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Biography
Sheila Gish (born 1942) has, since the early 1980s, been in the front rank of British actresses. She was born in Lincoln and made her acting debut at school in the role of the psychotic Jonathan Brewster in Arsenic and Old Lace. She trained at RADA and then played in repertory at Birmingham and Pitlochry. In her London debut, she played Bella Hedley in the hit musical, Robert and Elizabeth (1964) that ran for 948 performances at the Lyric Theatre.
After this, it took same time for her career to take off and her acting as done in the provinces and in bit arts in the occasional TV production and film (including A Day in the Death of Joe Egg in 1972). It was not until 1976 that she returned to the West End in the London premier of Alan Ayckbourn’s Confusions at the Apollo. For her performance, she won the Clarence Derwent award.
It was the 1978 production of Tennessee Williams's Vieux Carre (presented first at the Nottingham Playhouse and then at London’s Piccadilly Theatre) that allowed her to break out of the mould of being cast as the pretty English woman. Cast in the minor role as Jane, she dismissed as incomprehensible some additional lines written for her by the ageing author and refused to learn tem. As a result she was thrown out of the cast and, for some years, banned from appearing in another Tennessee Williams play.
She was obviously the actress to play flamboyant flawed women and she did – with considerable success. Her performance of the title role in Racine’s Berenice (1982) in Christopher Fettes’ production at the Lyric Studio established her as an outstanding performer. It was a reputation further enhanced by her interpretation of the roles of Elena Andreyevna in Uncle Vanya (1982) at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket – again directed by Christopher Fettes; Countess Sophie in the first revival of John Osborne’s A Patriot for Me (1983), playing opposite Alan Bates, at the Chichester Festival; and, in a triumphant return to Tennessee Williams, as Blanche Du Bois in A Streetcar Named Desire at the Greenwich Theatre (1983) and the Mermaid Theatre (1984).
She has continued to be in constant demand for work on stage and television and, occasionally, in films. Her theatre credits include: Marriage Plays and Les Parents Terribles at The National Theatre; Neverland and The Treatment at The Royal Court; and Company at the Donmar Warehouse. Her recent television work includes: the mini-series, Blonde Bombshell (1998); Lynda La Plante's series Supply And Demand (1998); and, with Alan Bates, the series Love In A Cold Climate (2001). Her films include Highlander (1986) and Mansfield Park (1999).
Sadly, in 2003, she had an eye removed after suffering cancer of the face. A few months later, at the Chichester Festival Theatre, she gave a superb performance as Arkadina in The Seagull, wearing a black eye patch. Now that is gutsy!
| Items for Sale on Collectors' Post |
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| 014576 |
Theatre: Programs (UK) - post 1939 | UNCLE VANYA (by Anton Chekov) with DONALD SINDEN & SHEILA GISH |
| 011629 |
Theatre: Photos - Signed | SHEILA GISH - signed photo |
| 011732 |
Cinema & TV: Signed Material | SHEILA GISH - signed photo |
| 011734 |
Cinema & TV: Signed Material | SHEILA GISH - signed photo |
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