Jack Smight, an Emmy Award-winning director, was born on March 9, 1925, in Minneapolis, Minnesota, to Irish immigrant parents. He graduated from Cretin High School and later served in the US Army Air Force during World War Two, where he flew combat missions in the Pacific Theater.
After the war, Smight attended the University of Minnesota, where he met up with his old high-school friend, Peter Graves, in the theater department. After graduation, they moved to Hollywood, where they rented a room and made the rounds, looking for work as actors while Smight worked as a carhop and Graves drove a cab.
Although Smight did not achieve success as an actor, he became a stage manager and then turned to directing. His acting background helped him understand actors, and his intelligence, literacy, and ability to communicate with writers made him a successful director.
Smight won an Emmy Award for Best Direction of a Single Program of a Dramatic Series - Less Than One Hour for Eddie (1958),which starred Mickey Rooney and featured an Emmy-winning script by Ken Hughes. He directed films featuring A-list talent such as Paul Newman and Rod Steiger before moving back to TV in the 1970s, occasionally directing a feature film.
Jack Smight died of cancer on September 1, 2003, in Los Angeles, California, at the age of 78.
