Although named after a Shakespeare heroine, Cleopatra Sylvestre – more often known personally and professionally as Cleo – had to wait until very late in a long career to play one of the playwright’s women on a major stage. Last year, she was cast at Stratford-upon-Avon as Audrey in As You Like It, in a touching production using the conceit of older actors recreating a Royal Shakespeare Company show they appeared in decades before.
As the programme noted that this was the RSC debut of Sylvestre, who has died aged 79, it was clear the framing device was fake. And, given the talent and success of an actor who made her West End debut aged 19, the belated bestowal of such a role is a measure of the obstacles that actors of colour long faced in the UK.
