Author Description

Tony van Bridge is one of Canada's most beloved and respected actors. He is the only person ever to have played Sir John Falstaff in all of Shakespeare's "Falstaff" plays at the famous Stratford Festival. He is the only person ever to have become a fixture at both the Stratford Festival and the Shaw Festival - Canada's two most prestigious theatres. He has apppeared for 15 seasons at each one, a record which no one else even approaches. This is the story of Tony's life in the theatre. It begins with his birth in Battersea in 1917. It details his false start as a concert singer, his training at RADA in the 1930s, and his early years in the English theatre of a bygone era. In the 1950s, Tony suddenly decided to try his luck in Canada. Here, he joined the fledgling Stratford Festival company, directed the Canadian Players and the Shaw Festival, and won awards as a television actor, as well as acting and directing internationally. The book contains a lifetime of theatrical anecdotes woven into a life of artistic challenge and occasionally personal tragedy. It is also a history of present-day culture and the conditions in British theatre before the war.