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| Jonathan Miller, Bold Director of Theater and Opera, Is Dead at 85 | |
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| LONDON — Jonathan Miller, the British theater and opera director known for his radical restagings of classic works, died on Wednesday at his home in London. He was 85. | LONDON — Jonathan Miller, the British theater and opera director known for his radical restagings of classic works, died on Wednesday at his home in London. He was 85. |
| His death was confirmed by his son William Miller, who said his father had had Alzheimer’s disease. | His death was confirmed by his son William Miller, who said his father had had Alzheimer’s disease. |
| Although he was best known as a director, Mr. Miller was a man of many talents and regularly called a Renaissance man, although he disliked the term, which he said was almost invariably used “by people unacquainted with the Renaissance.” | Although he was best known as a director, Mr. Miller was a man of many talents and regularly called a Renaissance man, although he disliked the term, which he said was almost invariably used “by people unacquainted with the Renaissance.” |
| He first achieved fame as an actor in the anti-establishment revue “Beyond the Fringe,” a hit in both London and New York. He went on to win acclaim on both sides of the Atlantic for his productions of Verdi’s “Rigoletto,” Gilbert and Sullivan’s “Mikado” and other works. He also produced and hosted television shows. | He first achieved fame as an actor in the anti-establishment revue “Beyond the Fringe,” a hit in both London and New York. He went on to win acclaim on both sides of the Atlantic for his productions of Verdi’s “Rigoletto,” Gilbert and Sullivan’s “Mikado” and other works. He also produced and hosted television shows. |
| Most unusually, he was a medical doctor, with a special interest in neurology; he occasionally left the theater to practice medicine. But his absences — as, for instance, a research fellow in neuropsychology at the University of Sussex in 1983 — never lasted long. | Most unusually, he was a medical doctor, with a special interest in neurology; he occasionally left the theater to practice medicine. But his absences — as, for instance, a research fellow in neuropsychology at the University of Sussex in 1983 — never lasted long. |
| Mr. Miller’s theatrical career began at Cambridge University, where he studied science but was also, as he put it, “tripped up” by comedy. He joined the Footlights, the Cambridge theatrical club whose members later included David Frost, John Cleese and Eric Idle. He starred in two Footlights revues that transferred to London, winning acclaim as a mimic, before joining with Dudley Moore, Peter Cook and Alan Bennett in “Beyond the Fringe.” | Mr. Miller’s theatrical career began at Cambridge University, where he studied science but was also, as he put it, “tripped up” by comedy. He joined the Footlights, the Cambridge theatrical club whose members later included David Frost, John Cleese and Eric Idle. He starred in two Footlights revues that transferred to London, winning acclaim as a mimic, before joining with Dudley Moore, Peter Cook and Alan Bennett in “Beyond the Fringe.” |
| That show, a mix of broad comedy and political satire, had a two-week run at the 1960 Edinburgh Festival before moving to the West End later that year and, in 1962, to Broadway. It ran there for a year and a half, and the four performers won a special Tony Award. | That show, a mix of broad comedy and political satire, had a two-week run at the 1960 Edinburgh Festival before moving to the West End later that year and, in 1962, to Broadway. It ran there for a year and a half, and the four performers won a special Tony Award. |
| Mr. Miller found himself “absolutely intoxicated by the United States,” as he put it, and “swept away by the intellectual ferment” there. | Mr. Miller found himself “absolutely intoxicated by the United States,” as he put it, and “swept away by the intellectual ferment” there. |
| Between performances at the Golden Theater on Broadway, he wrote movie reviews for The New Yorker, wrote and directed scripts for American television, appeared on American talk shows and was the subject of an article in Life magazine. He also made many friends, including the poet Robert Lowell and the writers George Plimpton and Susan Sontag. | Between performances at the Golden Theater on Broadway, he wrote movie reviews for The New Yorker, wrote and directed scripts for American television, appeared on American talk shows and was the subject of an article in Life magazine. He also made many friends, including the poet Robert Lowell and the writers George Plimpton and Susan Sontag. |
| Returning to London, he was appointed editor of “Monitor,” the BBC’s main arts program. | Returning to London, he was appointed editor of “Monitor,” the BBC’s main arts program. |
| It was the sort of career choice he often claimed to regret. Like Chekhov, whose “Seagull” and “Three Sisters” he staged with great success, he said he regarded medicine as his wife and the stage as his lover. | It was the sort of career choice he often claimed to regret. Like Chekhov, whose “Seagull” and “Three Sisters” he staged with great success, he said he regarded medicine as his wife and the stage as his lover. |
| This attitude was probably influenced by his father, Emanuel Miller, a distinguished child psychiatrist and a remote parent who told his only son that he was squandering his talent on ephemera when he should be engaged in scientific research. That left Jonathan with lifelong feelings of guilt, which led him on several occasions to announce that he was abandoning what he once called “this footling flibbertigibbet world of theater.” | This attitude was probably influenced by his father, Emanuel Miller, a distinguished child psychiatrist and a remote parent who told his only son that he was squandering his talent on ephemera when he should be engaged in scientific research. That left Jonathan with lifelong feelings of guilt, which led him on several occasions to announce that he was abandoning what he once called “this footling flibbertigibbet world of theater.” |
| Jonathan Wolfe Miller was born on July 21, 1934, in London, where his Jewish grandparents on both sides had settled after fleeing anti-Semitism in what is now Lithuania. His mother, Betty, was a successful novelist; his father was a founder of Britain’s child guidance clinics. | Jonathan Wolfe Miller was born on July 21, 1934, in London, where his Jewish grandparents on both sides had settled after fleeing anti-Semitism in what is now Lithuania. His mother, Betty, was a successful novelist; his father was a founder of Britain’s child guidance clinics. |
| Jonathan attended the intellectually demanding St. Paul’s School, where he made a lifelong friend of Dr. Oliver Sacks, the neurologist, whose journey to international fame began when Mr. Miller showed the original manuscript of Dr. Sacks’s book “Awakenings” to a London publisher. | Jonathan attended the intellectually demanding St. Paul’s School, where he made a lifelong friend of Dr. Oliver Sacks, the neurologist, whose journey to international fame began when Mr. Miller showed the original manuscript of Dr. Sacks’s book “Awakenings” to a London publisher. |
| Then came Cambridge and what he later called “the bad thing I did”: agreeing to remain with “Beyond the Fringe” in London and New York instead of pursuing the career in which he had qualified as a doctor, worked as a house physician and pathologist in London and written a paper published in The Lancet about treating mercury poisoning. | Then came Cambridge and what he later called “the bad thing I did”: agreeing to remain with “Beyond the Fringe” in London and New York instead of pursuing the career in which he had qualified as a doctor, worked as a house physician and pathologist in London and written a paper published in The Lancet about treating mercury poisoning. |
| In America, he learned about television by writing a documentary profile on the Puritan reformer Anne Hutchinson for “Profiles in Courage,” a series based on John F. Kennedy’s book, and directing a TV comedy called “What’s Going On Here?,” which did not last. | In America, he learned about television by writing a documentary profile on the Puritan reformer Anne Hutchinson for “Profiles in Courage,” a series based on John F. Kennedy’s book, and directing a TV comedy called “What’s Going On Here?,” which did not last. |
| On returning to London, he presented intellectually upscale programs for “Monitor” and directed dramas for the BBC, notably a dreamlike version of “Alice in Wonderland” with John Gielgud as the Mock Turtle and Peter Sellers as the King of Hearts. | On returning to London, he presented intellectually upscale programs for “Monitor” and directed dramas for the BBC, notably a dreamlike version of “Alice in Wonderland” with John Gielgud as the Mock Turtle and Peter Sellers as the King of Hearts. |
| Mr. Miller’s stage directing career began in 1962, with John Osborne’s one-act play about sexual fetishes, “Under Plain Cover,” at the Royal Court in London. His trajectory continued with a well-received Off Broadway production of “The Old Glory,” by Mr. Lowell, in 1964, and, two years later, a Broadway farce called “Come Live With Me.” Its failure left its co-author, Lee Minoff, so disenchanted with Mr. Miller that he parodied him as the over-intellectual Jeremy Hillary Boob Ph.D. in his screenplay for the 1968 animated Beatles film “Yellow Submarine.” | Mr. Miller’s stage directing career began in 1962, with John Osborne’s one-act play about sexual fetishes, “Under Plain Cover,” at the Royal Court in London. His trajectory continued with a well-received Off Broadway production of “The Old Glory,” by Mr. Lowell, in 1964, and, two years later, a Broadway farce called “Come Live With Me.” Its failure left its co-author, Lee Minoff, so disenchanted with Mr. Miller that he parodied him as the over-intellectual Jeremy Hillary Boob Ph.D. in his screenplay for the 1968 animated Beatles film “Yellow Submarine.” |
| Mr. Miller’s directing career took off in the late 1960s with revivals of Sheridan and Shakespeare at Nottingham Playhouse and productions at the National Theater, where he became an associate director under Laurence Olivier. | Mr. Miller’s directing career took off in the late 1960s with revivals of Sheridan and Shakespeare at Nottingham Playhouse and productions at the National Theater, where he became an associate director under Laurence Olivier. |
| He used his medical experience to direct Michael Hordern as a senile King Lear and elicited a major performance from Olivier himself as a Shylock intended to resemble a 19th-century Rothschild. Here Mr. Miller was putting into practice the credo he later enunciated in his book “Subsequent Performances”: Classic plays — he seldom directed anything contemporary — were to acquire new life by setting them in periods and places that would speak to modern audiences. | He used his medical experience to direct Michael Hordern as a senile King Lear and elicited a major performance from Olivier himself as a Shylock intended to resemble a 19th-century Rothschild. Here Mr. Miller was putting into practice the credo he later enunciated in his book “Subsequent Performances”: Classic plays — he seldom directed anything contemporary — were to acquire new life by setting them in periods and places that would speak to modern audiences. |
| His determination, however, to stage an all-male “The Importance of Being Earnest,” which brought out Oscar Wilde’s gay subtext, exacerbated what became a feud with Olivier’s successor at the National Theater, Peter Hall, who thought the idea “a touch mad.” | His determination, however, to stage an all-male “The Importance of Being Earnest,” which brought out Oscar Wilde’s gay subtext, exacerbated what became a feud with Olivier’s successor at the National Theater, Peter Hall, who thought the idea “a touch mad.” |
| The causes of the rift were both artistic and personal. Mr. Hall came to believe that Mr. Miller was undermining him. Mr. Miller saw Mr. Hall as not just tyrannical but also as “a ball of rancid pig’s fat rolled around the floor of a barber’s shop.” | The causes of the rift were both artistic and personal. Mr. Hall came to believe that Mr. Miller was undermining him. Mr. Miller saw Mr. Hall as not just tyrannical but also as “a ball of rancid pig’s fat rolled around the floor of a barber’s shop.” |
| For a man widely liked for his warmth, generosity, humor and stimulating company — Dick Cavett called him “one of the most amazing conversationalists the world has ever produced” — Mr. Miller could be verbally ferocious, as well as surprisingly thin-skinned. | For a man widely liked for his warmth, generosity, humor and stimulating company — Dick Cavett called him “one of the most amazing conversationalists the world has ever produced” — Mr. Miller could be verbally ferocious, as well as surprisingly thin-skinned. |
| In the 1980s, after resigning from the National Theater, he denounced Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher as the culture-murdering equivalent of typhoid, unappreciative theater critics as “worse than leukemia” and England as “an ugly, rancorous, racist little place.” Because of these feelings, he increasingly looked outward, turning to opera and staging Mozart, Wagner, Verdi and others in places as far-flung as Los Angeles, Frankfurt, Florence and Tokyo. | In the 1980s, after resigning from the National Theater, he denounced Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher as the culture-murdering equivalent of typhoid, unappreciative theater critics as “worse than leukemia” and England as “an ugly, rancorous, racist little place.” Because of these feelings, he increasingly looked outward, turning to opera and staging Mozart, Wagner, Verdi and others in places as far-flung as Los Angeles, Frankfurt, Florence and Tokyo. |
| Not that he neglected other media or, indeed, Britain itself. In 1978 he presented “The Body in Question,” a 13-part BBC series about human biology during which he performed an autopsy on a dead vagrant. He then took control of the BBC’s “Bardathon,” in which all Shakespeare’s plays were televised, several of them directed by Mr. Miller himself. | Not that he neglected other media or, indeed, Britain itself. In 1978 he presented “The Body in Question,” a 13-part BBC series about human biology during which he performed an autopsy on a dead vagrant. He then took control of the BBC’s “Bardathon,” in which all Shakespeare’s plays were televised, several of them directed by Mr. Miller himself. |
| In 1983 came “States of Mind,” a 15-parter in which he interviewed the art historian Ernst Gombrich, the philosopher and scientist Daniel Dennett and others about consciousness and the brain. | In 1983 came “States of Mind,” a 15-parter in which he interviewed the art historian Ernst Gombrich, the philosopher and scientist Daniel Dennett and others about consciousness and the brain. |
| Mr. Miller returned to Broadway in 1986 to direct Jack Lemmon and a young Kevin Spacey in a revival of O’Neill’s “Long Day’s Journey Into Night,” notable for its overlapping dialogue, which shortened its usual lengthy running time. From 1988 to 1990 he was artistic director of the Old Vic, often reviving lesser-known classic drama. | Mr. Miller returned to Broadway in 1986 to direct Jack Lemmon and a young Kevin Spacey in a revival of O’Neill’s “Long Day’s Journey Into Night,” notable for its overlapping dialogue, which shortened its usual lengthy running time. From 1988 to 1990 he was artistic director of the Old Vic, often reviving lesser-known classic drama. |
| But it was his production of Leo Janacek’s opera “The Cunning Little Vixen” at Glyndebourne in 1975 that proved to be truly career-changing, establishing him as a serious director of opera in addition to drama. An unusually realistic “Figaro” for the English National Opera was followed by Britten’s “Turn of the Screw” and a Mafia-themed “Rigoletto,” set in 1950s New York, that triumphed in London in 1982 and at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in 1984. | But it was his production of Leo Janacek’s opera “The Cunning Little Vixen” at Glyndebourne in 1975 that proved to be truly career-changing, establishing him as a serious director of opera in addition to drama. An unusually realistic “Figaro” for the English National Opera was followed by Britten’s “Turn of the Screw” and a Mafia-themed “Rigoletto,” set in 1950s New York, that triumphed in London in 1982 and at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in 1984. |
| Other international successes included a “Mikado” set partly in 1930s Hollywood, a Mussolini-period “Tosca” and, in St. Louis in 1982, a “Così Fan Tutte” that led The New York Times’s Donal Henahan to write that Mr. Miller was thinking more incisively than anybody about how to bring opera to modern audiences. | Other international successes included a “Mikado” set partly in 1930s Hollywood, a Mussolini-period “Tosca” and, in St. Louis in 1982, a “Così Fan Tutte” that led The New York Times’s Donal Henahan to write that Mr. Miller was thinking more incisively than anybody about how to bring opera to modern audiences. |
| Production after production embodied what Mr. Miller had learned as a clinician. What brought them to life, he said, were tiny behavioral traits, like tapping a pencil, scratching an ear or, in the case of a diva expressing grief, simply twisting her hair and staring into the distance. “It’s my passionate, almost religious belief that it is in the negligible that the considerable is to be found,” he said. | Production after production embodied what Mr. Miller had learned as a clinician. What brought them to life, he said, were tiny behavioral traits, like tapping a pencil, scratching an ear or, in the case of a diva expressing grief, simply twisting her hair and staring into the distance. “It’s my passionate, almost religious belief that it is in the negligible that the considerable is to be found,” he said. |
| Mr. Miller’s creative restlessness did not lessen with time. In 1991 he staged six operas in six cities, including Tel Aviv and Vienna. In 1993, his modern “Così,” with Mozart impeccably dressed by Armani, gave him a belated Covent Garden debut. The next decade had him directing “The Cherry Orchard” in Sheffield, “Hamlet” in Bristol and Christopher Plummer as Lear in both Stratford, Ontario, and at Lincoln Center. He also presented television programs on subjects ranging from influenza to atheism and created sculptures from found wood and scrap metal, one of which became the set for his revival of Stravinsky’s “Oedipus Rex” for Graz Opera in Austria. | Mr. Miller’s creative restlessness did not lessen with time. In 1991 he staged six operas in six cities, including Tel Aviv and Vienna. In 1993, his modern “Così,” with Mozart impeccably dressed by Armani, gave him a belated Covent Garden debut. The next decade had him directing “The Cherry Orchard” in Sheffield, “Hamlet” in Bristol and Christopher Plummer as Lear in both Stratford, Ontario, and at Lincoln Center. He also presented television programs on subjects ranging from influenza to atheism and created sculptures from found wood and scrap metal, one of which became the set for his revival of Stravinsky’s “Oedipus Rex” for Graz Opera in Austria. |
| In 2002 Mr. Miller was knighted “for services to music and the arts,” though, characteristically, he said he wished it had been for the services to science that he had failed to deliver. Self-doubt and insecurity, along with bouts of depression, never left him. | In 2002 Mr. Miller was knighted “for services to music and the arts,” though, characteristically, he said he wished it had been for the services to science that he had failed to deliver. Self-doubt and insecurity, along with bouts of depression, never left him. |
| In addition to his son William, he is survived by his wife of 63 years, Rachel Collet, a doctor; another son, Tom; a daughter, Kate; and several grandchildren. | In addition to his son William, he is survived by his wife of 63 years, Rachel Collet, a doctor; another son, Tom; a daughter, Kate; and several grandchildren. |
| Mr. Miller once said that his life had resembled a butterfly’s, moving from flower to flower. “But,” he added, “they do pollinate.” | Mr. Miller once said that his life had resembled a butterfly’s, moving from flower to flower. “But,” he added, “they do pollinate.” |
| “There is a point to their existence,” he continued. “I hope there is to mine.” | “There is a point to their existence,” he continued. “I hope there is to mine.” |
| Alex Marshall contributed reporting. | Alex Marshall contributed reporting. |