Joe Masteroff (1919–2018)

Joseph Masteroff was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on December 11, 1919. He graduated with a bachelor's degree in journalism from Temple University in 1940. He joined the Army on December 8, 1941 and served for three years in England. From 1949 to 1951, he studied playwriting in New York at show more the American Theater Wing, which assisted veterans in theatrical pursuits. His first Broadway play was The Warm Peninsula. It ran for 86 performances in 1959 and 1960. His next Broadway musical, She Loves Me, ran for 10 months in 1963. He was best known for Cabaret, the 1966 Broadway musical which ran for 1,165 performances and won eight Tonys, including for best musical. He also wrote the libretto for a 1978 Edward Thomas folk opera based on Eugene O'Neill's Desire Under the Elms and the book and lyrics for Six Wives, a chamber musical based on the life of Henry VIII, which ran Off Broadway in 1992. Masteroff died on September 28, 2018 at the age of 98. (Bowker Author Biography) show less