John Gielgud

Born

April 14, 1904

Died

May 21, 2000 (aged 96)

Known as

theatre director, stage actor, film actor, television actor, film director, art collector

Sir Arthur John Gielgud was an English actor and theatre director. With his contemporaries Laurence Olivier, Michael Redgrave and Ralph Richardson, he made up a quartet of male actors who dominated the British stage of the mid-20th century. A member of the Terry family theatrical dynasty, his career spanned eight decades, and gained his first paid acting work as a junior member of his cousin Phyllis Neilson-Terry's company in 1922. After studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA), Gielgud worked in repertory theatre and in the West End before establishing himself at the Old Vic as an exponent of Shakespeare from 1929 to 1931.

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