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Christopher Fry

[frahy]

Christopher Fry (18 December 1907 – 30 June 2005) was a English playwright. He is best known for his verse dramas, notably The Lady's Not for Burning, which made him a major force in theatre in the 1940s and 1950s.

Life

Fry was born as Christopher Harris in Bristol, the son of Christopher John Harris, a full-time lay preacher in the Church of England, and his wife Marguerite Hammond (Fry). While still young, he took his mother’s maiden name because, on very tenuous grounds, he believed her to be related to the 19th-century Quaker prison reformer Elizabeth Fry). He adopted Elizabeth Fry's faith, and became a Quaker.

After attending Bedford Modern School, where he wrote amateur plays, he became a schoolteacher, working at the Bedford Froebel Kindergarten and Hazelwood School in Limpsfield, Surrey.

In the 1920s he met the poet Robert Gittings, who became a lifelong friend.

As a pacifist, he was a conscientious objector during World War II, and served in the Non-Combatant Corps; for part of the time he cleaned London's sewers.

In later life Fry lived in the village of East Dean in West Sussex, and died, from natural causes, in Chichester in 2005. His wife, Phyllis, whom he married in 1936, died in 1987. He was survived by their son, Tam.

Theatre writing

Early years

Fry gave up his school career in 1932 to found the Tunbridge Wells Repertory Players, which he ran for three years, directing the English premiere of George Bernard Shaw’s Village Wooing in 1934. His play about Dr Thomas John Barnardo, the founder of children’s homes, toured in a fund-raising amateur production in 1935 and 1936, including in its cast a young Deborah Kerr.

His professional career began to take off when he was commissioned by the vicar of Steyning, West Sussex to write a play celebrating the local saint, St Cuthman, which became The Boy With A Cart in 1938. Tewkesbury Abbey commissioned his next play, The Tower, written in 1939, which was seen by the poet T. S. Eliot, who became a friend and is often cited as an influence. In 1939 Fry also became artistic director of Oxford Playhouse.

After the the Second World War he wrote a comedy, A Phoenix Too Frequent, which was produced at the Mercury Theatre, London, in 1946, starring Paul Scofield. The Firstborn was produced at the Oxford Playhouse in 1946. In 1948 he wrote a commission for the Canterbury Festival, Thor, With Angels.

Major works

Fry was then commissioned to write a play by Alec Clunes, manager of the Arts Theatre in London. The result, The Lady's Not for Burning, was first performed there in 1948, directed by the actor, Jack Hawkins. Due to its success, it transferred to the West End for a nine-month run, starring John Gielgud and featuring Richard Burton and Claire Bloom among the cast. It was presented on Broadway in 1950, again with Burton. The play marked a revival in popularity for poetic drama, most notably espoused by T. S. Eliot. It is the most performed of all his plays and inspired British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher to declaim, “You turn if you want to — the lady’s not for turning,” at the Conservative Party conference in 1980.

In 1950 Fry adapted a translation of Jean Anouilh’s L'Invitation au Château as Ring Round The Moon for director Peter Brook. He also wrote Venus Observed, which was produced at the St James's Theatre by Laurence Olivier. A Sleep Of Prisoners followed in 1951, first performed at St Thomas' church in Regent Street, London, in 1951 and later touring with Denholm Elliott and Stanley Baker.

The Dark Is Light Enough, a winter play starring Edith Evans in 1954, was third in a quartet of "seasonal" plays. It followed the springtime of The Lady’s Not For Burning and the autumnal Venus Observed. The quartet was completed in 1970 with A Yard Of Sun, representing summer.

His next plays were translations from French dramatists: The Lark, an adaptation of Jean Anouilh’s L’Alouette, in 1955; Tiger At The Gates, based on Jean Giraudoux’s La Guerre de Troie n'aura pas lieu, also in 1955; Duel of Angels, adapted from Giraudoux's Pour Lucrèce, in 1960; and Judith, also by Giraudoux, in 1962.

Although Fry lived until 2005, his poetic style of drama began to fall out of fashion with the advent of the Angry Young Men of British theatre in the 1950s. Despite working mainly for the cinema in the 1960s, he continued to write plays, including Curtmantle for the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1961, and A Yard of Sun – the fourth in his seasonal quartet – at the Nottingham Playhouse in 1970.

During the next ten years he concentrated on further translations, including Henrik Ibsen’s Peer Gynt and Edmond Rostand’s Cyrano de Bergerac which were produced at the Chichester Festival Theatre.

His last play, A Ringing Of Bells, was commissioned by his old school, Bedford Modern School, and performed there in 2000. The following year, a new production was performed at the National Theatre.

Revivals

Revivals of his plays include a staged reading of The Lady's Not For Burning at the Royal National Theatre in 2001 as one of the 100 best plays of the 20th century, with actors Alex Jennings, Prunella Scales and Samuel West. West went on to produce The Lady’s Not For Burning at Chichester Festival Theatre's Minerva Theatre in 2002 with Nancy Carroll and Benjamin Whitrow. In 2007, it was performed in a new production at the Finborough Theatre, London.

Ring Round The Moon was revived at the Theatre Royal Haymarket 1967-68. starring John Standing and Angela Thorne. In 2008 it was revived again, directed by Sean Mathias, once again starring Angela Thorne, graduating from the role of young Diana to the wheelchair-bound Madame Desmortes. Other cast members included JJ Feild, Joanna David, Belinda Lang, John Ramm and Leigh Lawson.

Film and TV writing

Beginning in the 1950s, many of Fry's plays were adapted for the screen, mainly television. One of the most recent was The Lady’s Not For Burning for Yorkshire TV, starring Kenneth Branagh, in 1987.

In 1954, he collaborated with John Cannan on a screenplay for a film version of John Gay’s The Beggar's Opera, for director Peter Brook, starring Laurence Olivier. He was also one of the writers of the classic 1959 film, Ben-Hur, directed by William Wyler. He collaborated on other screenplays including Barabbas, which starred Anthony Quinn in 1961, and The Bible, directed by John Huston, in 1966.

Awards

His play, The Tiger At The Gates, was nominated for a Tony Award for best adaptation in 1956
He was awarded the Queen’s Gold Medal for poetry in 1962.
He was awarded the Benson Medal in 2000.