He has evolved into a first-rate commercial director.

Ellen Michelmore, Theater Three's first-rate musical director, keeps this "Christmas Carol" a figurative and sometimes literal hand-clapping sing-along.

By all accounts Ogden has been a first-rate director.

They said that having a single director for a series would be standard if there were enough first-rate directors.

If the end of that sentence surprised you, so will the end of this laborious and nonsensical psychological thriller, a mediocre piece of studio hackwork unredeemed by a first-rate director.

"Brand is a first-rate director, and if anybody can do this job well he probably can."

And he was never afraid to choose offbeat projects by first-rate directors.

"I think she's a - a first-rate director without question," he said.

Essentially, "Aftershocks" is an actors' vehicle, a fact that both the playwright and his first-rate director, Clinton J. Atkinson, seem to understand.

Mr. Papp described him as "a first-rate director," but he added that with Mr. Berkoff's London commitment, "it would have been a complicated situation."