It is sadly ironic that the death of Michael Blakemore, at the age of 95, coincides with news of the appointment of the next director of the National Theatre. As a valued associate of Laurence Olivier when the National was at the Old Vic, Blakemore was regarded by many as his natural successor. In the event, the post went to Peter Hall and although Blakemore continued to work for him, the relationship soon foundered. But Blakemore remained one of the great postwar directors and proved himself, in two volumes of memoirs and a novel, to be a formidable writer.
Having briefly trained as a doctor in his native Sydney, Blakemore worked as a press agent for Robert Morley in Australia and, incidentally, tutored two of his children. On Morley’s advice he came to Britain to work as an actor and did the rounds of the regional reps. He also appeared in the 1957 tour of Peter Brook’s production of Titus Andronicus which yielded his book, Arguments With England, one of the best accounts of Olivier’s acting ever written. Blakemore later did a season at Stratford in 1959 which was the basis for a novel, Next Season, and which led to a lifelong scepticism about Hall who was then director-designate of the Avonside theatre.
