William Aloysius Brady was an American theatre actor, producer and sports promoter.
Background
Brady was born to a newspaperman in 1863. His father kidnapped him from San Francisco and brought him to New York City, where his father worked as a writer while William was forced to sell newspapers on street corners. Upon his father"s death when William was 15, he hitchhiked his way back to San Francisco.
Career
He made his start on the stage in San Francisco, California with a company headed by Joseph R. Grismer and Phoebe Davies shortly after his return. As a callboy in The White Slave, he filled in a role for an ill actor, and started his career. After a failed attempt to produce a version of She by H. Rider Haggard, he was able to secure the rights to After Dark, successfully bringing the play to New New York
While Brady was sued for his efforts, as Augustin Daly claimed plagiarism, Brady was able to make enough money to continue with his theater ventures.
Brady inadvertently became a boxing promoter during this time. Brady would be the only person to manage two undisputed heavyweight champions, in Jeffries and James J. Corbett.
Brady produced The Corbett-Fitzsimmons Fight in 1897. Although Corbett ultimately lost, the match ran for over an hour and a half, and the documentary lasted that long, the longest film ever released at the time.
In 1898 Brady and Grismer produced the hugely successful Charlotte Blair Parker play, Way Down East.
The two remained partners until Grismer"s retirement sometime around 1909. Brady"s success continued until the Stock Market Crash of 1929, which wiped out his entire savings. His total theatrical output included over 260 plays, including a version of Uncle Tom"s Cabin that was later used as images for a book in 1904, and a number of movies before his death.
William A. Brady died at age 86 of a heart ailment.
He is interred at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Sleepy Hollow, New New York He was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1998.