By Robert Simonson
07 Oct 2009

Douglas Campbell, a leading figure in the Canadian acting community, died Oct. 6 in the Hôtel-Dieu de Montréal Hospital of congestive heart disease at the age of 87.

A native Glaswegian, he followed Tyrone Guthrie to Canada when the director was invited to start the Stratford Festival in 1953. Mr. Campbell would act with the company off and on for the rest of his career, his final performance there being of a character he was particularly famous for — Falstaff — in Henry IV, Parts 1 & 2 in 2001.

When Guthrie was lured to Minneapolis, Mr. Campbell followed him again, eventually succeeding him in 1963 as the artistic director of The Guthrie Theater there. In Canada, the actor founded the Canadian Players in 1954.

Douglas Campbell was born in Glasgow, Scotland on June 11, 1922. He abandoned school at the age of 17, hitch-hiked to London and got a job at the Old Vic Theatre Company as a truck driver, helping to transport scenery. He met Tyrone Guthrie and joined his company soon after seeing his 1941 production of King John.

In 1947, he married the daughter of famous English actress Sybil Thorndike, Ann Casson. They had four children together, including prominent stage actor Benedict Campbell.

He is survived by his second wife, Moira Wylie, the two children he had with her, Beatrice and Torquil (also an actor), as well as the four offspring from his marriage to Casson: Dirk, Teresa, Thomas and Benedict.