Richard Maltby Jr.


Richard Eldridge Maltby Jr. is an American theatre director and producer, lyricist, and screenwriter. He conceived and directed the only two musical revues to win the Tony Award for Best Musical: Ain't Misbehavin' and Fosse.

Life and career

Maltby was born in Ripon, Wisconsin, the son of Virginia and Richard Maltby Sr., a well-known orchestra leader.
Maltby and David Shire started working together as students at Yale University ; their first Broadway credit was in 1968, when their song "The Girl of the Minute" was used in the revue New Faces of 1968. In 1977 the Manhattan Theatre Club produced a revue of their earlier songs, written for other works, finally titled Starting Here, Starting Now. With composer Shire, Maltby was the director and lyricist for Baby, director and lyricist for Closer Than Ever, and lyricist for Big. Also with Shire, he conceived and wrote the lyrics for Take Flight, which had its world premiere in July 2007 at the Menier Chocolate Factory in London.About Time, with music by Shire and lyrics and direction by Maltby, premiered in May 2025 at Goodspeed Musicals Norma Terris Theatre, and was subsequently produced at 54 Below in November 2025.
He was director/co-lyricist for the American version of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Song and Dance, starring Bernadette Peters. He was co-lyricist for Miss Saigon.
He also conceived and directed Ring of Fire, a musical about Johnny Cash, which ran on Broadway in 2006. He is co-bookwriter/lyricist for The Pirate Queen. He was most recently represented on Broadway as the director of the new, original musical The [Story of My Life (musical)|The Story of My Life] by composer/lyricist Neil Bartram and book writer Brian Hill. That musical had a brief run at the Booth Theatre in February 2009. and received a 2009 Drama Desk Award nomination for outstanding production of a musical.
Since 1976 he has constructed the monthly cryptic crossword puzzles for Harper's Magazine, formerly in collaboration with E. R. Galli. He constructed cryptic crosswords for New York Magazine in the late 1960s.

Personal life

Maltby married twice: first to Barbara Black Sudler on June 5, 1965, and second, in 1987, to Janet Brenner.
He now has seven grandchildren: Liam, Owen, Matt, Aidan, Emma, Lionel, and Jesse Maltby.

Work

;Broadway
;Off-Broadway
;Regional
;Film

Awards and nominations

;Awards
;Nominations