Kingsley was born
Sidney Kirschner in New York. He studied at
Cornell University, where he began his career writing plays for the college dramatic club. He joined the
Group Theater for the production of his first major work. In 1933 the company performed his play
Men in White. Set in a hospital, the play dealt with the issue of illegal abortion, 1930s medical and surgical practices, and the struggle of a promising physician who must choose to dedicate his life to medicine or devote himself to his fiancée. The play was a box-office smash. Kingsley followed this success with the play
Dead End in 1935, a story about slum housing and its connection to crime. The play was fairly successful, being filmed and eventually spawning the film troupe
The Dead End Kids. Kingsley's two successes were followed by his 1936 anti-war play
Ten Million Ghosts and his 1939 work
The World We Make, which were both flops and had short runs. In 1943, Kingsley had success with the historical drama
The Patriots, which told the story of
Thomas Jefferson and his activities in the young American republic and won the
New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play. Kingsley continued writing for the theater late into his career, adapting
Arthur Koestler's novel
Darkness at Noon for the stage in 1951, and writing
Lunatics and Lovers in 1954 and
Night Life in 1962. In addition to his work for the stage, Kingsley wrote a number of scripts for
Hollywood productions, mostly based on his own work. He later also wrote the scripts and templates for numerous television series and television films. Despite reaching the rank of lieutenant in the
United States Army during
World War II, soon after, in 1951, Kingsley's name was placed on the
Hollywood Blacklist by
HUAC, which ended his film career. His marriage to actress
Madge Evans in 1939 lasted until her death in 1981. The couple lived together in their 18th century
Oakland, New Jersey, home for 42 years. Meeting him in 1957,
Michael Korda described Kingsley as "a short, powerfully built man with broad shoulders, a big head, and rough-hewn features that made him look like a bust by
Sir Jacob Epstein". Kingsley hired Korda as an assistant to do research for a screenplay he was writing for CBS on the Hungarian Revolution which was never produced. and in 1983, he was inducted into the
American Theater Hall of Fame. Kingsley died of a stroke on March 20, 1995, aged 88, in his home in
Oakland, New Jersey. == Works ==