Skylight Books Founder Katseles Dies at 75
by Wendy Werris -- Publishers Weekly, 10/31/2008 7:14:00 AM
Legendary acting teacher and director Milton Katseles, whose visionary idea about opening a bookstore in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles turned Skylight Books into a reality in 1996, died on October 24 at the age of 75. Katseles, who studied at the famed Actors Studio in New York with Lee Strasberg and went on to apprentice under fellow Greek and director Elia Kazan, taught actors such as Gene Hackman, Alec Baldwin, Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney during his long career. After opening the Beverly Hills Playhouse in 1978 Katseles branched out into the Los Feliz area with a second location for his school. The Skylight Theatre opened in the early 1980s, adjacent to Chatterton’s Books on Vermont Avenue.
When Chatterton’s closed in 1994, it was Katseles who insisted the space remain a bookstore and sought out his former acting student Kerry Slattery to help reestablish the empty space as Skylight Books. A group of 10 investors made the transition possible, and Skylight is celebrating its twelfth anniversary this weekend. Slattery, who is general manager and partner in the company, will always be grateful to Katseles for being instrumental in turning her into a book person.
“He had a lot of belief in me and the bookstore,” she said. “When we were opening, he told everyone to just leave me alone and let me create what would become Skylight.” Although Katseles didn’t interfere with Slattery, he was aware of what she was doing and supported her efforts along the way. His background in theatre and sets helped create the look of the bookstore, including the ficus tree that was planted in the middle of the store below the skylight and which is now twenty feet tall. “A bookstore is a meeting place, and this open area under the tree really helps define what Skylight Books is,” Slattery said.
Katseles, who was also a well-known painter, gave Slattery first option on the space-adjoining Skylight when he decided to no longer use it as his art studio. This enabled the expansion of the visual and performing arts sections into the annex now called Skylight Books 1814, which opened in August. Katseles held an event at the annex for his new book, Acting Class: Take a Seat (Phoenix) before dying a few days later.
