Betty Ruth Caplan

CAPLAN: On Wednesday, March 9, 2016, Betty Ruth Caplan, 88, died peacefully in her home in the Bronx. Betty Ruth was wife to the late Abe Caplan. A long-term resident of Pittsburgh, she spent the last six years in New York close to her beloved Broadway.  Betty was embedded within Pittsburgh’s theater world in the ‘60s to ‘90s. Betty was a lifelong writer and creative force in that community who wrote and produced plays, musicals and Purim shpiels. Betty Caplan brought the first dinner theater to Pittsburgh with productions at leading restaurants downtown.  Her crown jewel was to import “Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris!” which ran for six years at Walt Harpers’ Attic.  It was a Pittsburgh record for the longest single run of any show locally and for this show nationally. Equally accomplished as an educator, she taught English to high school students within the Pittsburgh public schools for 22 years, including class plays at Taylor Allderdice.  She is deeply loved and missed by her four children, Andrew, Marty, Eddie and Nancy, her two daughters-in-law Linda and Barbara, her son-in-law the late Ross Shapiro and her six grandchildren Sarah, Noah, Emily, Eric, Aiden and Emma. Services were held at Ralph Schugar Chapel, Inc., 5509 Centre Avenue, Shadyside. Interment Adath Jeshurun Cemetery.  Contributions may be made to a charity of the donor’s choice.

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