Robert Marsden

Robert Marsden (22nd August 1921-5th April 2007) played Abraham Lincoln in The Chase.

ROBERT MARSDEN was born in West Hampstead. He went to seven schools, and his theatre training (likewise thorough) was at LAMDA, the London Mask Theatre School, RADA, and Webber Douglas.

He made his professional debut at Warrington in 1939.

At Stratford-on-Avon, aged nineteen, he played a round of Shakespearean roles. He first broadcast in 1942 and joined the BBC Drama Repertory Company (a wartime creation), playing a variety of parts including Robert in "The Letter", Chorus to Olivier's "Henry V" and the disciple Philip in Dorothy L. Sayers' play cycle on Jesus "The Man Born To Be King".

He was in John Drinkwater's "Abraham Lincoln" both at the Westminster in 1940 and at the Playhouse in 1943 - the parts getting bigger. At the Arts he played in "The Rivals", "The Constant Couple" etc. In 1944 he joined the Greta Douglas company at the Chanticleer, appearing in such plays as "The Lady From the Sea" and as the title character in "John Gabriel Borkman".

The following year he was approached by John Gielgud about Rodney Ackland's adaptation of "Crime & Punishment", and he played the leading character’s friend with Gielgud and Edith Evans (not to mention the Peters, Ustinov and Jones) at the New Theatre, and elsewhere.

Marsden’s next broadcast was as Young Marlow in "She Stoops To Conquer" with Angela Baddeley. He continued to freelance in radio, his parts including the King in "Love's Labour's Lost" and Donati in Henry Reed's "Vincenzo", as well as appearances in Children's Hour. They used to do short Shakespeares from Leeds, and Robert played Macbeth there to Avice Landone’s Lady Macbeth. These broadcasts sometimes utilised his musical abilities. He played Orsino in "Twelfth Night" and sang some of the songs. He was a fine pianist, and accompanied his own singing, on the air and later in recitations. He composed revue material and comic songs, such as a witty setting of Carroll's "Jabberwocky". On radio in the mid-fifties he played the title role in the series "Mike Dudley, Charter Pilot".

He also appeared on television, often for children as in "The Cruise of the Toytown Belle" and as the sinister 'Man in the Bowler Hat' in "Emil & The Detectives".

In Fry's "The Boy With A Cart", he played one of the brothers in the West End with Richard Burton (in 1950), and a different one on TV. In 1956 at the Phoenix he was in Peter Brook's production of "The Power & the Glory" with Paul Scofield.

His career as a director in regional theatre began at Whitby, and included Guildford (where he directed Philip Bond in "Richard II", and hospitalised himself by stepping backwards off the stage) and Coventry. At Preston he played Othello and co-directed it with Alan Foss. He also worked with Joan Littlewood at Stratford East.

In 1959 at the Belgrade, Coventry he 'did the hat-trick' with "Abraham Lincoln", now playing the name character. Richard Martin, who later directed him as Lincoln in “Dr Who: The Chase” was in the company. At the Belgrade he also played Shylock in "The Merchant of Venice" and Brutus in "Julius Caesar".

At Birmingham Rep in 1961 he was Enobarbus in "Antony & Cleopatra". He also performed at James Roose-Evans's Hampstead Theatre Club, as it was then called, in its early days, playing in "He Who Gets Slapped".

He started to vary his acting with work as a drama teacher, at RADA, Central School and the City Lit, as well as privately. He also gave solo recitations which were both dramatic and musical.

In 1965, he was invited to rejoin the Stratford-based Shakespeare company, now called the RSC, to be in "Henry V". Robert had done Chorus on radio and in his recitations. They found that Eric Porter needed a stand-in of stature to take over many London performances as the Chorus when he was in Stratford doing "The Jew of Malta". Porter and Marsden shared the role at the Aldwych, and in time Robert effectively took it over.

While with the RSC, he was in the earliest of their "Theatre-Go-Round" outreach programmes for school pupils, and he played Boretzki in Peter Weiss's disturbing compilation from the concentration camp hearings, "The Investigation". Performed at the Aldwych, it was recorded by the BBC and broadcast more than once.

After this, though he appeared on television again and was Gladstone in "Portrait Of A Queen" at Bromley, he did not work much as an actor. For many years he continued as a private drama teacher, specialising in coaching intense verbal work.