Kendrew Lascelles (pronounced Lassels; 20 September 1935 – 1 March 2022[1]) was an English-born actor, performer and writer from South Africa.
[3][4] Some of his most notable works include Wait a Minim!, an anti-apartheid revue that he co-wrote and performed;[5] and, The Box, an iconic poem first recited by him on The Smothers Brothers Summer show on the ABC TV network in the summer of 1970, and was later performed by John Denver on his 1971 album Poems, Prayers & Promises.
[8] Lascelles has written four novels, seventeen plays, two produced screenplays, four musicals, a television mini-series, and four anthologies of poems.
[10] His first paid performance was in 1953 replacing the Principal Dancer, injured two hours before opening night, of a visiting Italian opera company in the dance sequence in their production Faust, starring Giuseppe Di Stefano.
[16] During and immediately after his work with Minim!, Lascelles appeared as a guest on various talk shows, including David Frost, Steve Allen, and Ed Sullivan.
[17] After settling in the United States, Lascelles began writing scripts for television, most notably the Smothers Brothers and The Dean Martin Show.
A few weeks later, John Denver appeared on the show and asked Lascelles if he could perform The Box, later recording it for his 1971 album "Poems, Prayers & Promises."
[19] Lascelles was a staff writer and occasional performer for the Smothers Brothers Show and Dean Martin's Golddiggers in 1972–73.
He wrote Exclusive Circles; it received a reading with Alfre Woodard directed by Robert Egan at the Mark Taper Forum – it received a second reading at the New York Actors Studio and monitored by Elia Kazan;[23] it was finally produced at the Denver Center Theatre Company with Lascelles playing the role of Bossie.
The company produced Trophy Hunters first and then in the following year Exclusive Circles in which Lascelles performed the role of Bossie.
[25] Released in 2001, Focus starred William H. Macy, Laura Dern, David Paymer, and Meat Loaf.
[25][28] Lascelles wrote the script for the film The Aryan Couple, a drama produced and directed by John Daly and released in 2004.
[11] The book is a post apocalyptic fantasy adventure about an orphaned teenage porn star who travels with a Christian cowboy to find a relative in Denver.
In 2010 he published "A Child's Guide to Heresy," sometimes referred to as "The Great Yorkshire Witch Trial of 1249," which won the Pacific Book Award for Occult Fiction in 2015.
[18] In 2010 he released his third book, "Blood Oasis," a novel set in Darfur juxtaposing the regional culture with Western expectations.