Olive King

(****-****). Actress and singer. Performed in The Boy Friend (as “Mme Dubonnet”), La Traviata (as “Flora”), Give My Regards to Broadway (with NAPAC), The Merry Widow (with PACT), My Fair Lady (with PACT), Golden Rendevous (with Richard Harris), Shut your Eyes and Think of England (for Toerien-Firth Company)' Also made “Olive King’s original Puppets. (SACD 1973) (SACD 1977/78) (SACD 1978/79) (SACD 1979/80)

KING, Olive. (19*-). Performer. ** Roles in Adam Leslie’s For Love or Money (1960), Show Boat (JODS, 1963-1964), directed and designed by Anthony Farmer, Joan Brickhill and Louis Burke’s The Minstrel Scandals (ACT , 1966), * (See Tucker, 1997)

KING, Olive. (19*-) Actress and singer*. ** As performer appeared in the revue Sextet by Anthony Farmer, Ralph Trewhela and Adam Leslie (1957), Brian Brooke’s production of The Reluctant Debutante (1956), Adam Leslie’s For Love or Money (1960), *

KING, Olive. South African actress. Starred in imported musicals such as Annie Get Your Gun, which was staged by ACT in 1949, and Brigadoon, also staged by ACT in 1950. She starred in Sextet, a review which was devised and written by Anthony Farmer with music by Ralph Trewhela. Adam Leslie contributed material to the show. Also starring Olive Wright, Norma Vorster, Dennis Hale, Jimmy Mentis and Tommy Tucker in 1957. She played the part of Gwendolyn in Half in Earnest, a musical version of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest. It was Kushlick-Gluckman’s first production, staged in April 1959, and directed by Leon Gluckman. It also starred Taubie Kushlick, Gordon Mulholland, June Hern and Michael McGovern. She starred in The Glass Slipper, which the National presented in conjunction with Children's Theatre and the Reps for Christmas 1959. It was a musical version of Cinderella which also starred Hilda Kriseman and Anne Ziegler. She starred in For Love or Money, by Adam Leslie, which was the inaugural production of the Playhouse in October 1960. Michael Finlayson directed this show starring Leslie himself, and also Joan Blake, and comedian Garth Meade. She starred in the JODS production of the musical Show Boat, with Inia te Wiata, Marie Van Zyl, Ronnie Shelton, Shirley Arden and the Capedium Choir at the Civic Theatre in 1963. Anthony Farmer directed and did the designed for the production. It played at the Civic again in 1964, and JODS took it to African Theatre’s Cape Town venue, the Alhambra, where the Eoan Group replaced the Capedium Choir. She starred in Joan Brickhill and Louis Burke’s The Minstrel Scandals for ACT, which opened at the Alhambra in Cape Town before playing at the Empire Theatre in 1966. Boris Cohen was the musical director, and other performers included Lynton Burns, Aubrey Ellis, Michael Fisher, Stephanie Shiller, Beryl Ellis, Jeanette James, Ronnie Grainge and Charles Stodel with Joan Brickhill playing the lead girl. ***(Tucker, 1997)

Return to ESAT Personalities K

Return to South African Theatre Personalities

Return to Main Page