Nigel Hawthorne
(19**-20**) Actor.
He began his professional career with Brian Brooke. He starred in Leonard Schach’s Cockpit Players production of Basil Warner’s Try for White, which opened in 1959 at the Pretoria Opera House before moving to the Intimate Theatre for the remainder of their highly successful run. It also starred Marjorie Gordon, Zoe Randall, Michael Turner. Joyce Grant and Fiona Fraser replaced Minna Millsten and Heather Lloyd-Jones respectively, from the Cape Town cast. He starred in Long Day’s Journey into Night at the Intimate Theatre for the Cockpit Players, together with John McKelvey, Joan Blake and Leon Gluckman in 1959. He starred in Thornton Wilder’s lively period-New York comedy, The Matchmaker, which was staged by the Cockpit Player’s in 1959. This enduring show, also starring Marjorie Gordon as Dolly Levi, John McKelvey, Michael McGovern, Robert Haber and Heather Lloyd-Jones, became the musical Hello, Dolly! He played in the Cockpit Players productions of Harold Pinter’s The Caretaker and Paddy Chayefsky’s prizewinning The Tenth Man at the Playhouse in 1961 with actors Michael McGovern and Siegfried Mynhardt. He Left for London in 1962 and returned again in 1995, after his success abroad which included London’s Olivier Award, Broadway’s Tony and an Oscar nomination. He made the film Inside with director Arthur Penn on his return.
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