The 'Bishop' of Broadway: The Life and Times of David Belasco

The Gilded Gentleman

David Belasco -- playwright, producer, impresario, theatre manager, and theatrical visionary -- was one of the most important names in the world of the Gilded Age stage.

Beginning his life and career in San Francisco following the Gold Rush years, Belasco moved to New York to revolutionize how theatre was seen and produced in the last years of the 19th and into the 20th century.

In addition to writing such hits as plays "Madame Butterfly" and "The Girl of the Golden West" which went on to become even more popular ad Puccini operas, he was responsible for launching the careers of Maude Adams (the first Peter Pan), Mary Pickford and Barbara Stanwyck. He was known for often wearing the robes and clerical collar of a Catholic priest, despite his Jewish heritage and thus began to call himself "The Bishop of Broadway".

Belasco owned and operated today's Belasco Theatre on 44th St which continues to bear his name. The theatre, built in 1907, is home to current Broadway hits and still contains the once lavish apartment now abandoned in which he lived on the theatre's top floor.

It's said that perhaps Belasco has never quite left his eponymous theatre and reports have persisted over the years of sightings and strange occurrences that indicate his possible presence even today.