Kirk Douglas on Broadway in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” in 1963, opposite Joan Tetzel as Nurse Ratched. He optioned the film rights but eventually gave them to his son Michal Douglas, who produced the movie directed by Milos Forman and starring Jack Nicholson.

In his third show on Broadway, after portraying a singing messenger boy in “Spring Again” and an orderly in “The Three Sisters,” Kirk Douglas was the replacement juvenile lead in “Kiss and Tell” in 1943.

a caricature of Douglas in the play One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

In Trio, Kirk Douglas replaced Richard Widmark as a graduate student who falls in love with the young female protege of a college professor, who feels threatened

The Wind is Ninety

Woman Bites Dog, in 1946, was Kirk Douglas’s seventh Broadway play, the last one before he became a movie star. He returned 17 years later for Cuckoo.

Kirk Douglass in 1987 at the Majestic Theater with his four sons.

In 2009, the 92-year-old actor appeared in a one-man show called “Before I Forget” at the Kirk Douglas Theater in Culver City

Although Kirk Douglas, who died yesterday at the age of 103, was known primarily as a movie star, he was also a veteran of Broadway.

(Obituaries in CNN, Hollywood Reporter, New York Times)

Born Issur Danielovitch on December 9, 1916 to an impoverished Yiddish speaking immigrant family in upstate New York, he put himself through St. Lawrence University by working as a janitor. Then, moving to Manhattan, he was given a special scholarship to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, where he befriended classmate Betty Joan Perske — stage name Lauren Bacall.
Graduating in 1941, he recalled, “my first job was on Broadway. Then I went into the Navy. When I came out of the Navy, I went back to Broadway. A friend of mine, Lauren Bacall, was in Hollywood filming with Humphrey Bogart. She told one of her producers I was great in my play, and he saw it and cast me in ‘The Strange Love of Martha Ivers'” — as the lead opposite Barbara Stanwyck. That was in 1946, the first of more than 80 films over the next six decades, including Champions, Paths of Glory, Lust for Life, and Spartacus. More on Douglas’s film career.

Spartacus

Lust for Life

Paths of Glory

Young Man With A Horn

As to his Broadway career, a list of the eight shows in which he performed:

Spring Again (Nov 10, 1941 – Jan 10, 1942) starring Brace George and C. Aubrey Smith, in which Douglas played a singing messenger boy.

The Three Sisters (Dec 21, 1942 – Apr 03, 1943) in which he played an orderly.

Kiss and Tell (Mar 17, 1943 – Jun 23, 1945), in which he replaced the juvenile lead as
Lieut. Lenny Archer

Trio (Dec 29, 1944 – Feb 24, 1945): Ray MacKenzie

Alice in Arms (Jan 31, 1945 – Feb 03, 1945): Steve

The Wind Is Ninety (Jun 21, 1945 – Sep 22, 1945): Soldier

Woman Bites Dog (Apr 17, 1946 – Apr 20, 1946): Hopkins

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (Nov 13, 1963 – Jan 25, 1964: Randle P. McMurphy

Kirk Douglas returned to the stage in 2009 for a one-man show entitled “Before I Forget,” recounting his life, in the Kirk Douglas Theater in Culver City, California. In it, he told the story of his first acting gig, in a kindergarten play. His father, who sold rags in a horse-drawn cart, spent most of his free time in the corner saloon, ignoring his only son. But he actually showed up for this school performance.
“After the show, not a word was said. He bought me an ice cream cone. That ice cream cone was my Oscar. From that day on, I was determined to be an actor.”