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 The death of Harry Ives, who passed away peacefully in F February, severed a connection with The
Questors that had lasted more than forty years and cost the theatre a well-loved actor and personality.
Harry had the distinction of speaking the first lines heard in the present Playhouse when he and Wyllie
Longmore opened Ibsen's Brand, the first production there, with offstage calls and shouts in the
presence of The Queen Mother in 1964.
But his main acting career was in the old tin hut, where one of his most successful roles was Captain Jamey, the eccentric Scots soldier in Alfred Emmet's exciting production of Henry V in 1957. Two
members of that cast of thirty-five years ago, Vincent McQueen and myself, were among The Questors at his funeral.
Over the years Harry played an incredible variety of parts. He loved acting and didn't worry about the
size of the role, with the result that he played a large number of minor parts as well as some more
important ones. He was an inveterate scene-stealer and old hands used to look behind them on stage
to see what Harry was doing.
Harry was one of those lucky people who found acting fun. He particularly enjoyed making-up lavishly,
a fondness which inspired a section in The Art of Coarse Acting, where I describe making-up next to
Harry, who kept asking me if I wanted to borrow any of his boils and warts.
Harry's last acting role was in 1971, but he kept in touch and his final appearance was last summer
when he attended the memorial evening for his old friend Alfred Emmet. He was 79.
MIKE GREEN
[Questopics 352, May 1992]
HARRY IVES AT THE QUESTORS
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