Sir William Tyrone Guthrie

Sir William Tyrone Guthrie

Sir William Tyrone Guthrie, stage director, producer (b at Tunbridge Wells, Eng 2 July 1900; d at Newbliss, County Monaghan, Ire 15 May 1971). The great-grandson of the 19th-century actor Tyrone Power, he made his stage debut as a performer at Oxford in 1919. A frustrated singer, actor and playwright (Top of the Ladder, 1950), he pioneered radio drama production in Belfast (1924-26) for the BBC, a phenomenon he repeated in Canada in 1931 for the fledgling CNR radio network. His career as a renowned stage director began in Glasgow (1926-28), proceeded to Cambridge (1929-30) and then London (1931). As the resident producer-director of London's Old Vic and Sadler's Wells companies (1933-47), he developed his special interests in Shakespearean production and opera. In 1953 he became the founding director of Canada's STRATFORD FESTIVAL, reintroducing Shakespeare's thrust stage, a design concept to be echoed in theatres around the world. He was knighted in 1961 and 2 years later guided the theatre in Minneapolis that bears his name. His books include A Life in the Theatre (1959), A New Theatre (1964) and Tyrone Guthrie on Acting (1971).