DOBBS FERRY, N.Y., Jan. 19 (UPI) -- Peter Zeisler, a co-founder of Minneapolis' Guthrie Theater and hailed as a "true leader in American theater," died of heart failure at age 81.
Zeisler died Sunday at his Dobbs Ferry, N.Y., home, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported.
Zeisler "was a true leader of theater in America," said Sheila Livingston, co-director of education and community partnerships for the Guthrie.
Before founding the Guthrie in 1963, Zeisler was a production manager for more than 20 Broadway shows, including the original productions of "Candide" and "The Sound of Music" in the 1950s.
He tired of the Broadway constraints and, with Sir Tyrone Guthrie and Oliver Rea, all but pioneered the regional theater movement with the 1963 founding of the Guthrie in Minneapolis, the newspaper said.
The New York-born Columbia University graduate also was instrumental in founding the American Shakespeare Festival in Stratford, Conn.
