James Earl Jones to Leave Stage for TV and Film

James Earl Jones said he is retiring from the stage.

Jones, who has won every stage-acting award from the Tony to the Obie in his more than 30 years of live performances, said he’s getting too old to do the kind of stage acting he wants to do. The 58-year-old actor said he will concentrate on television and film from now on.

“I’ve done enough stage stuff now,” Jones said at a news conference in Los Angeles to promote his ABC fall television show, “Gabriel’s Fire.”

The series stars Jones as Gabriel Bird, a former Chicago police officer sent to prison for killing his partner in a house raid and shoot-out in 1969. Bird is freed by a young defense attorney after serving 20 years in jail. The show is about Bird’s re-entry into American life and his work as an investigator for the attorney who won his release.

Jones explained his retirement from the stage by saying: “The things I love doing on stage are serious drama. If I could sing, I could probably go on, you know, like Ethel Merman.

“But . . . I’m at the stage now where I have a hard time sustaining a serious drama beyond six months. My energies--I’ve had to face it--I just can’t keep getting up there after six months, eight times a week. And there are younger actors who can.”

Jones earned an Oscar nomination for the work he delivered after being pushed out in front of the camera for the film version of “The Great White Hope” in 1970. He is perhaps best known to younger audiences for his work in “Field of Dreams,” in which he played a reclusive writer.

Jones said all acting--whether on stage or in television--comes from the same place. And he emphasized that he is retiring from the stage, not acting.

“I will not make my living on the stage probably anymore,” Jones said. “So what’s left? TV and movies. I’m ready.”