2010 Alexa and Jack

2010 March 11th Alexa shared

Jack Ross

Jack Ross died at Port Orange Hospice March 8 after a brief illness.

 

It was his wish to live long enough to see Barack Obama elected President. A lifelong New Yorker, Jack was born to Isadore Rosenberg and Claire Shifres of Russian extraction on October 27, 1921. 

 

He was a "red diaper baby" and a Young Pioneer in his youth. He served his country during World War II constructing and demolishing Bailey bridges in France. 

 

He used his G.I. Bill to study playwrighting with Erwin Piscator of the Dramatic Workshop at Manhattan's New School. He worked on the railroad, the stock market, selling ads for outdoor movie screens and had a career at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts as a teacher and administrator for 15 years, nurturing the talents of actors like Robert Redford. He once sat next to Marilyn Monroe to see Arthur Miller's "A View from the Bridge."

He formed Ross and Timm Productions and took over the venerable Off-Broadway theatre, the Actors' Playhouse in Greenwich Village, hosting "Torch Song Trilogy" with Harvey Fierstein and Matthew Broderick prior to its move to Broadway. He booked productions like "Ten Percent Review", "What's A Nice Country Like You Doing In A State Like This?", "An Evening with Quentin Crisp" and Sebastian Stewart's "Smoking Newports and Eating French Fries," which he directed and many others. There he conducted In Theatre Training acting classes during the day and on Mondays when the theatre was dark, his students gave free performances to the public. 

With his companion since 1982, Alexa Abercrombie Ross, he wrote "Mice in the Theatre", a comic look at the challenges of running an Off-Broadway theatre, and both starred in the 1988 Actors Playhouse production, directed by John Monteith of Monteith and Rand. "Mice" had two subsequent productions in Philadelphia. 

After Jack sold his rights to Playhouse 91, a new Off-Broadway theatre he built on the upper East side, where "Quartermaine's Terms" debued in New York, followed by "After the Fall" with Frank Langella, "A Bronx Tale" with Chazz Palmentieri among other shows and was the subsequent home of Light Opera of Manhattan and the Jewish Repertory Theatre. 

Jack and Alexa moved to Daytona Beach Shores in 1997 and in 1999 took over the management of Southern Sands Motel.

 

They joined the Fiction Writer's group at City Island Library and Jack wrote a novel, "Afterwards", a fantasy based on theatre life in '50's New York. 

 

Jack leaves behind two daughters, Pamela Ross of Manhattan and Valerie Tensfeldt of Walnut Creek, CA., and a grandson, Dan Tensfeldt of San Francisco. Friends are invited to a memorial at the motel, 2500 South Atlantic Avenue, on Sunday, March 14 at 5 pm.

2010 March 9th Alexa shared

Jack Ross 1921-2010 

Last night at 9:18 pm my loving companion since 1982 expired in hospice.

Jack. a lifetime New Yorker, was a red diaper baby, the son of Russian Communists, a fighter in World War II, a playwright, teacher, director, actor, producer and theatre owner.

It was his hope to live to see Obama elected president.

"May choirs of angels sing thee to thy rest."