Max Adrian
Encyclopedia
Max Adrian was a Northern Irish stage, film and television actor
and singer. He was a founding member of both the Royal Shakespeare Company
and the National Theatre
.
In addition to his success as a character actor in classical drama, he was known for his work as a singer and comic actor in revue
and musicals
, and in one-man shows about George Bernard Shaw
and Gilbert and Sullivan
, and in cinema and television films, notably Ken Russell
's Song of Summer
. His voice and acting style were distinctive: The Times
referred to his "Osric-like elaborations of manner", and his voice "like no other heard on the English stage of his day, vestigially Irish and harshly attractive."
, County Fermanagh
, Northern Ireland, the son of Edward Norman Cavendish Bor and Mabel Lloyd Thornton. He was educated at the Portora Royal School
, Enniskillen
, whose past pupils also included Oscar Wilde
and Samuel Beckett
.
Adrian began his career as a chorus boy at a silent moving-picture house, coming on as part of the chorus line while the reels were being changed. He made his stage debut in the chorus of Katja the Dancer in 1925. He then toured with Lady Be Good and The Blue Train. He made his West End
debut in The Squall at the Globe Theatre
in December 1927. After working with Tod Slaughter
's company at Peterborough
, he joined the weekly rep
in Northampton
, where he took some forty roles a year. He made further West End appearances in The Best of Both Worlds at the Players' Theatre
in 1930, The Glass Wall at the Embassy Theatre
in 1933, First Episode by Terence Rattigan
and Philip Heimann at the Comedy Theatre in 1934 (later toured in the UK and then transferred to Broadway, This Desirable Residence at the Embassy in 1935, and England Expects, also at the Embassy in 1934. The Times described his performance in the last as "a gilded habitué of the backstairs" as outstanding.
and Sir Ralph Bloomfield Bonnington in The Doctor's Dilemma, winning enthusiastic notices from the critics: "Mr Max Adrian triumphantly turns Pandarus into a chattering and repulsive fribble of the glossily squalid night-club type"; "The egregious 'B.B.'... is a great piece of fun, and Mr. Max Adrian rightly draws him with all possible exuberance of line."
Adrian joined the Old Vic
company in 1939, playing the Dauphin in Shaw's Saint Joan
, "a beautifully malicious study in slyness, effeminacy, meanness, and a curious lost, inverted dignity." He continued classical work with John Gielgud
's company at the Haymarket Theatre
(1944–45), where he appeared as Puck
in A Midsummer Night's Dream
, Osric in Hamlet
, and Tattle in William Congreve
's Love for Love.
Away from the classics, he played the Strawman in The Wizard of Oz at the Phoenix Theatre
in 1943. In 1947, at the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, Adrian began performing in a series of revue
s (Tuppence Coloured, Oranges and Lemons, Penny Plain, Airs on a Shoestring, From Here to There, and Fresh Airs) in which he played more than 2,000 performances, and established himself, in Sheridan Morley
's words, "as a superlative – if eccentric – light comedian." Fellow performers in the revues included Joyce Grenfell
, Rose Hill
and Elisabeth Welch
. Contributors included Michael Flanders
, Donald Swann
and Alan Melville
, and the producer was Laurier Lister (1907–1986), who became Adrian's lifelong partner. Adrian's musical numbers included "Prehistoric Complaint" (as a misfit caveman), "Excelsior" (as a put-upon Sherpa), "Guide to Britten
" (as a manic conductor), "In the D'Oyly Cart
" ((sic) as a jaded Gilbert and Sullivan
performer), and "Surly Girls" (as headmistress of St. Trinian's).
When revue became less popular in the mid 1950s, Adrian went to America in 1956 to appear as Dr. Pangloss and Martin in Leonard Bernstein
's operetta Candide
on Broadway
. The original production was a failure, but the original cast recording has rarely been out of the catalogues in the subsequent half century. He remained in the U.S., working in summer stock in roles as varied as Doolittle in Pygmalion
, Jourdain in Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme
, Shylock in The Merchant of Venice
, and Sir Peter Teazle in The School for Scandal
. He returned to London in 1959 to appear in Noël Coward
's play Look After Lulu!
in which he also later played on Broadway.
In 1960, Adrian joined Peter Hall's newly-formed Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) in Stratford-upon-Avon
, together with such actors as Peggy Ashcroft
, Peter O'Toole
and Diana Rigg
. He played Jaques in As You Like It
, Feste in Twelfth Night, Pandarus in Troilus and Cressida, the Cardinal in John Webster
's The Duchess of Malfi
, and Father Barré in The Devils
, as well as a range of smaller parts. He also starred with Dorothy Tutin
, Richard Johnson
and John Barton
in The Hollow Crown, an anthology of prose and verse about the monarchs of England, devised by Barton and frequently revived in later years.
Adrian was one of the original members of Laurence Olivier
's National Theatre Company
at the Old Vic from 1963, and appeared as Polonius
in the opening production of Hamlet
, in which Peter O'Toole played the Prince. The Guardian
called his performance, "sly, dry, and not quite stuffy enough, but every sally from this character was touched with a look of great complicity towards the audience which made something special of this sometimes over-charged part." He then played
the Inquisitor in Saint Joan
, Serebryakov in Uncle Vanya
, Balance in The Recruiting Officer
and Brovik in The Master Builder
.
was a lesser, but real, success.
Adrian's first film was in 1934. He appeared in several British films in the 1940s, before playing the Dauphin in the Laurence Olivier production of Henry V
(1944). He also appeared in The Deadly Affair
(1966), and in several Ken Russell
films: The Music Lovers
(1970; as Anton Rubinstein
), The Boy Friend (1971) and The Devils
(1971).
He was also featured in Russell's acclaimed award-winning 1968 Omnibus
TV film Song of Summer
, as the blind composer Frederick Delius
. Adrian once said that, of all the roles he had ever played, he had never had such difficulty in ridding himself of involvement in a character as that of Delius in Song of Summer.
Also on television, he appeared in a 1957 adaptation
of A. J. Cronin
's novel, Beyond This Place
, which was directed by Sidney Lumet
. His other television work included the role of Senator Ludicrus Sextus in the first season of Up Pompeii!
with Frankie Howerd
(1969), Fagin
in the 1962 dramatisation of Oliver Twist
, and parts in The Baron
, Adam Adamant Lives!
and Perry Mason
. He also appeared in the Doctor Who
story The Myth Makers
as King Priam
.
Adrian died at age 69 from a heart attack, at his and Lister's home, Smarkham Orchard, Shamley Green
, near Guildford, Surrey, after returning from the television studios where he had been recording Bertolt Brecht
's The Caucasian Chalk Circle
for the BBC
. At his memorial service, at which the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography said the great names of British theatre paid tribute to Max Adrian's style and professionalism, the lessons were read by Alec Guinness
and Laurence Olivier and the eulogy was given by Joyce Grenfell.
Actor
An actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...
and singer. He was a founding member of both the Royal Shakespeare Company
Royal Shakespeare Company
The Royal Shakespeare Company is a major British theatre company, based in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England. The company employs 700 staff and produces around 20 productions a year from its home in Stratford-upon-Avon and plays regularly in London, Newcastle-upon-Tyne and on tour across...
and the National Theatre
Royal National Theatre
The Royal National Theatre in London is one of the United Kingdom's two most prominent publicly funded theatre companies, alongside the Royal Shakespeare Company...
.
In addition to his success as a character actor in classical drama, he was known for his work as a singer and comic actor in revue
Revue
A revue is a type of multi-act popular theatrical entertainment that combines music, dance and sketches. The revue has its roots in 19th century American popular entertainment and melodrama but grew into a substantial cultural presence of its own during its golden years from 1916 to 1932...
and musicals
Musical theatre
Musical theatre is a form of theatre combining songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...
, and in one-man shows about George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60...
and Gilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the librettist W. S. Gilbert and the composer Arthur Sullivan . The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H.M.S...
, and in cinema and television films, notably Ken Russell
Ken Russell
Henry Kenneth Alfred "Ken" Russell was an English film director, known for his pioneering work in television and film and for his flamboyant and controversial style. He attracted criticism as being obsessed with sexuality and the church...
's Song of Summer
Song of Summer
Song of Summer is a 1968 black-and-white film written, produced and directed by Ken Russell, who also plays a cameo role as a philandering priest. It portrays the final six years of the life of Frederick Delius, when he was blind and paralysed, and when Eric Fenby lived with the composer and his...
. His voice and acting style were distinctive: The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
referred to his "Osric-like elaborations of manner", and his voice "like no other heard on the English stage of his day, vestigially Irish and harshly attractive."
Early years
Adrian was born in EnniskillenEnniskillen
Enniskillen is a town in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. It is located almost exactly in the centre of the county between the Upper and Lower sections of Lough Erne. It had a population of 13,599 in the 2001 Census...
, County Fermanagh
County Fermanagh
Fermanagh District Council is the only one of the 26 district councils in Northern Ireland that contains all of the county it is named after. The district council also contains a small section of County Tyrone in the Dromore and Kilskeery road areas....
, Northern Ireland, the son of Edward Norman Cavendish Bor and Mabel Lloyd Thornton. He was educated at the Portora Royal School
Portora Royal School
Portora Royal School for boys, and some 6th form girls, located in Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland, is one of a number of 'free schools' founded by Royal Charter in 1608, by James I...
, Enniskillen
Enniskillen
Enniskillen is a town in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. It is located almost exactly in the centre of the county between the Upper and Lower sections of Lough Erne. It had a population of 13,599 in the 2001 Census...
, whose past pupils also included Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish writer and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s...
and Samuel Beckett
Samuel Beckett
Samuel Barclay Beckett was an Irish avant-garde novelist, playwright, theatre director, and poet. He wrote both in English and French. His work offers a bleak, tragicomic outlook on human nature, often coupled with black comedy and gallows humour.Beckett is widely regarded as among the most...
.
Adrian began his career as a chorus boy at a silent moving-picture house, coming on as part of the chorus line while the reels were being changed. He made his stage debut in the chorus of Katja the Dancer in 1925. He then toured with Lady Be Good and The Blue Train. He made his West End
West End theatre
West End theatre is a popular term for mainstream professional theatre staged in the large theatres of London's 'Theatreland', the West End. Along with New York's Broadway theatre, West End theatre is usually considered to represent the highest level of commercial theatre in the English speaking...
debut in The Squall at the Globe Theatre
Gielgud Theatre
The Gielgud Theatre is a West End theatre, located on Shaftesbury Avenue in the City of Westminster, London, at the corner of Rupert Street. The house currently has 889 seats on three levels.-History:...
in December 1927. After working with Tod Slaughter
Tod Slaughter
Tod Slaughter was an English actor, best known for playing over-the-top maniacs in macabre film adaptations of Victorian melodramas.-Ealy life:...
's company at Peterborough
Peterborough
Peterborough is a cathedral city and unitary authority area in the East of England, with an estimated population of in June 2007. For ceremonial purposes it is in the county of Cambridgeshire. Situated north of London, the city stands on the River Nene which flows into the North Sea...
, he joined the weekly rep
Repertory
Repertory or rep, also called stock in the United States, is a term used in Western theatre and opera.A repertory theatre can be a theatre in which a resident company presents works from a specified repertoire, usually in alternation or rotation...
in Northampton
Northampton
Northampton is a large market town and local government district in the East Midlands region of England. Situated about north-west of London and around south-east of Birmingham, Northampton lies on the River Nene and is the county town of Northamptonshire. The demonym of Northampton is...
, where he took some forty roles a year. He made further West End appearances in The Best of Both Worlds at the Players' Theatre
Players' Theatre
The Players' Theatre was a theatre in London as well as a theatre club for music hall in the style of the BBC programme "The Good Old Days".-Origins:...
in 1930, The Glass Wall at the Embassy Theatre
Embassy Theatre (London)
The Embassy Theatre is a theatre at 64, Eton Avenue, Swiss Cottage, London.- Early years :The Embassy Theatre was opened as a repertory company in September 1928 on the initiative of Sybil Arundale and Herbert Jay., when the premises of Hampstead Conservatoire of Music were adapted by architect...
in 1933, First Episode by Terence Rattigan
Terence Rattigan
Sir Terence Mervyn Rattigan CBE was one of England's most popular 20th-century dramatists. His plays are generally set in an upper-middle-class background...
and Philip Heimann at the Comedy Theatre in 1934 (later toured in the UK and then transferred to Broadway, This Desirable Residence at the Embassy in 1935, and England Expects, also at the Embassy in 1934. The Times described his performance in the last as "a gilded habitué of the backstairs" as outstanding.
Classical roles and revue
Adrian first achieved wide public notice in a nine-month season at the Westminster Theatre from September 1938, as Pandarus in a modern dress Troilus and CressidaTroilus and Cressida
Troilus and Cressida is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1602. It was also described by Frederick S. Boas as one of Shakespeare's problem plays. The play ends on a very bleak note with the death of the noble Trojan Hector and destruction of the love between Troilus...
and Sir Ralph Bloomfield Bonnington in The Doctor's Dilemma, winning enthusiastic notices from the critics: "Mr Max Adrian triumphantly turns Pandarus into a chattering and repulsive fribble of the glossily squalid night-club type"; "The egregious 'B.B.'... is a great piece of fun, and Mr. Max Adrian rightly draws him with all possible exuberance of line."
Adrian joined the Old Vic
Old Vic
The Old Vic is a theatre located just south-east of Waterloo Station in London on the corner of The Cut and Waterloo Road. Established in 1818 as the Royal Coburg Theatre, it was taken over by Emma Cons in 1880 when it was known formally as the Royal Victoria Hall. In 1898, a niece of Cons, Lilian...
company in 1939, playing the Dauphin in Shaw's Saint Joan
Saint Joan (play)
Saint Joan is a play by George Bernard Shaw, based on the life and trial of Joan of Arc. Published not long after the canonization of Joan of Arc by the Roman Catholic Church, the play dramatises what is known of her life based on the substantial records of her trial. Shaw studied the transcripts...
, "a beautifully malicious study in slyness, effeminacy, meanness, and a curious lost, inverted dignity." He continued classical work with John Gielgud
John Gielgud
Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH was an English actor, director, and producer. A descendant of the renowned Terry acting family, he achieved early international acclaim for his youthful, emotionally expressive Hamlet which broke box office records on Broadway in 1937...
's company at the Haymarket Theatre
Haymarket Theatre
The Theatre Royal Haymarket is a West End theatre in the Haymarket in the City of Westminster which dates back to 1720, making it the third-oldest London playhouse still in use...
(1944–45), where he appeared as Puck
Puck (Shakespeare)
Puck, also known as Robin Goodfellow, is a character in William Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream that was based on the ancient figure in English mythology, also called Puck. Puck is a clever and mischievous elf and personifies the trickster or the wise knave...
in A Midsummer Night's Dream
A Midsummer Night's Dream
A Midsummer Night's Dream is a play that was written by William Shakespeare. It is believed to have been written between 1590 and 1596. It portrays the events surrounding the marriage of the Duke of Athens, Theseus, and the Queen of the Amazons, Hippolyta...
, Osric in Hamlet
Hamlet
The Tragical History of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, or more simply Hamlet, is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1599 and 1601...
, and Tattle in William Congreve
William Congreve
William Congreve was an English playwright and poet.-Early life:Congreve was born in Bardsey, West Yorkshire, England . His parents were William Congreve and his wife, Mary ; a sister was buried in London in 1672...
's Love for Love.
Away from the classics, he played the Strawman in The Wizard of Oz at the Phoenix Theatre
Phoenix Theatre
Phoenix Theatre may refer to:*Phoenix Arts Centre, former name was Phoenix Theatre in Leicester, UK*Phoenix Theatre , a West End theatre*Phoenix Theatre , a professional alternative theatre*Phoenix Theatre , a regional theatre...
in 1943. In 1947, at the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, Adrian began performing in a series of revue
Revue
A revue is a type of multi-act popular theatrical entertainment that combines music, dance and sketches. The revue has its roots in 19th century American popular entertainment and melodrama but grew into a substantial cultural presence of its own during its golden years from 1916 to 1932...
s (Tuppence Coloured, Oranges and Lemons, Penny Plain, Airs on a Shoestring, From Here to There, and Fresh Airs) in which he played more than 2,000 performances, and established himself, in Sheridan Morley
Sheridan Morley
Sheridan Morley was an English author, biographer, critic, director, actor and broadcaster. He was the eldest son of actor Robert Morley and grandson of actress Dame Gladys Cooper, and wrote biographies of both...
's words, "as a superlative – if eccentric – light comedian." Fellow performers in the revues included Joyce Grenfell
Joyce Grenfell
Joyce Irene Grenfell, OBE was an English actress, comedienne, diseuse and singer-songwriter.-Early life:...
, Rose Hill
Rose Hill (actress)
Rose Lilian Hill was an English actress best known for her role as Madame Fanny La Fan in the British television series Allo 'Allo!. She was a former member of the Royal Shakespeare Company....
and Elisabeth Welch
Elisabeth Welch
thumb|right|200pxElisabeth Welch was an American born singer, actress, and entertainer whose career spanned seven decades, many years of which she was based in Britain....
. Contributors included Michael Flanders
Michael Flanders
Michael Henry Flanders OBE, was an English actor, broadcaster, and writer and performer of comic songs. He is best known to the general public for his partnership with Donald Swann performing as the duo Flanders and Swann....
, Donald Swann
Donald Swann
Donald Ibrahím Swann was a British composer, musician and entertainer. He is best known to the general public for his partnership of writing and performing comic songs with Michael Flanders .-Life:...
and Alan Melville
Alan Melville
Alan Melville was a South African cricketer who played in 11 Tests from 1938 to 1949. He was a Wisden Cricketer of the Year ....
, and the producer was Laurier Lister (1907–1986), who became Adrian's lifelong partner. Adrian's musical numbers included "Prehistoric Complaint" (as a misfit caveman), "Excelsior" (as a put-upon Sherpa), "Guide to Britten
Benjamin Britten
Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
" (as a manic conductor), "In the D'Oyly Cart
D'Oyly Carte Opera Company
The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company was a professional light opera company that staged Gilbert and Sullivan's Savoy operas. The company performed nearly year-round in the UK and sometimes toured in Europe, North America and elsewhere, from the 1870s until it closed in 1982. It was revived in 1988 and...
" ((sic) as a jaded Gilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the librettist W. S. Gilbert and the composer Arthur Sullivan . The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H.M.S...
performer), and "Surly Girls" (as headmistress of St. Trinian's).
When revue became less popular in the mid 1950s, Adrian went to America in 1956 to appear as Dr. Pangloss and Martin in Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...
's operetta Candide
Candide (operetta)
Candide is an operetta with music composed by Leonard Bernstein, based on the novella of the same name by Voltaire. The operetta was first performed in 1956 with a libretto by Lillian Hellman; but since 1974 it has been generally performed with a book by Hugh Wheeler which is more faithful to...
on Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
. The original production was a failure, but the original cast recording has rarely been out of the catalogues in the subsequent half century. He remained in the U.S., working in summer stock in roles as varied as Doolittle in Pygmalion
Pygmalion (play)
Pygmalion: A Romance in Five Acts is a play by Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw. Professor of phonetics Henry Higgins makes a bet that he can train a bedraggled Cockney flower girl, Eliza Doolittle, to pass for a duchess at an ambassador's garden party by teaching her to assume a veneer of...
, Jourdain in Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme
Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme
Le Bourgeois gentilhomme is a five-act comédie-ballet—a play intermingled with music, dance and singing—by Molière, first presented on 14 October 1670 before the court of Louis XIV at the Château of Chambord by Molière's troupe of actors...
, Shylock in The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice is a tragic comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1596 and 1598. Though classified as a comedy in the First Folio and sharing certain aspects with Shakespeare's other romantic comedies, the play is perhaps most remembered for its dramatic...
, and Sir Peter Teazle in The School for Scandal
The School for Scandal
The School for Scandal is a play written by Richard Brinsley Sheridan. It was first performed in London at Drury Lane Theatre on May 8, 1777.The prologue, written by David Garrick, commends the play, its subject, and its author to the audience...
. He returned to London in 1959 to appear in Noël Coward
Noël Coward
Sir Noël Peirce Coward was an English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what Time magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise".Born in Teddington, a suburb of London, Coward attended a dance academy...
's play Look After Lulu!
Look After Lulu!
Look After Lulu! is a play by British actor and playwright Noël Coward, based on "Occupe-toi d'Amelie" by Georges Feydeau. It is set in Paris in 1908. The farcical story concerns an attractive prostitute who is entrusted to a friend by her lover, when he goes into the army...
in which he also later played on Broadway.
In 1960, Adrian joined Peter Hall's newly-formed Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) in Stratford-upon-Avon
Stratford-upon-Avon
Stratford-upon-Avon is a market town and civil parish in south Warwickshire, England. It lies on the River Avon, south east of Birmingham and south west of Warwick. It is the largest and most populous town of the District of Stratford-on-Avon, which uses the term "on" to indicate that it covers...
, together with such actors as Peggy Ashcroft
Peggy Ashcroft
Dame Peggy Ashcroft, DBE was an English actress.-Early years:Born as Edith Margaret Emily Ashcroft in Croydon, Ashcroft attended the Woodford School, Croydon and the Central School of Speech and Drama...
, Peter O'Toole
Peter O'Toole
Peter Seamus Lorcan O'Toole is an Irish actor of stage and screen. O'Toole achieved stardom in 1962 playing T. E. Lawrence in Lawrence of Arabia, and then went on to become a highly-honoured film and stage actor. He has been nominated for eight Academy Awards, and holds the record for most...
and Diana Rigg
Diana Rigg
Dame Enid Diana Elizabeth Rigg, DBE is an English actress. She is probably best known for her portrayals of Emma Peel in The Avengers and Countess Teresa di Vicenzo in the 1969 James Bond film On Her Majesty's Secret Service....
. He played Jaques in As You Like It
As You Like It
As You Like It is a pastoral comedy by William Shakespeare believed to have been written in 1599 or early 1600 and first published in the folio of 1623. The play's first performance is uncertain, though a performance at Wilton House in 1603 has been suggested as a possibility...
, Feste in Twelfth Night, Pandarus in Troilus and Cressida, the Cardinal in John Webster
John Webster
John Webster was an English Jacobean dramatist best known for his tragedies The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi, which are often regarded as masterpieces of the early 17th-century English stage. He was a contemporary of William Shakespeare.- Biography :Webster's life is obscure, and the dates...
's The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess of Malfi is a macabre, tragic play written by the English dramatist John Webster in 1612–13. It was first performed privately at the Blackfriars Theatre, then before a more general audience at The Globe, in 1613-14...
, and Father Barré in The Devils
The Devils
The Devils is a name for:* The Devils , the 1960 play by John Whiting based on the book The Devils of Loudon by Aldous Huxley* The Devils , the 1971 Ken Russell film...
, as well as a range of smaller parts. He also starred with Dorothy Tutin
Dorothy Tutin
Dame Dorothy Tutin DBE was an English actor of stage, film, and television.An obituary in The Daily Telegraph described her as "one of the most enchanting, accomplished and intelligent leading ladies on the post-war British stage...
, Richard Johnson
Richard Johnson (actor)
Richard Johnson is an English actor, writer and producer, who starred in several British films of the 1960s and has also had a distinguished stage career. He most recently appeared in The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas.-Life and career:...
and John Barton
John Barton (director)
John Bernard Adie Barton CBE is a theatrical director. He is the son of Sir Harold Montagu and Lady Joyce Barton. He married Anne Righter, a university lecturer, in 1968....
in The Hollow Crown, an anthology of prose and verse about the monarchs of England, devised by Barton and frequently revived in later years.
Adrian was one of the original members of Laurence Olivier
Laurence Olivier
Laurence Kerr Olivier, Baron Olivier, OM was an English actor, director, and producer. He was one of the most famous and revered actors of the 20th century. He married three times, to fellow actors Jill Esmond, Vivien Leigh, and Joan Plowright...
's National Theatre Company
Royal National Theatre
The Royal National Theatre in London is one of the United Kingdom's two most prominent publicly funded theatre companies, alongside the Royal Shakespeare Company...
at the Old Vic from 1963, and appeared as Polonius
Polonius
Polonius is a character in William Shakespeare's Hamlet. He is King Claudius's chief counsellor, and the father of Ophelia and Laertes. Polonius connives with Claudius to spy on Hamlet...
in the opening production of Hamlet
Hamlet
The Tragical History of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, or more simply Hamlet, is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1599 and 1601...
, in which Peter O'Toole played the Prince. The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
called his performance, "sly, dry, and not quite stuffy enough, but every sally from this character was touched with a look of great complicity towards the audience which made something special of this sometimes over-charged part." He then played
the Inquisitor in Saint Joan
Saint Joan (play)
Saint Joan is a play by George Bernard Shaw, based on the life and trial of Joan of Arc. Published not long after the canonization of Joan of Arc by the Roman Catholic Church, the play dramatises what is known of her life based on the substantial records of her trial. Shaw studied the transcripts...
, Serebryakov in Uncle Vanya
Uncle Vanya
Uncle Vanya is a play by the Russian playwright Anton Chekhov. It was first published in 1897 and received its Moscow première in 1899 in a production by the Moscow Art Theatre, under the direction of Konstantin Stanislavski....
, Balance in The Recruiting Officer
The Recruiting Officer
The Recruiting Officer is a 1706 play by the Irish writer George Farquhar, which follows the social and sexual exploits of two officers, the womanising Plume and the cowardly Brazen, in the town of Shrewsbury to recruit soldiers...
and Brovik in The Master Builder
The Master Builder
The Master Builder is a play by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. It was first published in December 1892 and is regarded as one of Ibsen's most significant and revealing works.-Performance:...
.
Solo shows and screen work
In the late 1960s, Adrian toured as George Bernard Shaw in the one-man show An Evening with GBS, which played in London, on Broadway, and in Asia, Africa and Australia. The Times said that the show "presented a deeply understanding portrait... impish, malicious, playful, outrageous, affectionate, angry and almost always eloquent." His later one-man show about Gilbert and SullivanGilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the librettist W. S. Gilbert and the composer Arthur Sullivan . The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H.M.S...
was a lesser, but real, success.
Adrian's first film was in 1934. He appeared in several British films in the 1940s, before playing the Dauphin in the Laurence Olivier production of Henry V
Henry V (1944 film)
Henry V is a 1944 film adaptation of William Shakespeare's play of the same name. The on-screen title is The Cronicle History of King Henry the Fift with His Battell Fought at Agincourt in France . It stars Laurence Olivier, who also directed. The play was adapted for the screen by Olivier, Dallas...
(1944). He also appeared in The Deadly Affair
The Deadly Affair
The Deadly Affair is a 1966 British espionage–thriller film, based on John le Carré's first novel Call for the Dead. The film stars James Mason, Harry Andrews, Simone Signoret and Maximilian Schell and was directed by Sidney Lumet from a script by Paul Dehn. In it George Smiley, the central...
(1966), and in several Ken Russell
Ken Russell
Henry Kenneth Alfred "Ken" Russell was an English film director, known for his pioneering work in television and film and for his flamboyant and controversial style. He attracted criticism as being obsessed with sexuality and the church...
films: The Music Lovers
The Music Lovers
The Music Lovers is a 1970 British biographical film directed by Ken Russell. The screenplay by Melvyn Bragg, based on Beloved Friend, a collection of personal correspondence edited by Catherine Drinker Bowen and Barbara von Meck, focuses on the life and career of 19th century Russian composer...
(1970; as Anton Rubinstein
Anton Rubinstein
Anton Grigorevich Rubinstein was a Russian-Jewish pianist, composer and conductor. As a pianist he was regarded as a rival of Franz Liszt, and he ranks amongst the great keyboard virtuosos...
), The Boy Friend (1971) and The Devils
The Devils (film)
The Devils is a 1971 British historical drama directed by Ken Russell and starring Oliver Reed and Vanessa Redgrave. It is based partially on the 1952 book The Devils of Loudun by Aldous Huxley, and partially on the 1960 play The Devils by John Whiting, also based on Huxley's book...
(1971).
He was also featured in Russell's acclaimed award-winning 1968 Omnibus
Omnibus (TV series)
Omnibus was an arts-based BBC television documentary series, broadcast on BBC1 in the United Kingdom. It ran from 1967 until 2003, usually being transmitted on Sunday evenings....
TV film Song of Summer
Song of Summer
Song of Summer is a 1968 black-and-white film written, produced and directed by Ken Russell, who also plays a cameo role as a philandering priest. It portrays the final six years of the life of Frederick Delius, when he was blind and paralysed, and when Eric Fenby lived with the composer and his...
, as the blind composer Frederick Delius
Frederick Delius
Frederick Theodore Albert Delius, CH was an English composer. Born in the north of England to a prosperous mercantile family of German extraction, he resisted attempts to recruit him to commerce...
. Adrian once said that, of all the roles he had ever played, he had never had such difficulty in ridding himself of involvement in a character as that of Delius in Song of Summer.
Also on television, he appeared in a 1957 adaptation
Beyond This Place (1957)
Beyond This Place is a 1957 American television adaptation from A. J. Cronin's novel, Beyond This Place, which was originally published in 1953. It is not really a film, but a live production broadcast on television, and possibly preserved on kinescope. The show was directed by Sidney Lumet and...
of A. J. Cronin
A. J. Cronin
Archibald Joseph Cronin was a Scottish physician and novelist. His best-known works are Hatter's Castle, The Stars Look Down, The Citadel, The Keys of the Kingdom and The Green Years, all of which were adapted to film. He also created the Dr...
's novel, Beyond This Place
Beyond This Place
Beyond This Place is a 1953 novel by Scottish author A. J. Cronin. A serial version appeared in Collier's under the title of To Live Again.-Adaptations:...
, which was directed by Sidney Lumet
Sidney Lumet
Sidney Lumet was an American director, producer and screenwriter with over 50 films to his credit. He was nominated for the Academy Award as Best Director for 12 Angry Men , Dog Day Afternoon , Network and The Verdict...
. His other television work included the role of Senator Ludicrus Sextus in the first season of Up Pompeii!
Up Pompeii!
Up Pompeii! is a British television comedy series broadcast between 1969 and 1970, starring Frankie Howerd. The first series was written by Talbot Rothwell, a scriptwriter for the Carry On films, and the second series by Rothwell and Sid Colin. Two later specials were transmitted in 1975 and...
with Frankie Howerd
Frankie Howerd
Francis Alick "Frankie" Howerd OBE was an English comedian and comic actor whose career, described by fellow comedian Barry Cryer as "a series of comebacks", spanned six decades.-Early career:...
(1969), Fagin
Fagin
Fagin is a fictional character who appears as an antagonist of the Charles Dickens novel Oliver Twist, referred to in the preface of the novel as a "receiver of stolen goods", but referred to more frequently within the actual story as the "merry old gentleman" or simply the "Jew".-Character:Born...
in the 1962 dramatisation of Oliver Twist
Oliver Twist
Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy's Progress is the second novel by English author Charles Dickens, published by Richard Bentley in 1838. The story is about an orphan Oliver Twist, who endures a miserable existence in a workhouse and then is placed with an undertaker. He escapes and travels to...
, and parts in The Baron
The Baron
The Baron is a British television series, made in 1965/66 based on the book series by John Creasey, written under the pseudonym Anthony Morton, and produced by ITC Entertainment. It was the first ITC show without marionettes to be produced entirely in colour...
, Adam Adamant Lives!
Adam Adamant Lives!
Adam Adamant Lives! is a British television series which ran from 1966 to 1967 on the BBC. Proposing that an adventurer born in 1867 had been revived from hibernation in 1966, the show was a comedy adventure that took a satirical look at life in the 1960s through the eyes of an Edwardian .- Character...
and Perry Mason
Perry Mason (TV series)
Perry Mason is an American legal drama produced by Paisano Productions that ran from September 1957 to May 1966 on CBS. The title character, portrayed by Raymond Burr, is a fictional Los Angeles defense attorney who originally appeared in detective fiction by Erle Stanley Gardner...
. He also appeared in the Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
story The Myth Makers
The Myth Makers
The Myth Makers is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 16 October to 6 November 1965. The story is set in Homeric Troy, based on Iliad by Homer...
as King Priam
King Priam
King Priam is an opera by Michael Tippett, to his own libretto. The story is based on Homer's Iliad, except the birth and childhood of Paris, which are taken from the Fabulae of Hyginus.The premiere was on 29 May 1962, at Coventry...
.
Adrian died at age 69 from a heart attack, at his and Lister's home, Smarkham Orchard, Shamley Green
Shamley Green
Shamley Green is a small village in the county of Surrey, England. Neighbouring villages include Wonersh, Chilworth, Farncombe and Bramley. Nearby railway stations include Chilworth railway station and Farncombe railway station . Although Shalford Station is in fact closer as the route to...
, near Guildford, Surrey, after returning from the television studios where he had been recording Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...
's The Caucasian Chalk Circle
The Caucasian Chalk Circle
The Caucasian Chalk Circle is a play by the German modernist playwright Bertolt Brecht. An example of Brecht's epic theatre, the play is a parable about a peasant girl who rescues a baby and becomes a better mother than its natural parents....
for the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
. At his memorial service, at which the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography said the great names of British theatre paid tribute to Max Adrian's style and professionalism, the lessons were read by Alec Guinness
Alec Guinness
Sir Alec Guinness, CH, CBE was an English actor. He was featured in several of the Ealing Comedies, including Kind Hearts and Coronets in which he played eight different characters. He later won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role as Colonel Nicholson in The Bridge on the River Kwai...
and Laurence Olivier and the eulogy was given by Joyce Grenfell.
Selected filmography
- The Primrose PathThe Primrose Path (film)The Primrose Path is a 1934 British romance film directed by Reginald Denham and starring Isobel Elsom, Whitmore Humphries and Max Adrian. A doctor's wife has to choose between her settled life with her husband in a small town or a more turbulent relationship with a successful artist...
(1934) - Penn of PennsylvaniaPenn of PennsylvaniaPenn of Pennsylvania is a 1941 British historical drama film directed by Lance Comfort and starring Deborah Kerr, Clifford Evans, Dennis Arundell, Henry Oscar, Herbet Lomas and Edward Rigby. The film depicts the life of the Quaker founder of Pennsylvania, William Penn...
(1941)