Married to theatre collaborator Rick Elice since 2011, Roger was subsequently diagnosed with cancer.

- IMDb Mini Biography By: Like a number of British actors of the same generation (John Hurt and Alan Rickman, to name two), Roger Rees originally trained for the visual arts. He was in a relationship with British actor Roger Rees for 37 years, during which Rees voluntarily converted to Elice's Jewish faith.

Two months later, there was a memorial service for him at Broadway's New Amsterdam Theatre. Jerry Mitchell directed and choreographed Elice's next musical, My Very Own British Invasion, based on the teenage years of Peter Noone of Herman's Hermits fame. Royal Shakespeare Company. Roger Rees was previously married to Rick Elice (2011 - 2015). [11] Rees left the production in May 2015 due to his illness. |  This page was last edited on 13 October 2020, at 07:23. Like a number of British actors of the same generation (John Hurt and Alan Rickman, to name two), Roger Rees originally trained for the visual arts. From 1989 to 1991 and in 1993, he also appeared intermittently on the long-running American television series Cheers as the English business tycoon Robin Colcord, a love interest for Rebecca Howe (Kirstie Alley).

The play enjoyed a successful tour throughout North America in 2013–14. Greatest Norm Peterson response to a greeting. The Olivier Award he won for The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby" was for Actor of the Year in a New Play.

His last role was as Anton Schell in the musical version of The Visit, opposite Chita Rivera, which opened on Broadway on 23 April 2015 and closed on 14 June 2015. He is a charter member of the American Repertory Theater.

With Roger Rees, he wrote the popular thriller, Double Double, which has been translated into 16 languages.[5]. Elice collaborated with Brickman once again, this time writing the book for the musical, He was inducted into the exclusive entertainment fraternity, the Grand Order of Water Rats, as a full member.

From 1988 to 1991 he starred in the British sitcom Singles, with co-star Judy Loe. He was widely known to American television audiences for playing the characters Robin Colcord in Cheers and Lord John Marbury in The West Wing. He put away his brushes for good after this.He turned to acting on a full-time basis in the mid-1960s and appeared on both the London and Scottish stages. [8], Ford Center for the Performing Arts Oriental Theatre, Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Book of a Musical, Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Book of a Musical, Tony Award for Best Original Score Written for the Theatre, "Actor-director Roger Rees and partner Rick Elice, co-librettist of ''Jersey Boys. His most recent collaboration with Brickman was for the film of Jersey Boys, directed by Clint Eastwood and released by Warner Brothers in June 2014. He then worked his way up through the RSC's ranks, finally achieving stardom in the early 1980s in the 8-1/2 hour stage adaptation of "The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickelby", which had a cast of 40 actors, and for which he won both an Olivier Award and a Tony Award. He was born on May 5 1944 in Aberystwyth, Wales, and acted in church and Boy Scouts stage productions while growing up in South London, but studied painting and lithography at the Slade School of Art. Rick Elice (born November 17, 1956) is a writer and former stage actor. He won an Olivier Award and a Tony Award for his performance as the lead in The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby. Rees married his partner of 33 years, playwright Rick Elice, in 2011, shortly after same-sex marriage in New York was legalised. Rees played the Sheriff of Rottingham in the Mel Brooks movie, Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993). "The Suicide" by Nikolai Erdman (as Semyon Semyonovich). Rees was posthumously inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in November 2015. That same year, Rees portrayed Fred Hollywell in A Christmas Carol, which he also narrated, starring George C. Scott as Scrooge. His first paying jobs in show business were as a scenery painter. The Addams Family. Was painting scenery at the Wimbledon Theatre when approached to play a part in "Hindle Wakes" in 1965. [4], Continuing his work in the theatre through the 1990s, both as an actor and a director, Rees was awarded an Obie Award for his 1992 performance in the Off-Broadway play The End of the Day. From 1999–2009, he served as creative consultant to Walt Disney Studios.

[7], From November 2004 to October 2007, Rees was artistic director of the Williamstown Theatre Festival, only the fourth person to hold the post in its half-century history. By the middle of May, it had become too difficult for him to speak, and he left the show. About. [4] His film career began in the 1980s. [1] He and his parents moved to Balham, south London, England, where he grew up. [7]. In 2013, Rees directed Crispin Whitell's play, The Primrose Path, at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis. RK, Other Works Roger Rees, Actor: Frida. He played British Ambassador Lord John Marbury in several episodes of The West Wing from 2000 to 2005. They collaborated on the 2012 Broadway play Peter and the Starcatcher, with Elice as playwright and Rees as co-director. While undergoing two brain surgeries, two courses of radiation and ongoing chemotherapy, Rees managed to rehearse, preview and open in The Visit on 23 April 2015. [20] His ashes were scattered in the Atlantic Ocean. On Wednesday, 15 July 2015, the marquee lights at all the theatres on Broadway were dimmed in his honour. [21]On 16 November 2015, Rees was inducted, posthumously, into the Broadway Theatre Hall of Fame. Rees continued his career with the Royal Shakespeare Company. Former Cheers and West Wing Star Roger Rees has died aged 71, his spokesman has confirmed. He has been a creative consultant for Walt Disney Studios from 1999–2009. He was also scheduled to perform his one-man Shakespeare show, What You Will in New York in the autumn of 2015, and had hoped to return to the Royal Shakespeare Company for a stint in Don Quixote in 2016. Welsh Actor Roger Rees was born on 5th May, 1944 in Aberystwyth, Cardiganshire, Wales and passed away on 10th Jul 2015 Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA aged 71. for four years. [13], Rees lived in the United States for more than 25 years[2] and became a naturalized American citizen in 1989. or "Ah, my Lord!" Elice with Marshall Brickman wrote the book for the Broadway musical Jersey Boys, which received a Tony Award nomination and a Drama Desk nomination for best book for a musical in 2006. In 1995, he was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for his role in Indiscretions. [12], Rees was to have directed a new musical written by Elice and Will Van Dyke, Magnificent Climb, in the fall of 2016 at MCC Theater in New York.

[4] Elice's memoir of Rees' life and their much-admired partnership of more than thirty years, called Finding Roger: An Improbably Theatrical Love Story, is published by Kingswell. He wrote Leonardo’s Ring (London Fringe, 2003) and Dog and Pony (New York Stage and Film, 2003). [4] Rees created the title role in the original production of The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, David Edgar's stage adaptation of the Charles Dickens novel, winning a Laurence Olivier Award for Actor of the Year in a New Play in 1980 and a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play in 1982. REES--Roger. Publicity Listings Started his career with the Royal Shakespeare Company and attended the Slade School of Fine Arts.

Elice was creative director at Serino Coyne, Inc. (1982–2000), where he produced advertising campaigns for more than 300 Broadway shows including A Chorus Line and The Lion King.

Married to theatre collaborator Rick Elice since 2011, Roger was subsequently diagnosed with cancer. Won Broadway's 1982 Tony Award as Best Actor for playing the title role in "The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby," a role he recreated in the television version with the same title. In 2014, Rees directed Dog and Pony, a musical written by Rick Elice and Michael Patrick Walker, which had its world premiere at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego. He was painting scenery, in fact, when he was asked to sub in for a part and made his acting debut. Official Sites.

By this time, he had several TV movies to his name, but he did not make his big-screen debut until Star 80 (1983).Living in the United States since 1989, Roger made a name for himself in America when he joined the cast of the TV hit comedy Cheers (1982) as the priggish Britisher Robin Colcord and later the glib British ambassador Lord John Marbury on the series The West Wing (1999). Elice was born in New York City, where he attended public elementary, junior high, and high schools. The show premiered on February 10, 2019 at Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn, NJ.

|  In 2019, Disney Theatrical Productions announced that Elice and Tony winner Bob Martin would write the book, and Tony winner David Yazbek would write the score, for a musical adaptation of William Goldman's revered novel and cult film, The Princess Bride, for Broadway. I didn't have any lines, other than "The Queen!" In 2012, Elice and Rees received Tony Award nominations for Elice's stage adaptation and Rees' co-direction (with Alex Timbers), respectively, of Peter and the Starcatcher. [18] Elice and Rees married in 2011. [15] [16] [17] Rees and Elice also collaborated professionally, including as co-playwrights of the comedic thriller Double Double . Brickman and Elice wrote the screenplay, adapted from their book for the stage musical. However, Roger Rees remained primarily a man of the theatre with secondary careers as a playwright and stage director. Roger Rees (5 May 1944 – 10 July 2015) was a Welsh actor and director, widely known for his stage work. [3][4] He played Malcolm in the acclaimed Trevor Nunn 1976 stage and 1978 television production of Macbeth. The show received two 2019 Tony Awards, for Best Costume Design (Bob Mackie), and Best Actress in a Musical (Stephanie J. Peter and the Starcatcher received nine Tony Award nominations, more than any new American play in the history of the Tony Awards. After a diagnosis of brain cancer in October 2014, Rees focused his energy on his commitment to playing opposite Chita Rivera on Broadway in The Visit, the final musical written by John Kander and Fred Ebb. He converted from Christianity to Judaism in the 1980s. Rees died at age 71 at his home in New York City on 10 July 2015. Rees's longtime romantic partner (and, as of 2011, husband) is writer/producer. For sixteen years, the actor Roger Rees and the playwright Rick Elice have lived in a book-crammed apartment in the Beresford, on Central Park West.