Michael Redgrave

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Michael Redgrave (1978)
Michael Redgrave (1973)

Sir Michael Scudamore Redgrave CBE (born March 20, 1908 in Bristol , † March 21, 1985 in Denham , Buckinghamshire ) was a British actor , theater director and author .

Life

Redgrave was born to silent film star Roy Redgrave and actress Margaret Scudamore . He studied at Cambridge and then became a teacher, newspaper editor and freelance journalist. Through his participation in an amateur theater, he finally found professional acting. In 1934 he went to Liverpool to the theater. The actor made his film debut in 1936 with a small role in Alfred Hitchcock's secret agent . The director took a liking to his performance and two years later gave him the lead role of an eccentric musician in the crime comedy A Lady Goes Away with Margaret Lockwood . This film role made him popular and from then on he was one of the stars of British films. He then played leading roles in numerous now largely forgotten films. In 1940 he took on the role of Macheath in The Beggar's Opera for the Wartime Tour of the Glyndebourne Festival . His partners as Polly were Audrey Mildmay and Irene Eisinger .

Between 1941 and 1942, Redgrave served in the Royal Navy . In 1947 he went to Hollywood , where he received an Oscar nomination for his Hollywood debut in Mourning Becomes Electra . His attempt to establish himself as a film star there was, however, generally unsuccessful and so he returned to British film. After he was first known in lighter film roles, he later turned to more and more demanding roles in film and theater. At the Cannes Film Festival in 1951 , he was awarded the Actor Prize for his role in Conflict of the Heart .

After his role in the commercially very successful war film May 1943 - The Destruction of the Dams in 1955, Michael Redgrave increasingly turned to character roles . He appeared in supporting roles in Orson Welles ' Mr Satan himself (1955), as the prison director in Tony Richardson's The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Runner (1962) and as an embittered old man in The Mediator (1971), directed by Joseph Losey . His title roles in Chekhov's Uncle Vanya and Ibsen's master builder Solness received a lot of attention at the theater in the 1960s .

In addition to his acting career, Redgrave also wrote a total of five books, including two autobiographies, and several plays.

Private life

From 1935 Redgrave was married to actress Rachel Kempson . Their children Vanessa Redgrave (* 1937), Corin Redgrave (1939-2010) and Lynn Redgrave (1943-2010) also became actors. The grandchildren Natasha Richardson (1963–2009), Joely Richardson (* 1965) and Jemma Redgrave (* 1965) as well as the great-granddaughter Daisy Bevan (* 1992) followed in the acting business. Although the bisexual actor also had extramarital affairs, the marriage to Kempson lasted until his death.

In 1952 he was made Commander of the Order of the British Empire , and in 1959 he was made a knight . In the mid-1970s, Parkinson's disease made itself felt in him, whereupon he ended his acting career. He died in Denham the day after his 77th birthday.

Awards

Filmography (selection)

bibliography

  • Water Music for a Botanist W. Heffer, Cambridge (1929), book of poems
  • The Actor's Ways and Means Heinemann (1953)
  • Mask or Face: Reflections in an Actor's Mirror Heinemann (1958)
  • The Mountebank's Tale Heinemann (1959)
  • In My Mind's I: An Actor's Autobiography Viking (1983)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Michael Redgrave | Biography, Movie Highlights and Photos. Retrieved December 22, 2018 (American English).
  2. ↑ BFI Screenonline: Redgrave, Michael (1908-1985) Biography. Retrieved December 22, 2018 .
  3. ↑ BFI Screenonline: Redgrave, Michael (1908-1985) Biography. Retrieved December 22, 2018 .
  4. ↑ Albin Krebs: Sir Michael Redgrave Dead; Head of Acting Clan Was 77 . In: The New York Times . March 22, 1985, ISSN  0362-4331 ( nytimes.com [accessed December 22, 2018]).
  5. ^ Richard Severo: Rachel Kempson, 92, Matriarch of Acting Family . In: The New York Times . May 26, 2003, ISSN  0362-4331 ( nytimes.com [accessed December 22, 2018]).
  6. ↑ Albin Krebs: Sir Michael Redgrave Dead; Head of Acting Clan Was 77 . In: The New York Times . March 22, 1985, ISSN  0362-4331 ( nytimes.com [accessed December 22, 2018]).


personal data
SURNAME Redgrave, Michael
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Scudamore Redgrave, Sir Michael
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British actor
DATE OF BIRTH March 20, 1908
PLACE OF BIRTH Bristol , England
DATE OF DEATH March 21, 1985
Place of death Denham