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By Denise Petski
January 3, 2017
Prolific TV and theater director Jeffrey Hayden, whose
credits include Peyton Place and The Donna Reed Show, among many others, died
December 24. Hayden passed away following a year-long battle with cancer at his
Los Angeles home surrounded by his family, including his wife, Eva Marie Saint.
He was 90.
Hayden began his decades-long career at NBC New York
after graduating from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. He joined
ABC Television as an associate director two years later and directed the first
color specials for NBC Television, Lady in the Dark, starring Ann Sothern, and
The Chocolate Soldier, starring Eddie Albert and Rise Stevens. He then directed
his wife, actor Eva Marie Saint, and Richard Kiley in the prestigious Omnibus
series on CBS. Hayden also directed the variety series The Bert Parks Show and
the quiz show The Big Payoff.
In 1954, Hayden was chosen by producer Fred Coe to join
the staff of The Philco Television Playhouse, where he directed live television
dramas with such stars as James Dean, Walter Matthau, and Paul Newman. His work
attracted the attention of several film studios, and Hayden moved with his
family to Los Angeles to direct a film for Dore Schary at MGM, The Vintage,
starring Michèle Morgan, Pier Angeli, John Kerr, and Mel Ferrer.
In addition to Peyton Place and The Donna Reed Show,
Hayden’s many TV directing credits include The Andy Griffith Show, Leave it to
Beaver, Lassie, Dennis the Menace, Please Don’t Eat the Daisies, , 77 Sunset
Strip, Name of the Game, Route 66, Mannix, Quincy, The Bold Ones, Ironside, Alias
Smith & Jones, Cagney and Lacey, In the Heat of the Night, and Magnum,
P.I., among others. Hayden was executive producer/director of the daytime
series Santa Barbara, and directed several highly praised afterschool specials
for ABC.
Hayden was honored with the Governor’s Media Award for
The Loretta Young Show, the NAACP Award for Palmerstown, USA, and the New York
Emmy Award and Cine Golden Eagle Award for the PBS documentary Children in
America’s Schools with Bill Moyers. He also wrote, produced, and directed the
Cine Golden Eagle Award-winning documentary Primary Colors: The Story of Corita
for PBS.
Hayden also was praised for his direction of stage works
such as The Front Page, and productions starring Eva Marie Saint of Summer and
Smoke, Desire Under the Elms, Candida, The Fatal Weakness, Duet for One, Death
of a Salesman and The Country Girl, for which he won the Drama-Logue Award. He
also produced and directed Awake and Sing, The Oldest Living Graduate, Dark at
the Top of the Stairs, Winesburg, Ohio and Sunrise in My Pocket. At the Odyssey
Theatre in Los Angeles, Hayden directed The Sunshine Boys, Fences, Desire Under
the Elms and, his most recent production in 2015, Sunset Baby. Hayden and Saint
also performed together in both Love Letters and in Willa Cather’s On the
Divide.
A member of the Actors Studio in New York, Hayden became
an active member of Actors Studio West in Los Angeles where he frequently
facilitated the Playwrights/Directors Unit. A guild supporter, Hayden was an
original member of the Directors Guild of America’s first Creative Rights
Committee, collaborating on the creation of the “Bill of Creative Rights.”
Throughout his career, Hayden remained an outspoken advocate for directors’
rights. Hayden also was passionately involved with the civil rights movement in
the 1950s and 1960s.
In addition to his wife, Hayden is survived by his
children Laurette and Darrell, and grandchildren Eli, Tyler, Molly and Stella.
In lieu of flowers, the family asks that gifts be made in
Hayden’s memory to UCLA’s Jonsson Cancer Center Foundation.
HAYDEN, Jeffrey
Born:
10/15/1926, New York City, New York, U.S.A.
Died:
12/24/2016, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.
Jeffrey Hayden’s
westerns – producer, director:
Redigo (TV) – 1963 [director]
Shane (TV) – 1966 [director]
Cowboy in Africa (TV) – 1967 [director]
Dundee and the Culhane (TV) – 1967 [director]
The Virginian (TV) – 1971 [director]
Alias Smith and Jones (TV) – 1971-1973 [director]
How the West Was Won (TV) – 1976-1977 [producer]
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