Joshua Logan

Joshua Logan 1908-88, American theatrical and film director and writer, b. Texarkana, Tex. He directed several successes in New York, including Knickerbocker Holiday (1938) and Annie Get Your Gun (1946). Later he was director, producer, and coauthor of Mr. Roberts (1948), South Pacific (1949; Pulitzer Prize; film, 1958), and Fanny (written with S. N. Behrman, 1954; film, 1961). His other films include Picnic (1955), Sayonara (1957), and Camelot (1967).

Bibliography: See his autobiography (1976).

Logan, Joshua Lockwood (1908–88), American director and producer, who trained as an actor under Stanislavsky but turned to direction and had a big success with Paul Osborn's On Borrowed Time (1938). He became famous as a director of musicals such as I Married an Angel (1938), Annie Get Your Gun (1946), South Pacific (1949; London, 1951), and Fanny (1954), being co-librettist and co-producer of the last two. He also wrote The Wisteria Trees (1950), an adaptation of Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard to an American setting which he directed and co-produced. His biggest success in the non-musical theatre was Mister Roberts (1948; London, 1950), which he directed and jointly adapted with Thomas Heggen from the latter's novel. Other plays he directed included Norman Krasna's John Loves Mary (1947), Inge's Picnic (1953), and Paddy Chayevsky's Middle of the Night (1956), all of which he produced or co-produced. His film work included versions of his stage successes.

Logan, Joshua [Lockwood] (1908–88), director and playwright. Born in Texarkana, Texas, he studied at Princeton and with Stanislavsky in Moscow, then founded the University Players in 1928, with whom he remained until 1933. Logan's first solo directorial assignment on Broadway was To See Ourselves (1935), but it was his staging of On Borrowed Time (1938) that called attention to his talent and inaugurated a string of successes or interesting productions: I Married an Angel (1938), Knickerbocker Holiday (1938), Stars in Your Eyes (1939), Morning's at Seven (1939), Two for the Show (1940), Higher and Higher (1940), By Jupiter (1942), This Is the Army (1942), Annie Get Your Gun (1946), Happy Birthday (1946), John Loves Mary (1947), Mister Roberts (1948), South Pacific (1949), The Wisteria Trees (1950), Wish You Were Here (1952), Picnic (1953), Fanny (1954), Kind Sir (1953), Middle of the Night (1956), Blue Denim (1958), and The World of Susie Wong (1958). He co‐wrote and/or co‐produced several of the above. At his best, Logan's direction was distinguished by a deep insight into character and a remarkable fluidity, the latter especially evident in his staging of often‐cumbersome musicals. He was sometimes criticized in his later shows and films, however, for too heavy a touch. Autobiography: Josh: My Up and Down, In and Out Life, 1976.