Noted American stage director and acting teacher who appeared in a few films. A provocative and illuminating director whose special province was the works of Tennessee Williams, Ventura served as artistic director of Theatre West in Los Angeles and, for the last few years of his life, as the principal teacher at the Actors Studio's West Coast workshop. An athletic and charismatic man who was more likely to be mistaken for a beach boy than an acting teacher, he made a few films, mostly low-budget action pictures. But it is his dynamic work for the stage and his brilliant capabilities as a teacher for which he will always be most noted in the theatrical world. He died in 1990 from the sudden onslaught of complications from AIDS.