Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Email
Answers.com

Sam Wanamaker

 
Actor: Sam Wanamaker
Home > Library > Entertainment & Arts > Actors
  • Born: Jun 14, 1919 in Chicago, Illinois
  • Died: Dec 18, 1993 in London, England, UK
  • Occupation: Actor, Director
  • Active: '60s-'90s
  • Major Genres: Drama, Crime
  • Career Highlights: Holocaust, Warning Shot, The Criminal
  • First Major Screen Credit: My Girl Tisa (1948)

Biography

Actor/director Sam Wanamaker was one of those whose career was nearly derailed by the machinations of Senator McCarthy and his House Un-American Activities Committee. A native of Chicago, born Samuel Watenmaker, he began his career in theater at age 17 following training at Chicago's Goodman Theater. Wanamaker honed his acting skills in stock, traveling shows, and on Broadway. He also attended Drake University. Between 1943 and 1946, Wanamaker was in the U.S. Army. Early in his career, he also worked in radio. He made his feature film debut in My Girl Tisa (1948). The following year, Wanamaker, whose leftist political views were no secret in Hollywood, went to England to appear in blacklisted director Edward Dymtryk's Give Us This Day (1949). After making another film in Britain, Wanamaker learned that he too was about to be investigated and had been blacklisted; therefore, Wanamaker elected to remain in England. Over the next ten years, Wanamaker worked on-stage as a director, producer, and actor. In the 1960s, Wanamaker resumed his acting career in internationally produced films such as The Concrete Jungle (1962) and The Spy Who Came in From the Cold (1965). He made his directorial bow in 1969 with The File of the Golden Goose (1969) and went on to make several more films, including The Executioner (1970). He also made television movies such as the well-regarded true story, The Killing of Randy Webster (1981). In 1985, Wanamaker appeared on the short-lived television series The Berrengers. When not busy acting or directing, Wanamaker had been an active supporter of the plan to restore Shakespeare's Globe Theatre. Unfortunately, Wanamaker died of cancer just before the project was completed. His daughter Zoe Wanamaker is also an actor. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
Search unanswered questions...

Enter a question here...
Search: All sources Community Q&A Reference topics

Wikipedia: Sam Wanamaker
Top
Home > Library > Miscellaneous > Wikipedia
Sam Wanamaker
Born Samuel Wanamaker
14 June 1919(1919-06-14)
Chicago, Illinois, USA
Died 18 December 1993 (aged 74)
London, England
Occupation Actor
Spouse(s) Charlotte Holland (1940-1993)

Samuel Wanamaker (14 June 1919 – 18 December 1993) was an American film director and actor, credited as the person most responsible for the modern recreation of Shakespeare's Globe Theatre in London.

Contents

Biography

Early years

Wanamaker was born in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Ukrainian Jewish immigrants from Nikolayev, tailor Morris Wanamaker (Manes Watmacher) and Molly Bobele. Wanamaker trained at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, and began working with summer stock theatre companies in Chicago and northern Wisconsin, where he helped build the stage of the Peninsula Players Theatre in 1937.

Career

Wanamaker began his acting career in travelling shows, and worked on Broadway. In 1940, he married Charlotte Holland, a Canadian radio soap star of the 1940s and later an actress.

Communist party

In 1943, Wanamaker was part of the cast of the play Counterattack at the National Theatre, Washington D.C.. During the play he became struck by the ideals of Communism and joined the American Communist Party. He attended Drake University prior to serving in the U.S. Army between 1943 and 1946 during the Second World War. In 1947 he returned to civilian life and, before relocating to Hollywood, left the Communist Party.

HUAAC blacklisting

In 1951, Wanamaker made a speech welcoming the return of two of the Hollywood Ten. In 1952 at the height of the McCarthy "Red Scare" period, despite his distinguished service in the U.S. Army during World War II, Wanamaker learned that he had become blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAAC), which he discovered while filming Mr. Denning Drives North in the UK. Wanamaker consequently decided not to return to the United States. Instead, he reestablished his career in England, as actor on stage and screen, director and producer.

The BBC documentary Who Do You Think You Are? broadcast on 24 February 2009, which featured Wanamaker's daughter Zoë, revealed that the FBI had kept a substantial investigation file for him, including incriminating witness statements. His activities were also reportedly monitored by MI5.[1]

Britain and America

Blue plaque to Wanamaker outside the Shakespeare's Globe Theatre

In 1957, he was appointed director of the New Shakespeare Theatre, in Liverpool. In 1959, he joined the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre company at Stratford-upon-Avon. In the 1960s and 1970s, he produced or directed several works at Covent Garden and elsewhere including the Shakespeare Birthday Celebrations in 1974. In the 1970s, Wanamaker began an intimate, long-standing relationship with the then-widowed American actress, Jan Sterling.

He worked both as a director and actor in both films and television, and his appearances included such movies as The Spiral Staircase (1974), Private Benjamin (1980), Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987), and Baby Boom (1987). He also directed stage productions. In 1980, he directed Giuseppe Verdi's opera "Aida" starring Luciano Pavarotti at San Francisco Opera (now broadcast version released as DVD). He also was featured as the widowered and very ruthless Department Store owner, Simon Berrenger on the short lived drama Berrenger's in 1985.

The Man Who Built the Globe

Shakespeare's Globe Theatre, Southbank, London, 2004

Wanamaker founded the Shakespeare Globe Trust to rebuild the Globe Theatre in London, and played a central role in realizing the project, eventually raising well over ten million dollars. According to the New York Times, it became Wanamaker's "Great Obsession" to realize an exact replica of William Shakespeare's first Globe Theatre, eventually securing the financial support of philanthropist and fellow lover of Shakespeare, Samuel H. Scripps.[2]

According to Karl Meyer of The New York Times:

The Shakespeare project helped Mr. Wanamaker keep his sanity and dignity intact. On his first visit to London in 1949, he had sought traces of the original theater and was astonished to find only a blackened plaque on an unused brewery. He found this neglect inexplicable, and in 1970 launched the Shakespeare Globe Trust, later obtaining the building site and necessary permissions despite a hostile local council. He siphoned his earnings as actor and director into the project, undismayed by the skepticism of his British colleagues.[2]

On the south bank of the Thames River in London, near where the modern recreation of Shakespeare's Globe stands today, is a plaque that reads: "In Thanksgiving for Sam Wanamaker, Actor, Director, Producer, 1919-1993, whose vision rebuilt Shakespeare's Globe Theatre on Bankside in this parish".[2]

There is a blue plaque on the riverside wall of the theatre.

Personal life

Wanamaker died of prostate cancer in London in 1993 at the age of 74,[3] before his dream could be finalized, and prior to the grand opening by the Queen in June 1997.[4] He was survived by three daughters, Abby, Jessica and the actress Zoë Wanamaker.

Filmography

Actor

Television

  • Return of the Saint – as Domenico in "Dragonseed" (episode # 1.22) February 25, 1979
  • Rafferty – as Hollander in "Rafferty" (Pilot) (episode # 1.1) September 5, 1977
  • Thirty-Minute Theatre in "A Wen" (episode # 1.233) December 27, 1971
  • Judd for the Defense – as Shelly Gould in "The Gates of Cerberus" (episode # 2.8) November 15, 1968
  • The Baron – as Sefton Folkard in "You Can't Win Them All" (episode # 1.19) February 1, 1967
  • Run for Your Life – as Major Joe Rankin in "A Rage for Justice: Part 2" (episode # 2.17) January 16, 1967
  • Run for Your Life – as Major Joe Rankin in "The Flight from Tirana: Part 1" (episode # 2.16) January 9, 1967
  • Gunsmoke – as Asa Longworth in "Parson Comes to Town" (episode # 11.31) April 30, 1966
  • The Wild Wild West – as Dr. Arcularis in "The Night of the Howling Light" (episode # 1.14) December 17, 1965
  • The Defenders – as United States Attorney Brooker in "A Taste of Ashes" (episode # 4.8) November 12, 1964
  • The Defenders – as Edward Banter in "Hollow Triumph" (episode # 3.35) June 20, 1964
  • The Outer Limits – as Dr. Simon Holm in "A Feasibility Study" (episode # 1.29) April 13, 1964
  • Espionage – as Sprague in "Festival of Pawns" (episode # 1.10) December 11, 1963
  • Man of the World – as Nicko in "The Bandit" (episode # 2.1) May 11, 1963
  • The Defenders – as James Henry David in "A Book for Burning" (episode # 2.27) March 30, 1963
  • The Defenders – as Dr. Ralph Ames in "The Hundred Lives of Harry Simms" (episode # 1.7) October 28, 1961
  • Danger Man – as Patrick Laurence in "The Lonely Chair" (episode # 1.8) October 30, 1960
  • Cameo Theatre in "Manhattan Footstep" (episode # 1.4) June 7, 1950

Director

References

  1. ^ [1]
  2. ^ a b c "Sam Wanamaker's Great Obsession," by Karl E. Meyer, The New York Times, December 29, 1996.
  3. ^ Obituary for Sam Wanamaker, New York Times, December 19, 1993
  4. ^ Shakespeare's Globe :: Sam Wanamaker

External links

v • d • e
Society of London Theatre Special Award

Laurence Olivier (1979) · Ralph Richardson (1980) · Charles Wintour (1982) · Joan Littlewood (1983) · John Gielgud (1985) · Alec Guinness (1988) · Peggy Ashcroft (1991) · Ninette de Valois (1992) · Kenneth MacMillan (1993) · Sam Wanamaker (1994) · Harold Pinter (1996) · Margaret Harris (1997) · Ed Mirvish / David Mirvish (1998) · Peter Hall (1999) · Rupert Rhymes (2002) · Sam Mendes (2003) · Judi Dench (2004) · Alan Bennett (2005) · Ian McKellen (2006) · John Tomlinson (2007) · Andrew Lloyd Webber (2008) · Alan Ayckbourn (2009)

This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

 
 

 

Copyrights:

Actor. Copyright © 2009 All Media Guide, LLC. All rights reserved.  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Sam Wanamaker".  Read more

Related answers
» More
 
Answer these
» More

Mentioned in

» More» More