Tharon Musser, who won Tony Awards for Best Lighting Design for the landmark shows Follies, A Chorus Line and Dreamgirls, has died after a long illness. She was 84.

In the 1960s, she was often connected to serious-minded revivals such as Mother Courage and Peer Gynt, and new Edward Albee plays like A Delicate Balance. That changed somewhat after she designed the lighting for the hit 1970 musical Applause. Thereafter, she forged strong connections to leading musical theatre figures such as Stephen Sondheim (Follies, A Little Night Music, Pacific Overtures), Jerry Herman (Mack & Mabel), John Kander and Fred Ebb (The Act) and, perhaps most importantly, director Michael Bennett. For Bennett, she designed lights for A Chorus Line, Dreamgirls and Ballroom. A Chorus Line was the first Broadway production to utilize a completely computerized lighting console instead of the manually operated "piano boards."

Source: playbill.com