Todd Haimes, Roundabout Artistic Director, Dies at 66

Todd Haimes, the longtime artistic director of New York’s Roundabout Theatre Company, died Wednesday, April 19 at the age of 66. Haimes had been undergoing treatment for the cancer osteosarcoma; he was first diagnosed in 2002 with sarcoma of the jaw.

Haimes, a New York native, was 26 when he joined Roundabout in 1983 as managing director. The company was heavily in debt and on the brink of dissolution, but Haimes turned its fortunes around. Roundabout went from running shows in a 150-seat space in a basement in Chelsea to owning five theaters in Midtown, three on Broadway and two off-Broadway, earning scores of Tonys and other awards along the way. He was a pioneer of early curtain times, education initiatives, and star-casting productions.

Under Haimes’s direction, Roundabout opened its first Broadway house at the now-defunct Criterion Center in 1991. Early productions there included Eugene O’Neill’s Anna Christie, which not only starred Liam Neeson and Natasha Richardson, but led to their romantic coupling. In 2000, after a $24 million capital campaign to renovate the Selwyn Theatre on 42nd Street, Roundabout opened the doors of its renamed and restored flagship, the American Airlines Theatre, with a revival of The Man Who Came to Dinner starring Nathan Lane and Jean Smart. The American Airlines Theatre has since been home to Tony-winning productions including The Pajama Game, with Harry Connick Jr. and Kelli O’Hara, and, more recently, A Soldier’s Play, with Blair Underwood and David Alan Grier.

Roundabout also operates the former nightclub Studio 54, which has been home to hit revivals including Cabaret and Assassins, as well as the Stephen Sondheim Theatre, where Roundabout notably presented Anything Goes in 2011. Both venues double as rental houses; the former is currently playing Pictures from Home, the latter & Juliet.

In addition to revivals, Haimes and Roundabout have a long history of championing the next generation of playwrights and musical-theater writers utilizing the off-Broadway Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre, which houses the Laura Pels Theatre and the Black Box Theatre, home to Roundabout Underground. Playwrights who got their start include Stephen Karam (The Humans), Steven Levenson (If I Forget), Ming Peiffer (Usual Girls), Joshua Harmon (Significant Other), and dozens of others.

During Haimes’s tenure as Artistic Director/CEO (a title added in 2015), Roundabout’s productions earned 34 Tony Awards, 58 Drama Desk Awards, and 73 Outer Critics Cirle Awards. He was the recipient of a 2013 Lucille Lortel Lifetime Achievement Award and a caricature at Sardi’s Restaurant.

His survivors include his wife, Jeanne-Marie; children Hilary and Andrew and their spouses; stepdaughters Julia and Kiki; and four grandchildren.