Shakespearean actor who played many familiar roles on film and television
Few actors can claim to have played most of Shakespeare's clowns and made some of them funny, but Geoffrey Hutchings, who has died of meningitis aged 71, did just that. An associate artist with the Royal Shakespeare Company, he played Launce, Bottom, Feste, one of the Dromios and even the impossible Lavache in Trevor Nunn's great "Crimean war" All's Well That Ends Well, with Peggy Ashcroft making her RSC farewell as the Countess of Rousillon. Hutchings brought an individual quality of asperity and crackle to everything he did, and was noted early on as a character actor of uncommon personality: small, slight, but always ferocious, he was like a terrier with a dangerous bark.
He grasped Autolycus, for instance, that wandering snapper-up of unconsidered trifles, in Ronald Eyre's 1981 The Winter's Tale at Stratford-upon-Avon, and transformed him into a...
Few actors can claim to have played most of Shakespeare's clowns and made some of them funny, but Geoffrey Hutchings, who has died of meningitis aged 71, did just that. An associate artist with the Royal Shakespeare Company, he played Launce, Bottom, Feste, one of the Dromios and even the impossible Lavache in Trevor Nunn's great "Crimean war" All's Well That Ends Well, with Peggy Ashcroft making her RSC farewell as the Countess of Rousillon. Hutchings brought an individual quality of asperity and crackle to everything he did, and was noted early on as a character actor of uncommon personality: small, slight, but always ferocious, he was like a terrier with a dangerous bark.
He grasped Autolycus, for instance, that wandering snapper-up of unconsidered trifles, in Ronald Eyre's 1981 The Winter's Tale at Stratford-upon-Avon, and transformed him into a...
- 7/11/2010
- by Michael Coveney
- The Guardian - Film News
Veteran actor Patrick Stewart channels his traumatic childhood to deliver his most emotional performances, recalling the pain of seeing his father beat his mother.
The X-Men star was deeply affected by the domestic violence he witnessed between dad Alfred and mum Gladys but he tried to repress the painful memories from his youth as he embarked upon a career on the stage.
It wasn't until a theatre director encouraged him to tap into those emotions that he began to use his experiences to boost his performances.
He explains, "The stage was a far safer place for me than anything I had to live through at home - it offered escape. I could be someone else, in another place, in another time. It was not until 1981, when the director Ronald Eyre asked me to play the psychotic Leontes in The Winter's Tale, that the breakthrough came.
"He quietly told me that the play would only work if I gave myself over, completely and totally, to the delusions, madness and murderousness of this man. From that time forward I was never again afraid of my feelings on stage."
Stewart admits the abuse still plays a part in his adult relationships, adding: "Such experiences are destructive. In my adult life I have struggled to overcome the bad lessons of my father's behaviour, this corrosive example of male irresponsibility."
The actor is now a patron of the U.K. domestic violence charity Refuge - and hopes to use the platform to put a stop to the matter: "I cannot express how sad - and angry - it makes me to think that we still cannot ensure the safety of women and children in their own homes. More women and children, just like my mother and me, will continue to experience domestic violence unless we all speak out against it."...
The X-Men star was deeply affected by the domestic violence he witnessed between dad Alfred and mum Gladys but he tried to repress the painful memories from his youth as he embarked upon a career on the stage.
It wasn't until a theatre director encouraged him to tap into those emotions that he began to use his experiences to boost his performances.
He explains, "The stage was a far safer place for me than anything I had to live through at home - it offered escape. I could be someone else, in another place, in another time. It was not until 1981, when the director Ronald Eyre asked me to play the psychotic Leontes in The Winter's Tale, that the breakthrough came.
"He quietly told me that the play would only work if I gave myself over, completely and totally, to the delusions, madness and murderousness of this man. From that time forward I was never again afraid of my feelings on stage."
Stewart admits the abuse still plays a part in his adult relationships, adding: "Such experiences are destructive. In my adult life I have struggled to overcome the bad lessons of my father's behaviour, this corrosive example of male irresponsibility."
The actor is now a patron of the U.K. domestic violence charity Refuge - and hopes to use the platform to put a stop to the matter: "I cannot express how sad - and angry - it makes me to think that we still cannot ensure the safety of women and children in their own homes. More women and children, just like my mother and me, will continue to experience domestic violence unless we all speak out against it."...
- 11/27/2009
- WENN
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