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Cast & Creative
Simon Callow
Trained: Drama Centre.
Theatre: Merry Wives of Windsor (RSC), Present Laughter (national tour), Aladdin (Richmond), The Woman in White (Palace), The Holy Terror (Duke of York’s), The Mystery of Charles Dickens (Two seasons in the West End – Comedy, Albery; two national tours; Ireland, Australia, Chicago and Broadway); starred in and co-directed Alan Bennett’s Single Spies (NT, Queens); Beefy in JP Donleavy’s The Beastly Beatitudes of Balthazar (Duke of York’s); Credits with the National Theatre include the title role in the world premiere of Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus, Orlando in As You Like It, Sisterly Feelings, Galileo. While still at the NT, he gave a one-man performance of all of Shakespeare’s sonnets – a show that he has subsequently toured internationally. His first West End appearance was In 1975 as Max in The Plumber’s Progress starring Harry Secombe (Prince of Wales Theatre)
Other theatre work includes seasons in repertory at Lincoln and at The Traverse in Edinburgh. Also played Max in Schippel (Traverse Theatre), Martin Sherman’s Passing By (Gay Sweatshop); The Speakers, Devil’s Island, Fanshen, A Mad World My Masters and Epsom Downs for Joint Stock Company; Mary Barnes (Royal Court), the title role in Titus Andronicus (Bristol Old Vic); The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui (Half Moon Theatre); Lord Are in Edward Bond’s Restoration (Royal Court); Verlaine in Christopher Hampton’s Total Eclipse and the title role in Faust Parts I and II (Lyric Hammersmith); Molina in The Kiss of the Spiderwoman (Bush).
Credits as a Director include Jus’ Like That (Garrick Theatre), Willy Russell’s Shirley Valentine (West End and Broadway), Simon’s own translations of Jean Cocteau’s The Infernal Machine with Maggie Smith, Milan Kundera’s Jacques and his Master (Los Angeles) and Les Enfants du Paradis (RSC); Carmen Jones (Old Vic), My Fair Lady (national tour), The Pajama Game (Victoria Palace). Simon has also directed the operas Cosi Fan Tutte (Luzern), Die Fledermaus (Scottish Opera), Il Trittico and Il Turco in Italia Broomhill), La Calisto (Glimmerglass), The Consul (Holland Park Opera) and Le Roi Malgré Lui at Grange park in his own translation..
Film: Numerous film roles including Schikaneder in Amadeus, Reverend Mr Beebe in A Room with a View, Mr Ducie in Maurice, Gareth in Four Weddings and a Funeral, Edmund Tilney in Shakespeare in Love, Simon in Mike Nichols’s Postcards From The Edge, Gilles André in The Phantom of the Opera and Mr Butler in Bob the Butler with Brooke Shields. Simon directed the film of The Ballad of Sad Café starring Vanessa Redgrave, Keith Carradine and Rod Steiger. Has recently filmed the Swedish blockbuster ARN and british independent CHEMICAL WEDDING.
Television: The critically acclaimed HBO mini-series Angels in America directed by Mike Nichols, the title role in the Emmy-award winning Drama-Documentary Galileo’s Daughter and the HBO pilot HOPE AGAINST HOPE. Simon has appeared in numerous TV dramas including, recently, Miss Marple and Midsomer Murders. As well as several one-man shows he has appeared in The Mystery Of Charles Dickens and played Dickens himself in the recent BBC series of Dr Who.
Simon Callow is also an author whose published work includes many books on actors and acting as well as highly-acclaimed biographies of Charles Laughton and Orson Welles and the memoir Love Is Where It Falls. The second volume of his biography of Orson Welles, Hello Americans, was published in May 2006.
Simon was made Commander of the British Empire in 1999.
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