Emrys James

He performed in many theatre and television roles between 1960 and 1989, and was an Associate Artist of the Royal Shakespeare Company.

James was born in Machynlleth, the son of a railwayman,[1] and attended the University of Wales, Aberystwyth.

After training at RADA,[2] in 1953 James joined Peter Hall and John Barton's Oxford Playhouse-based Elizabethan Theatre Company.

[3] James's notable roles at the RSC included Sir Hugh Evans in The Merry Wives of Windsor, 1968; Gower in Pericles, 1969; Feste in Twelfth Night, 1969; The Boss in Günter Grass' The Plebeians Rehearse the Uprising, 1970; The Cardinal in John Webster's The Duchess of Malfi, 1971; Shylock in The Merchant of Venice, 1971; Iago in Othello, 1971; the title role in King John, 1974; Mephistopheles in Christopher Marlowe's Doctor Faustus, 1974; Chorus in Henry V, 1975; the title role in Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2, 1975–76; York in Henry VI, parts I, II and III, 1977–78; Jaques in As You Like It, 1977; Edgar in Strindberg's The Dance of Death, 1978; Cassius in Julius Caesar, 1983; Malvolio in Twelfth Night, 1984; and Sir Giles Overreach in Philip Massinger's A New Way to Pay Old Debts, 1984.

The couple set up home, firstly in London then in Warwickshire, when James began his lasting association with the RSC at Stratford.