Janet Dale
Timothy Dalton
Charles Dance
The Dance of Death
Ron Daniels
The Danton Affair
Nick Darke
Daughter of the Air
Shaun Davey
Alan David
Howard Davies
Rudi Davies
Daniel Day-Lewis
Days in the Trees
Days of the Commune
The Dead Monkey
Nick Dear
Deathwatch/The Maids
Thomas Dekker
Robert Delamere
A Delicate Balance
Frances de la Tour
Robert Demeger
Jeffery Dench
Judi Dench
The Desert Air
Desire Under the Elms
Destiny
The Devil is an Ass
The Devil's Disciple
The Devils
Ann Devlin
Es Devlin
Mark Dignam
Stephen Dillane
The Dillen
Lisa Dillon
Dingo
The Dispute
Divine Gossip
Joe Dixon
Doctor Faustus
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
The Dog in the Manger
Monica Dolan
A Doll's House
Don Carlos
Donmar Warehouse
Declan Donnellan
Gregory Doran
Simon Dormandy
Roy Dotrice
John Dougall
Wayne Dowdeswell
Downchild
Penny Downie
Kevin Doyle
A Dream of People
Dreamplay
Amanda Drew
Darrell D'Silva
Kate Duchêne
The Duchess of Malfi
Duck Song
William Dudley
The Dumb Waiter
Lindsay Duncan
Jeremy Dunn
Marguerite Duras
Friedrich Dürrenmatt
Susan Dury
Dutch Uncle
The Dybbuk
Charles Dyer
Chris Dyer
Born in Brazil to British parents, Ron Daniels came to England in 1963 on a drama scholarship and worked initially as an actor (his professional career had started as a teenager; following an abortive spell at drama school he co-founded the Teatro Oficina in São Paulo). He joined the RSC in 1968 to play the small role of Metellus Cimber in Julius Caesar (John Barton, RST, UK Tour and Aldwych) and John Grass in Indians (Jack Gelber, Aldwych). His reputation as a director was established at the Victoria Theatre, Stoke-on-Trent, where he worked on both classical and modern texts.
Trevor Nunn brought Daniels back into the RSC in 1974 to direct new plays, and the occasional classic, at The Other Place. He became Artistic Director of TOP in 1977 and along with Howard Davies (Director of the Warehouse) spearheaded the RSC's new writing work for the next decade. There was no obvious division in quality between the new plays and the classics that played side by side. Daniels's productions of David Edgar's Destiny (1976), John Rudkin's The Sons of Light (1977), Ford's 'Tis Pity She's a Whore (1977) and Shakespeare's Pericles (1979) were lucid and gripping—new plays staged as classics, classics staged as new plays.
The success of Pericles and Timon of Athens (1980) led to his first main house production, a fine Romeo and Juliet (1980) with Anton Lesser and Judy Buxton. A Midsummer Night's Dream (1981), with Mike Gwilym and Juliet Stevenson, used the mechanics of Victorian theatre as a metaphor. The Tempest (1982) was designed with extravagance, but Daniels returned to the leaner style of Romeo for his remarkable productions of Hamlet (1988) and Richard II (1990). In Hamlet he took imaginative risks (Mark Rylance's Hamlet wore pyjamas for much of the play) to emphasise dislocation and mental disturbance: the set's slanting walls were plain white, like those of an institution, and the outdoor scenes were played before a vast, turbulent seascape. In Richard II he contrasted an elegant court with the urban landscape of a modern civil war.
Daniels left the RSC at the end of the Terry Hands era and moved to America. As Associate Artistic Director of the American Repertory Theatre (Cambridge, Massachusetts) from 1992 to 96, he directed Hamlet, with Mark Rylance; The Seagull, with Rylance; Dream of the Red Spider; Cakewalk; Henry IV; The Cherry Orchard, with Claire Bloom; Henry V; The Threepenny Opera (1995); The Tempest (1995), with Paul Freeman as Prospero; Long Day's Journey into Night (1996), with Claire Bloom; and Naomi Wallace's Slaughter City (1996). During this time he was also the Director of the A.R.T.'s Institute for Advanced Theatre Training.
Since 1996 he has worked as a freelance director: Antony and Cleopatra (The Shakespeare Theatre, Washington D.C., 1996); Mozart's Il Re Pastore (Boston Lyric Opera, 1997), his opera debut; the premiere production of Naomi Wallace's One Flea Spare (The Public Theater, New York, 1997); Madame Butterfly (San Francisco Opera, Golden Gate Theater, 1997); Richard II and Richard III played in repertory (Playhouse at St Clement's, New York, 1998); Carmen (Houston Grand Opera, 2000); Hedda Gabler (Dallas Theater Center, 2001); and The Feast of Snails, David Warner's return to the London stage (Lyric, 2002).
In late 1996 he returned to the RSC to direct the world premiere of Slaughter City in the Pit (his A.R.T. production opened a few months later). In 1997 he staged a main house Henry V (RST, UK Tour and Barbican) with Michael Sheen in the title role: played in modern dress before black walls etched with the names of the dead, it was an unremittingly sombre, often angry, production.
Other work in the US: Romeo and Juliet (The Guthrie Theater, Minneapolis); Pam Gem's Camille (Long Wharf), with Kathleen Turner; and, at the Yale Repertory Theatre, Bingo, Ivanov, Man is Man, and Mister Puntila.
Education: Anglo-American School, Rio de Janeiro
RSC: Joined 1968; Director of The Other Place, 1977-83; Associate Director, 1979-91; Director of the Mermaid, 1987-88; Member of the Directorate, 1987-90; Honorary Associate Director (since 1991)
Productions: Afore Night Come, David Rudkin (TOP, 1974); Destiny, David Edgar (TOP, 1976/Aldwych, 1977); 'Tis Pity She's a Whore, John Ford (TOP, 1977/Warehouse, 1978); The Lorenzaccio Story, Paul Thompson after Alfred de Musset (TOP, 1977/Warehouse, 1978); The Sons of Light, David Rudkin (TOP, 1977/Warehouse, 1978); The Women-Pirates Ann Bonney and Mary Read, Steve Gooch (Aldwych, 1978); Hippolytus, David Rudkin (TOP, 1978/Warehouse, 1979); Pericles (TOP, 1979/Warehouse, 1980); The Suicide, Nikolai Erdman (TOP, 1979/Warehouse, 1980); Romeo and Juliet (RST, 1980/Aldwych, 1981); Timon of Athens (TOP, 1980/Warehouse, 1981); Hansel and Gretel, David Rudkin (TOP, 1980/Warehouse, 1981); A Midsummer Night's Dream (RST, 1981/Barbican, 1982); Peer Gynt, Henrik Ibsen (TOP, 1982/Pit, 1983); The Tempest (RST, 1982/Barbican, 1983); Julius Caesar (RST, 1983/Barbican, 1984); Maydays, David Edgar (Barbican, 1983); Camille, Pam Gems (TOP, 1984/Comedy, 1985); Hamlet (RST, 1984/Barbican, 1985); Breaking the Silence, Stephen Poliakoff (Pit, 1984/Mermaid, 1985); Real Dreams, Trevor Griffiths (Pit, 1986); Much Ado About Nothing (Small-scale Tour, 1986); The Danton Affair, Pam Gems (Barbican, 1986); They Shoot Horses Don't They? (Mermaid, 1987); The Plain Dealer, William Wycherley (Swan, 1988/Pit, 1989); Hamlet (UK Tour, 1988/RST, 1989/Barbican, 1989); Playing With Trains, Stephen Poliakoff (Pit, 1989); A Clockwork Orange (Barbican, 1989); Earwig, Paula Milne (Pit, 1990); Richard II (RST, 1990/Barbican, 1991); Slaughter City, Naomi Wallace (Pit, 1995); Henry V (RST, 1997/UK Tour, 1997/Barbican, 1997)
TOPHOME