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John Rolfe died on the afternoon of
16 June after a short illness. He was an active member for more than 40 years
and his contribution as set designer and constructor, front-of-house steward,
occasional stage manager, and friend was imeasurable. We miss him terribly.
AN APPRECIATION BY KEITH HUTTON
It was in the 1950s that I first became aware of John Rolfe, without knowing who
he was. From my vantage point at the 97 bus stop in Pitshanger Lane, I would
regularly see, across the road, a young woman emerge from the ladies
hairdressing salon and climb aboard a vintage Trojan motor car, to be
transported by an imperious man in the driving seat. The passenger was
Margaret, who became John's wife.
Friends for Forty Years
In the 1960s, I was led to John by Eric Walmsley, a designer for BBC-TV who
created sets for me at St Peter's Players. He suggested I contact the Head of
Design at The Questors, to seek a recommendation for a successor. I
misunderstood and made a direct approach to John with an invitation to design sets for the Players. Thus it was that the mystery driver became John Rolfe and
for 40 years we never looked back.
During that period, John designed more than 15 sets for me and I never
questioned his prodigious capacity for creative work, despite his jig-saw life of family, teaching, landscaping, music and, following Margaret's death, a diary full
of activity.
Musical Prowess
The range of his work was astonishing. He did two proscenium stage sets for me
at St Peter's, three for Ruislip Dramatic Society on the vast wastes of the
Winston Churchill Hall stage, and designed ups and 10 sets for full scale
musicals, on fit-up stages, for Heatham House Youth Theatre at Twickenham. He not only designed the setting for the Youth Theatre's closing tribute in 1988, but
played sax in the accompanying quartet and performed an emotional solo for
One Boy (from Bye Bye Birdie).
Non-Intrusive
John was a gentle person — I never heard him use an expletive or saw him lose his temper but he was highly attuned to quality and the lengths to which he would
go to meet his own criteria. In so doing, he threw out challenges to me. Having read a script and grasped the nature of the piece, he would invariably say "this is
a tricky one; I don't know how we're going to manage it", which was as much as
to say, "have you really thought out what you want?" It was his way, consciously
or not, of ensuring that I was absolutely certain I did know.
John's designs supported the players — and, like the man himself, never intruded. He was an economical designer, meticulous in the detail of his drawings
and models, technically displaying the essence of practicality. He took into account the nature of the playhouse and his sets subtly reflected idiosyncrasies
in the architecture.
It has been a privilege to enjoy John's company and to have been inspired by his
consummate art, determination, patience and humility
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KATY GALLANTRY remembers JOHN ROLFE
I have been trying to remember how I first met Rolfy. I failed to recollect which
production brought us together, but I did go through many memories of the man I
affectionately referred to as "the old git". As he never complained about the title, I
can only assume that he didn't mind too much. Failing that, it could have been
due to the constant problems he had with his hearing aids. Cries of "John, you
are whistling" could often be heard during the rehearsal period, John's response
being to insert his finger in his ear and commence fiddling to find improved reception.
Hugs
I think that the time I really started to know John was on the death of his wife. He
never showed his grief publicly, but it was clear that he always missed her. It was
not long after this I think that we started on a policy of hugs when we met up. I
recollect John telling me that having three sons meant that he never got many hugs. From then on it was hugs all the way with us.
Upstaging
In the last few seasons John and I have worked as designer and stage manager,
although on one occasion he did tread the boards along with Brian Ingram. It was
an Oscar Wilde production and their job was to "direct" the scene changes whilst appearing to be standing passively by. This was far from the case. On most nights they would manage to upstage any other action that was going on at the
time, and from Brian's accounts I believe that John spent most of his time
endeavouring to make Brian corpse — it involved language of an adult nature I
believe!
Charmer
We were also involved in several tours to the Minack Theatre and John was
always a complete charmer with members of the audience. Problems with his
knees did make it difficult to get down to the stage but he was always there. Back
at The Questors, he was always very reluctant to accept help from others, at least until he knew how capable they were. He did not suffer fools gladly,
something we had in common.
The last production we worked on was Duet for One (2004) and as usual John was
really involved. Not only was he designing the show but also he did like to offer
his little pearls of directorial wisdom every now and then. I was actually away for
the run of the show, but am happy to say that my last memory of time with John
was us putting books fascias into the "library" on the set. It was a very calming
experience and I was glad that he finally let me help.
John I send you big hugs on your final journey and hope that you will continue to watch over us all safely.
JOHN ROLFE DESIGNING AT THE QUESTORS
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