BROADWAY PLAYWRIGHT STITT DIES

BROADWAY PLAYWRIGHT STITT DIES

Broadway playwright MILAN STITT has lost his battle with liver cancer, aged 68.
He died on 12 March (09) in Manhattan, New York, according to his sister, Susan Miller.
Stitt was praised by critics for his 1976 Broadway play The Runner Stumbles, about a Roman Catholic priest on trial for killing a nun.
The production - one of 17 plays he wrote for theatre and television - made its big screen debut in 1979, starring DICk Van Dyke, Beau Bridges and Kathleen Quinlan. It was revived for the stage in an off Broadway production in 2007.
In addition to his writing credits, Stitt was founder and director of the play development programme at the Circle Repertory Theater, which helped to establish playwrights including David Mamet and Tennessee Williams before its close in 1996.
He also served as professor of dramatic writing at Pennsylvania's Carnegie Mellon University and has held teaching posts at prestigious colleges including Yale, Princeton and New York University.
Miller is his only survivor.