Michell, Keith

Michell, Keith (1928– ) Australian-born actor and singer, formerly an art teacher, who made his stage début in Adelaide in 1947, and then trained at the Old Vic Theatre School. He appeared as Charles II in the musical version of Fagan's And So to Bed (1951), and then toured Australia with the company from the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, returning to Stratford for the seasons of 1954 and 1955. At the Old Vic in 1956 he was seen as Benedick in Much Ado about Nothing and Antony in Antony and Cleopatra. He then went to the West End to star in another musical, Irma la Douce (1958), in which he made his début in New York in 1960, returning there after playing Don John in Fletcher's The Chances at the first Chichester Festival in 1962 to appear in Anouilh's The Rehearsal in 1963. Two other musical roles were Robert Browning in the long-running Robert and Elizabeth (1964), based on Besier's The Barretts of Wimpole Street, and Don Quixote in Man of La Mancha (1968), based on Cervantes. He scored a great success in Ronald Millar's Abelard and Heloise (1970; NY, 1971), and again played Browning in Kilty's Dear Love (1973). He was Artistic Director of the Chichester Festival, 1974–7, his roles there including the title-role of Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac, Iago in Othello, and King Magnus in Shaw's The Apple Cart, the last also in London. After leaving Chichester he starred in the musicals On the Twentieth Century (1980) in London and La Cage aux folles (1984–5) in San Francisco, New York, Sydney, and Melbourne.