BELASCO, DAVID (1859–), American playwright and manager, was born at San Francisco, Cal., July 25 1859. After graduating from Lincoln College, Cal., in 1875, he was stage-manager at several theatres and then went to New York where he owned and managed the prosperous Belasco theatre. He wrote or adapted some 200 plays, largely melodramatic, and owing to his mastery of stage-craft he was eminently successful as a producer and stage director. He presented E. H. Sothern in Lord Chumley (1887); Mrs. Leslie Carter in The Heart of Maryland (1895); Blanche Bates in Naughty Anthony (1899); Henrietta Crosman in Sweet Kitty Bellairs (1903); and David Warfield in The Music Master (1904).
Of his numerous other productions may be mentioned: May Blossom (1884); The Charity Ball (1887, with H. C. De Mille); Men and Women (1890); The Girl I Left Behind Me (1893, with Franklin Fyles); Madame Butterfly (1900); Madame Du Barry (1901); The Darling of the Gods (1902, with John Luther Long); The Girl of the Golden West (1905); The Return of Peter Grimm (1911); The Governor's Lady (1912); The Temperamental Journey (1913); The Secret (1914); A Celebrated Case (1915); The Boomerang (1915) and Polly with a Past (1917).