Robert Eddison

Robert Leadam Eddison, OBE (10 June 1908 – 14 December 1991) was a British stage and screen actor whose career spanned six decades. Born in Yokohama, Japan, to Edwin Eddison, a civil engineer, and Hilda Muriel Leadham, he appeared on Broadway between 1975 and 1983, with credits including All's Well That Ends Well and the comedy The Misanthrope. Despite a distinguished classical stage career, Eddison is perhaps most widely recognized for portraying the Grail Knight in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. He also played Merlin in the BBC television series The Legend of King Arthur and a tragic ferryman in the episode "The Luck Child" from The Storyteller.

Eddison was one of four brothers born to his parents in Yokohama. His twin, Talbot Leadam Eddison, rose to the rank of Rear Admiral in the Royal Navy and received both the Distinguished Service Cross and the Most Honourable Order of the Bath. Another brother became a director of an engineering company, and the youngest was Roger Eddison. Both parents were members of the Yokohama Dramatic Club, and Eddison later wrote in his memoir that the smell of stage make-up and spirit-gum he encountered as a child had a powerful and lasting effect on him. By the age of five he had already decided he wanted to be an actor.

Following his father's death in 1917, his mother returned to England with her four sons, traveling by way of British Columbia, Canada, where Eddison and his twin brother attended boarding school in Victoria. The family settled in Haywards Heath, Sussex, after the Armistice in 1919. All four brothers were educated at Charterhouse School, where Eddison was disappointed to find no dramatic society. He subsequently studied at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he read medicine, though his focus shifted decisively toward the theatre. He became a member of the ADC and The Marlowe Society and served as President of the Cambridge Amateur Dramatics Club from 1929 to 1930. During his time at Cambridge he played Virginia alongside George Rylands in Coriolanus and appeared as Beatrice opposite Michael Redgrave as Florindo in Goldoni's A Servant of Two Masters. He made his professional debut on 23 June 1930 at the Festival Theatre, Cambridge, in Lady Audley's Secret, opposite Flora Robson. He left Cambridge without a degree.

His early professional career included a year at the Westminster Theatre, where he made his London debut in The Anatomist, again alongside Flora Robson and with Henry Ainley, directed by Tyrone Guthrie. He subsequently spent a period in weekly repertory in Croydon. In 1934 he came to the attention of Ben Greet and appeared over three seasons at the Open Air Theatre, Regent's Park, continuing there until 1939. Noël Coward noticed him performing in the comedy Yes and No, and Val Gielgud later invited him to appear in BBC radio productions. He also played six seasons with the Old Vic, one of the earliest of which involved taking over the roles of Le Beau and William from Alec Guinness, with Edith Evans playing Rosalind.

In 1939, before the full onset of the Second World War, Eddison appeared as Pericles and Oberon at Regent's Park and accepted an engagement with H.M. Tennent to appear in Noël Coward's This Happy Breed and the semi-autobiographical Present Laughter, in the role of Roland Maule. Rehearsals were halted by the war, and the role of Roland Maule was ultimately created by James Donald. Eddison did appear in a 1947 revival of the production. One of his final stage appearances before military service was Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet in 1940, in which he played Romeo opposite Pamela Brown's Juliet.

Eddison was called up to the Royal Navy in 1940 and officially enlisted on 5 May 1941, training at a naval establishment in Fareham before moving to Portsmouth. A medical examination revealed that his heart was positioned on the wrong side of his chest, though this was not considered a disqualifying condition. He was drafted to HMS King George V at Rosyth and was appointed a temporary sub-lieutenant in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve on 5 June 1942. In 1943 he was promoted to temporary lieutenant and assigned to the aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious, where he was greeted by fellow officer Michael Hordern, who later became a prominent actor in his own right. The ship was attacked by Kamikaze aircraft on Easter Day 1945. Eddison served three years aboard Illustrious and was demobilized in March 1946.

Following the war, Eddison spent two further seasons at the Bristol Old Vic, where he played Iago and was noted for his Hamlet, opposite Jane Wenham as Ophelia. That production later transferred to the St James' Theatre in 1948. In 1950 he was invited to join the Old Vic Company and was part of the company that reopened London's Old Vic Theatre following its wartime damage. The opening production was Twelfth Night, with Peggy Ashcroft as Viola and Paul Rogers as Malvolio, and the production subsequently toured Italy. Over the course of his career, Eddison worked alongside a number of actors during the early stages of their careers, including Ian McKellen, Derek Jacobi, and Maggie Smith. His Broadway appearances from 1975 to 1983 included All's Well That Ends Well and The Misanthrope.