily News in 1936. One of his first tasks at the paper was to transport images to the Daily News offices in Manhattan from the Lindbergh kidnapping trial in Flemington, New Jersey.

Watt not only covered Broadway, he was also a pianist and songwriter whose songs "After All These Years" and "Heaven Help Me" were recorded by Doris Day and Frankie Laine.

Death Watt died at age 95 on September 29, 2009, in Southampton, New York because of pneumonia. At the time of his death, he resided in both Southampton and Manhattan. He was survived by his second wife, the former Ethel Madsen, as well as by two daughters, two sons, eight grandchildren and six great-grandchildren. His first marriage had been ended by divorce.