RIP: Alan Howard
Those of you who know me may have heard me mention being a Royal Shakespeare Company groupie in my not-misspent-enough youth. Alan Howard was the star of the troupe at that time. I actually got a lump in my throat when I found The Guardian obituary today. The first photo was from Coriolanus which was the first RSC production I ever saw. It was on tour in Brussels and my Humanities class read the play and took an evening field trip to see the production.
A year later, I'd flunked out of college and was taking an intensive Shakespeare class through University of Maryland to prove to my family (and myself) that I could handle university level work. The class took place in Stratford on Avon and introduced me to one of my favorite professors, Claire Baker. Alan Howard was her favorite of the actors, and she was disappointed that he wasn't in any of the current productions.
Fast forward another year, and I'm taking two semesters of British Theater with Claire Baker in London. It's the last season for the Royal Shakespeare Company at the Aldwych and we have tickets to see every production including three with Alan Howard:
Richard II
Richard III
The Forest by Alexander Ostrovsky
I ended up seeing both Richards multiple times, including the final RSC performance at the Aldwych Theater which was Richard II. Alan Howard came forward at the end and gave a lovely speech about the theater and the ghosts of past productions there.
During that same season, he also performed in C.P. Taylor's Good at the Donmar Warehouse. It's a fascinating play with music interspersed throughout. As it shows a good man slowly becoming a Nazi, it used Alan Howard's resemblance to his uncle Leslie Howard as a way of keeping the audience off balance. It was the only performance of his that I genuinely loved. I was lucky enough to see it several times at the Warehouse, which is a tiny venue, making the transformation very intimate.
I wish I liked him more as an actor. Other than in Good, he was, for me, a somewhat cold, remote presence.
For most of you, I know that your exposure to him was probably either as the Lover in The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover or as "The Ring" in The Lord of the Ring trilogy.
A year later, I'd flunked out of college and was taking an intensive Shakespeare class through University of Maryland to prove to my family (and myself) that I could handle university level work. The class took place in Stratford on Avon and introduced me to one of my favorite professors, Claire Baker. Alan Howard was her favorite of the actors, and she was disappointed that he wasn't in any of the current productions.
Fast forward another year, and I'm taking two semesters of British Theater with Claire Baker in London. It's the last season for the Royal Shakespeare Company at the Aldwych and we have tickets to see every production including three with Alan Howard:
Richard II
Richard III
The Forest by Alexander Ostrovsky
I ended up seeing both Richards multiple times, including the final RSC performance at the Aldwych Theater which was Richard II. Alan Howard came forward at the end and gave a lovely speech about the theater and the ghosts of past productions there.
During that same season, he also performed in C.P. Taylor's Good at the Donmar Warehouse. It's a fascinating play with music interspersed throughout. As it shows a good man slowly becoming a Nazi, it used Alan Howard's resemblance to his uncle Leslie Howard as a way of keeping the audience off balance. It was the only performance of his that I genuinely loved. I was lucky enough to see it several times at the Warehouse, which is a tiny venue, making the transformation very intimate.
I wish I liked him more as an actor. Other than in Good, he was, for me, a somewhat cold, remote presence.
For most of you, I know that your exposure to him was probably either as the Lover in The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover or as "The Ring" in The Lord of the Ring trilogy.