William Robert Sickinger (November 7, 1926 – May 9, 2013) was an American theater director, based in

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

. He was regarded as the founder of "off-Loop" theater, the Chicago equivalent of

Off-Broadway An off-Broadway theatre is any professional theatre venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, inclusive. These theatres are smaller than Broadway theatres, but larger than off-off-Broadway theatres, which seat fewer tha ...

. He often cast non-professional actors in his productions, and in doing so occasionally found new talent such as

David Mamet David Alan Mamet (; born November 30, 1947) is an American playwright, author, and filmmaker. He won a Pulitzer Prize and received Tony Award, Tony nominations for his plays ''Glengarry Glen Ross'' (1984) and ''Speed-the-Plow'' (1988). He first ...

Marilu Henner Marilu Henner (born April 6, 1952) is an American actress and author. She began her career appearing in the original production of the musical ''Grease (musical), Grease'' in 1971, before making her screen debut in the 1977 comedy-drama film ''B ...

Jim Jacobs Jim Jacobs (born October 7, 1942) is an American actor, composer, lyricist, and writer for the theatre, long associated with the Chicago theater scene. Jacobs is best known for creating the book, storyline, characters, and lyrics for the 1971 m ...

, and Mike Nussbaum, all of whom were Sickinger proteges.

Early life

Raised in Philadelphia, Sickinger was drafted into the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the primary Land warfare, land service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution.Article II, section 2, clause 1 of th ...

whilst still at school, and served in the Philippines during the Second World War. He subsequently resumed his studies at

Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania Commonwealth University-Bloomsburg (CU-Bloomsburg, or Bloomsburg) is a campus of Commonwealth University of Pennsylvania in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, United States. It is part of the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education (PASSHE). The ...

, where he trained as a teacher and first discovered theater.

Chicago theater

Sickinger was able to convince a local movie theater owner to rent him space, and produced a number of plays in this venue during the early 1950s. He was later hired by

Hull House Hull House was a settlement house in Chicago, Illinois, that was co-founded in 1889 by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr. Located on the Near West Side of Chicago, Hull House, named after the original house's first owner Charles Jerald Hul ...

Association director Paul Jans to run a theater programme in Chicago. Sickinger chose to produce "challenging, sometimes distressing contemporary plays" on subjects that had never been seen on Chicago stages, mounting productions by

Edward Albee Edward Franklin Albee III ( ; March 12, 1928 – September 16, 2016) was an American playwright known for works such as ''The Zoo Story'' (1958), ''The Sandbox (play), The Sandbox'' (1959), ''Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?'' (1962), ''A Delicat ...

Harold Pinter Harold Pinter (; 10 October 1930 – 24 December 2008) was a British playwright, screenwriter, director and actor. A List of Nobel laureates in Literature, Nobel Prize winner, Pinter was one of the most influential modern British dramat ...

Athol Fugard Harold Athol Lanigan Fugard (; 11 June 19328 March 2025) was a South African playwright, novelist, actor and director. Widely regarded as South Africa's greatest playwright and acclaimed as "the greatest active playwright in the English-speaki ...

, and

Amiri Baraka Amiri Baraka (born Everett Leroy Jones; October 7, 1934 – January 9, 2014), previously known as LeRoi Jones and Imamu Amear Baraka, was an American writer of poetry, drama, fiction, essays, and music criticism. He was the author of numerous b ...

. Though his choices raised eyebrows, critics generally praised his productions as "revelatory". Sickinger founded the Uptown Theater, as well as other theaters in more deprived areas of Chicago. He was an accomplished fundraiser, promoting theater in unlikely venues such as breakfast clubs and organising performances in the homes of Chicago's wealthier citizens. He attended almost every performance of his productions, and would continue giving notes to the actors throughout a show's run.

Later career

After Jans' resignation in 1969, Sickinger was also obliged to resign from the Hull House Association when board members argued that he was no longer engaged with their mission to provide social services. Sickinger relocated to New York, where he directed a number of off-Broadway shows with limited success. He later retired from theater and began running a

telemarketing Telemarketing (sometimes known as inside sales, or telesales in the UK and Ireland) is a method of direct marketing in which a salesperson solicits prospective customers to buy products, subscriptions or services, either over the phone or throu ...

company called Everything For Living Space. He died of congestive heart failure at his residence in

Delray Beach, Florida Delray Beach is a city in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. The population of Delray Beach as of April 1, 2020, was 66,846 according to the 2020 United States census, 2020 United States Census. Located in the Miami metropolitan area, De ...

, on May 9, 2013, aged 86.

References

External links

Bob Sickinger Papers
a
the Newberry
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sickinger, Robert 1926 births 2013 deaths People from Chicago Military personnel from Philadelphia Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania alumni American theatre directors United States Army personnel of World War II