James Light

James Light (1894 – February 11, 1964) was an American theatre director, actor, and educator. He is best remembered as a champion of the playwright Eugene O'Neill, and he directed many of his plays both on Broadway and in regional theaters.

Early life and education Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1894, Light was the son of an English building contractor who was working on a project in Pittsburgh at the time of Light's birth. He returned to England with his parents while still an infant and did not return to the United States until he was fourteen years old. He ultimately abandoned his studies in art and transferred to Ohio State University (OSU) where he graduated with degrees in English literature and philosophy. He was a swimmer on the OSU swim team, He starred in only one more play on Broadway, the role of Baron Skansenkorge in August Strindberg's The Spook Sonata (1923), before completely re-orienting his career away from acting into directing. The first play he directed on Broadway was O'Neill's All God's Chillun Got Wings in 1924. The play featured an interracial couple with the black actor Paul Robeson in the role of Jim Harris opposite the white actress Mary Blair in the role of his wife Ella Downey. The decision by O'Neill and Light to portray a racially mixed couple was controversial for the time period, and both men received threats from the Ku Klux Klan and poison pen letters.

Light's other Broadway credits as director include Hatcher Hughes's Ruint (1925), William Shakespeare's Hamlet (1925), Strindberg's The Dream Play (1926), O'Neill's The Great God Brown (1926), O'Neill's The Emperor Jones (1926), Lajos Egri's Rapid Transit (1927), E.E. Cummings's Him (1928), Archibald MacLeish's Panic (1935), Virgil Geddes's Native Ground (1937), Pedro Calderón de la Barca's The Mayor of Zalamea (1945), and Sophocles's Oedipus Rex (1945) among others.

An opponent of racial discrimination, Light was appointed Director of the "Philadelphia Black Unit" of the Federal Theatre Project (FTP) in 1936; a branch of the FTP whose mission was to create employment opportunities for black performers to combat institutional racism in the American theatre. Light had worked with McClendon earlier when he directed her in the Broadway production of Annie Nathan Meyer's anti-racism drama Black Souls in 1932; a work which centered around the lynching of an innocent black man on the campus of a college in the American south.

Working closely with Jasper Deeter and the Hedgerow Theatre among other Philadelphia impresarios, Light directed, produced, and promoted numerous plays with all-black casts in Philadelphia during the mid to late 1930s through his work with the FTP. He continued to pursue other projects to promote black artists after the Great Depression. His final directing assignment on Broadway was a revival of Aristophanes's Lysistrata at the Belasco Theatre that starred an all-black cast led by Etta Moten Barnett in the title role and Sidney Poitier as Polydorus in 1946.

Educator In 1928 Light was appointed director of the Yale Dramatic Association at the Yale School of Drama. He joined the faculty of The New School for Social Research (NSSR) in the 1930s, and ultimately became the Dean of NSSR's School of Drama from 1939 to 1942.

Personal life and death Light was married twice. His first marriage to Sue Jenkins ended in divorce. His second marriage was to Patti Margolies. He died at the age of 69 at his home in Manhattan on February 11, 1964.