Keith Michell

Keith Joseph Michell (1 December 1926 – 20 November 2015) was an Australian actor born in Adelaide and raised in Warnertown, near Port Pirie. His parents were Joseph, a cabinet-maker, and Alice (née Aslat). He attended Port Pirie High School, Adelaide Teachers' College, and Adelaide University, and began his professional career as an art teacher before making his acting debut in 1947 in the comedy Lover's Leap at Adelaide's Playbox Theatre. He subsequently worked in radio for the ABC in Adelaide before relocating to Britain in 1949 to study at the Old Vic Theatre School.

After joining the Young Vic theatre company, Michell made his first London appearance by 1951, with an early role as Bassanio in The Merchant of Venice. His first London musical was And So to Bed, in which he played King Charles II. In 1952–1953, he toured Australia with the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre Company, and at Stratford-upon-Avon he appeared in The Taming of the Shrew, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Troilus and Cressida, and Romeo and Juliet. In 1956, he played Henry Higgins in a television production of Pygmalion and starred in the title role of Ronald Duncan's Don Juan at the Royal Court Theatre. That same year, he appeared in several Old Vic Company productions, including as Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing, Proteus in The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Antony in Antony and Cleopatra, and Aaron in Titus Andronicus.

Michell's Broadway career spanned from 1960 to 1992. He first appeared on Broadway in Irma La Douce in 1960–1961, playing Nestor-Le-Fripe, a role he had originated in the 1958 London production and also performed with the National Theatre in Washington, DC. In 1963, he returned to Broadway in The Rehearsal by Jean Anouilh, playing the Count. He starred as Abelard opposite Diana Rigg in the Broadway production of Abelard and Heloise, a play by Ronald Millar, in 1971. He also appeared on Broadway in Man of La Mancha, playing the dual role of Miguel de Cervantes and Don Quixote, having first starred in the original London production of that musical. Additional Broadway credits include Aspects of Love and the musical The Choir Rehearsal.

In London, Michell starred as Robert Browning opposite Australian soprano June Bronhill in the 1964 musical Robert and Elizabeth. He played Don John in The Chances and Ithocles in The Broken Heart at the newly opened Chichester Festival Theatre in 1962, and later served as the theatre's artistic director from 1974 to 1977. During his tenure there, he appeared in Tonight We Improvise, Oedipus Tyrannus, A Month in the Country, and The Confederacy by Vanbrugh. He also starred as Georges in La Cage aux Folles in the 1980s.

Michell became most widely recognized for his portrayals of King Henry VIII. He won the BAFTA Award for Best Actor for his performance in the BBC series The Six Wives of Henry VIII in 1970, and reprised the role in the film Henry VIII and His Six Wives in 1972. He also played Henry VIII in a 1996 television adaptation of The Prince and the Pauper. Earlier in his screen career, he had been nominated for the BAFTA Award for Most Promising Newcomer to Film for his role as Harry Bell in True as a Turtle (1957), made during a period when he was under contract to the Rank Organisation. Other film credits include The Hellfire Club (1961), Seven Seas to Calais (1962), and The Executioner (1970). On American television, he appeared on Murder, She Wrote from 1988 to 1993, playing Dennis Stanton, a former jewel thief turned insurance claims investigator.

Beyond performing, Michell illustrated a collection of Jeremy Lloyd's poems titled Captain Beaky. He sang the title song from the associated album, and the single peaked at number 5 in the UK and number 36 in Australia in 1980. He also co-wrote and recorded the single I'll Give You the Earth, which reached number 30 in the UK charts in 1971. He wrote the musical Pete McGynty and the Dreamtime, an Australian rendering of Henrik Ibsen's Peer Gynt, using his own paintings as backdrops for the production. He illustrated a limited edition of Shakespeare's sonnets, for which he also did the calligraphy, and wrote and illustrated a number of macrobiotic cookbooks.

Michell married actress Jeanette Sterke in 1957. They had a son, Paul, who was the lead singer of the 1980s band the Roaring Boys, and a daughter, Helena, who appeared in the films Prick Up Your Ears and Maurice. Michell died in Hampstead, London, on 20 November 2015, eleven days before his 89th birthday.