Fred Coe was born in Mississippi in 1914, and was raised in Kentucky and Tennessee. He was
the only child of Fred Hayden, an attorney, and Annette Haroll Coe, a nurse. In 1940, Coe
married Alice Griggs, whom he subsequently divorced. He married Joyce Beeler, later an
executive producer with ABC, in 1952. Coe had two children with his first wife, John Hayden
and Laurence Anne, and two with his second wife, Sue Ann and Samuel Hughes. Coe suffered a
heart attack and died in 1979.
Coe produced and directed in theater, television, and film. He was involved with television
from its early years, and became a well-known and influential producer of television drama,
especially live broadcasts based on original teleplays. Coe produced more than 500
television dramas, two comedy series, the Kennedy-Nixon debates, several Emmy Award shows,
and several specials, including Peter Pan
and The Miracle Worker (in production when
Coe died). He produced and/or directed 14 Broadway plays, and produced, directed, and/or
co-wrote six feature films. Coe's contribution to the projects in which he was involved was
critically acclaimed, regardless of the degree of success of the total production. A
tireless worker, he won numerous awards in different media.
Coe directed plays with the Nashville Community Theatre from 1932 until 1940, while
simultaneously attending the Yale University School of Drama (1938-40). From 1940 until
1945, he directed the Town Theatre in Columbia, South Carolina, and in 1945, directed Bonanza in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Coe
co-produced his first Broadway play, The Trip to
Bountiful, with the Theatre Guild in 1953. Two of his theater productions went on
national tours: A Thousand Clowns (1962 --
which he also directed); and Wait Until
Dark (1966). Coe produced Journey to the
Day in Westport, Connecticut in 1961, and in New York City in 1963. In addition,
he co-authored a musical based on A Raisin in the
Sun, entitled Raisin, which was
eventually produced by someone else.
Coe became a production manager for NBC in 1945, performing miscellaneous duties, including
work with Worthington Minor on Studio One.
In 1948, he began production of NBC's Television
Playhouse, sponsored by Philco and later, by Goodyear. He continued to produce
successful television drama from 1954-57 on Producer's Showcase, including Peter
Pan and The Petrified Forest.
Another NBC Coe production, Playwrights
'56, also known as The Playwrights
Hour, ran from 1955-1956. While with NBC, Coe also directed two episodes of a
dramatic series which he produced. In 1957, he departed NBC for CBS, where he produced
Playhouse 90 for three years. In the late
1960s and the early 1970s, he produced specials for all three major networks. In 1976, he
produced and directed episodes of The Adams
Chronicles for PBS.
Coe produced his first major motion picture, The
Left Handed Gun, in 1958. Later, he directed A Thousand Clowns and Me, Natalie. His film productions of Wait Until Dark and The Miracle
Worker were hailed internationally. In addition, Coe helped write the screenplay
for This Property Is Condemned.
