Antony Sher

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Antony Sher – Life, Career, and Famous Quotes

Discover the life, career, writings, and unforgettable quotes of Antony Sher — the South African-born actor, writer, and theatre visionary whose work reshaped Shakespeare performance and inspired generations.

Introduction

Antony Sher (14 June 1949 – 2 December 2021) was a towering presence in 20th- and early 21st-century theatre: an actor, director, writer, and visual artist of South African origin who made his career largely in Britain. Though perhaps best known to many as a Shakespearean actor, Sher’s creative output extended far beyond the stage. His writings—memoirs, novels, plays, diaries—offer an intimate window into the artist’s interior life and his craft. Today, his legacy lives on through his performances, his insightful literary work, and the lessons he left for actors, writers, and anyone who values truth, identity, and artistic risk.

Early Life and Family

Antony Sher was born on 14 June 1949 in Cape Town, South Africa, into a Jewish family of Lithuanian descent. His parents were Margery (née Abramowitz) and Emmanuel Sher, who worked in business. He grew up in the suburb of Sea Point and attended Sea Point High School.

Growing up in apartheid South Africa shaped Sher’s awareness of constraint, identity, and “outsiderhood.” He felt both the privileges and the contradictions of being white in a system of state-sanctioned racial hierarchy—and yet as a Jewish, smaller-statured, queer young man, he also felt alien in that society. These tensions—belonging, concealment, moral responsibility—would inform much of his later work and writing.

Youth and Education

After completing compulsory military service, Sher left South Africa in 1968 to pursue opportunities in London. His early attempts to gain entrance to the Central School of Speech and Drama and to RADA (Royal Academy of Dramatic Art) were unsuccessful. Undeterred, he enrolled at the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art from 1969 to 1971.

During and after his training, Sher became involved with avant-garde and experimental theatre in London. He performed with Gay Sweatshop, a company which engaged with themes of sexuality and social justice. Early on, he also worked at the Liverpool Everyman Theatre in collaboration with writers and actors such as Alan Bleasdale, Willy Russell, Bernard Hill, Jonathan Pryce, and Julie Walters. That “anarchy-ruled” milieu shaped his appetite for risk and ensemble experimentation.

By the early 1970s, Sher had begun to earn recognition in repertory and fringe theatre, gradually building his range, sensitivity to text, and physical imagination.

Career and Achievements

Theatre: The Royal Shakespeare Company and Beyond

Sher’s career took a decisive turn when he joined the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) in 1982. Over more than three decades with RSC and beyond, he performed—often under his own fearless interpretive lens—some of the greatest roles in the Shakespearean and modern repertoire:

• Richard III (1984): His breakout performance. He won a Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor for this role.

• Stanley (1997): Another Olivier Award win for Best Actor, for the play Stanley at the Royal National Theatre.

• Other prominent roles: the Fool in King Lear, Iago in Othello, Shylock in The Merchant of Venice, Falstaff in Henry IV Part 1 & 2 (on national tour), Macbeth, Cyrano de Bergerac, Tamburlaine, Titus Andronicus, etc.

• He uniquely became the only actor to play both the Fool and King Lear at the RSC.

• In later years, he took on Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman (2015) with devastating psychological depth.

Sher’s approach was deeply intellectual and visually informed: he sketched characters, thought carefully about posture, emotion, and landscape. His rehearsal diaries—especially Year of the King, charting his Richard III process—became canonical reading for actors.

He also directed productions. For example, he directed Breakfast with Mugabe (Swan Theatre, Stratford) and later in the West End.

Literary Work: Memoirs, Novels & Plays

Sher was not only an actor but a prolific writer, whose works constitute a powerful companion to his stage life:

• Memoirs / Diaries / Nonfiction:
    - Year of the King (1985) — his annotated rehearsal diary for Richard III.
    - Woza Shakespeare: Titus Andronicus in South Africa (with Gregory Doran, 1997) — tracing the staging of Titus Andronicus in apartheid-era South Africa.
    - Beside Myself (autobiography, 2002)
    - Primo Time (2005)
    - Year of the Fat Knight (2015) — combines paintings, drawings, and reflections.

• Novels:
    - Middlepost (1989)
    - Cheap Lives (1995)
    - The Indoor Boy (1996)
    - The Feast (1998) — a novel blending realistic and speculative elements, sometimes treated under science fiction categorization.

• Plays:
    - I.D. (2003)
    - Primo (2004) — later adapted to film in 2005.
    - The Giant (2008) — the first play in which Sher did not perform; it features Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and their apprentice.

His writing often explored identity, memory, performance, exile, and the tension between image and interior truth.

Film and Television

Though his primary identity was theatrical, Sher also appeared in film and television:

• Films: Yanks (1979), Superman II (1980), Shadey (1985), Erik the Viking (1989), Mrs Brown (1997, as Benjamin Disraeli), The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (extended edition appearance as Thráin II).

• TV: The History Man (1981), Hornblower, The Jury (2002), Home (adaptation of J. G. Ballard’s "The Enormous Space"), God on Trial (2008) among others.

While his screen roles were fewer, they often allowed him to extend his reach to broader audiences.

Recognition and Honors

• Sher was a two-time winner of the prestigious Laurence Olivier Award and was nominated multiple times.

• He won the Evening Standard Best Actor Award (for Richard III)

• His solo show Primo earned him Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle awards in New York.

• In 2000, he was knighted (Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire, KBE) for his services to drama.

• He held several honorary doctorates, including from the University of Liverpool and the University of Warwick, as well as from his birth country’s University of Cape Town.

Historical Milestones & Context

Sher’s life and work are intertwined with the shifting cultural and political landscapes of the late 20th century:

• His departure from South Africa in 1968 came during the height of apartheid. The move placed him in a new country where he still had to negotiate identity—especially as a queer, Jewish, South African immigrant.

• Sher’s decision to adopt a British identity while distancing himself from South African labels reflected his struggle to reconcile patriotism, stigma, and exile. He spoke openly in interviews of “hiding” his accent or origins, especially early in his career.

• In staging Titus Andronicus in South Africa (Woza Shakespeare), Sher confronted the tension of Shakespeare in a country still wrestling with the violence of its history.

• As the public conversation on LGBT rights shifted across Britain during the late 20th and early 21st centuries, Sher became increasingly open about his sexuality and the burdens of concealment in earlier years.

• His collaborations with Gregory Doran (his partner and later husband) became a defining institution in British theatre. Doran later became the Artistic Director of the RSC, and their joint work exemplified how personal and creative partnerships could change institutional theatre.

Sher’s career thus sits at the intersection of postcolonial identity, queer visibility, Shakespeare reinterpretation, and the evolving culture of British theatre.

Legacy and Influence

Antony Sher’s influence endures in several interwoven strands:

• On-stage legacy: His interpretations of Shakespeare are still studied and revered. His intelligent, physical, and psychologically alive performances raised expectations for what classical acting could be.

• On acting craft: His rehearsal diaries and writings demystify the creative process. Many actors and theatre practitioners cite Year of the King, Beside Myself, and related texts as essential reading.

• On theatre institutions: The synergy between Sher and Gregory Doran reshaped RSC programming, bringing more daring, text-aware design, and a commitment to diversity and theatrical risk.

• On writers and memoirists: Sher’s willingness to expose nervousness, failure, and imperfection in his writing has inspired other performers to break the “public face” barrier.

• On identity discourse: Sher’s career embodied negotiation, concealment, and reinvention. He showed that identity—racial, sexual, national—can be a site of creative tension, not merely a label.

• Audience memory: For those who saw him live, many remember his performances as vivid, unforgettable, and alive in the moment—actors often say you experienced the text, not merely watched it.

Personality, Talents, and Craft

Antony Sher was a complex artist, a person of many paradoxes and singular gifts:

• Fearless vulnerability: Sher was often drawn to roles and texts that allowed emotional risk. He would push himself into psychologically dangerous territory rather than settle for safe choices.

• Painter’s eye: Always visually minded, Sher sketched, painted, and drew as a way to think through character. Visual art and theatrical imagination were in constant dialogue in his approach.

• Meticulous research: For Richard III, Sher consulted psychologists, people with physical disabilities, and historical texts. His character was not conceived as monstrous from the start but as shaped by power and limitation.

• Candor about struggle: Sher often wrote about failure, doubt, inner voice, and the pain of being imperfect. His transparency turned vulnerability into strength.

• Collaborative spirit: He cherished the ensemble, directors, designers, and stage colleagues. He repeatedly emphasized that theatre is not a solo act.

• Constancy in reinvention: Sher never settled; even in later life, he took on audacious roles (King Lear, Falstaff, Loman) and kept writing and creating.

Famous Quotes of Antony Sher

Here are some of his most resonant lines, which reflect his inner life, artistic beliefs, and moral clarity:

“Most of my career has been spent with the RSC doing Shakespeare, and the thing you learn from Shakespeare is that his historical plays don't bear anything other than a basic resemblance to history.”

“Life is just more comfortable if you're honest and open about everything. I spent so many years being in the closet about one thing or another.”

“I have no cynicism at all.”

“As a gay Jewish white South African, I belong to quite a lot of minority groups. You constantly have to question who you are, what you are and whether you have the courage to be who you are.”

“You don't expect to get the letter saying, Her Majesty would like to appoint you Knight Commander of the British Empire! It was just a completely overwhelming and exciting day.”

These lines echo recurring themes of identity, honesty, artifice, and recognition—central threads in Sher’s life.

Lessons from Antony Sher

From Sher’s life and work, several lessons stand out:

1. Embrace risk and vulnerability. Sher teaches that growth often comes when we step beyond mastery into uncertainty.

2. Let multiple disciplines inform your art. His visual art, diaries, and theatrical work enriched each other.

3. Don’t hide your contradictions. Sher’s wrestling with identity, exile, aspiration, and failure became fuel rather than burden.

4. Document the process. His rehearsal diaries gave insight and honesty to a craft often cloaked in secrecy.

5. Collaborate deeply. His partnership with Gregory Doran is a model of how mutual trust can lead to artistic freedom.

6. Revisit the classics with fresh eyes. Sher never accepted worn tropes; he always sought to reinterpret, question, and re-animate established texts.

Conclusion

Antony Sher was more than an actor: he was a thinker, a writer, an image-maker, and a moral explorer. Through his daring stage work, his honest writing, and his refusal to adhere strictly to any label, he left a multifaceted legacy—one that continues to challenge and inspire. Whether you’re drawn to his Shakespearean mastery, his interior reflections, or his courageous navigation of identity, Sher remains a guide for anyone who seeks to live and create bravely.