Cyril Butcher
{{Short description|English actor and director}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
Cyril George Butcher (31 July 1909 – 23 February 1987) was an English actor and director and longtime companion of Beverley Nichols.
Biography
Butcher was born on 31 July 1909, in Suffolk, England.
In 1930, the magazine Film Weekly sponsored a pair of film acting scholarships. The two winners (Cyril Butcher and Aileen Despard) went on to appear in the now lost Alfred Hitchcock short An Elastic Affair and placed under contract by British International Pictures.{{cite book|last1=Kerzoncuf|first1=Alain|last2=Barr|first2=Charles|title=Hitchcock Lost and Found: The Forgotten Films|date=2015|publisher=University Press of Kentucky|isbn=9780813160832|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=j9PtBgAAQBAJ&q=Cyril+Butcher+the+winner+of+film+weekly&pg=PT83|accessdate=23 January 2018}}
In the early 1930s, he met novelist and playwright Beverley Nichols and they remained lifelong partners from then. Their friends were Hugh Walpole and Lord Berners, among others.{{cite web|title=Beverley Nichols papers|url=http://www.lib.udel.edu/ud/spec/findaids/html/mss0620.html|website=Special Collections University of Delaware Library|accessdate=23 January 2018}} In 1939 Butcher was living with Nichols and a valet at 1 Ellerdale Close, Hampstead, London.1939 Register. The valet was Arthur Gaskin Born 27 Oct 1904
In 1934, he published In Extremis, Worst Moments in the Lives of the Famous with a foreword by Beverley Nichols.{{cite journal|title=In Extremis – 18 Nov 1934, Sun • Page 7|journal=The Observer|date=1934|page=7|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/16787065/the_observer/|accessdate=23 January 2018}} In 1939, together with Albert Arlen, he directed the play Counterfeit! at the Duke of York's, London.{{cite journal|title=Counterfeit! – 20 Aug 1939, Sun • Page 9|journal=The Observer|date=1939|page=9|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/16787104/the_observer/|accessdate=23 January 2018}}
In 1953, Butcher adapted Evensong by Beverley Nichols for the television,{{cite journal|title=Documentaries – 21 Oct 1953, Wed • Page 3|journal=The Guardian|date=1953|page=3|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/16787146/the_guardian/|accessdate=23 January 2018}} while in 1956 he directed the television adaptation of Macadam and Eve from the play by Roger Macdougall.{{cite journal|title=First Flashes of a New Spirit – 30 Jun 1956, Sat • Page 3|journal=The Guardian|date=1956|page=3|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/16787086/the_guardian/|accessdate=23 January 2018}} Butcher was the producer of the 1957 television drama Granite Peak.{{cite journal|title=Australian Authoress's Play – 27 Apr 1957, Sat • Page 5|journal=The Guardian|date=1957|page=5|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/16787051/the_guardian/|accessdate=23 January 2018}}
Between 1959 and 1963, he directed for television: Ideal Home Exhibition (1963), The English Captain (1960), The Last Hours (1959), Old People; Part 1 (1959) and Election Results 1959 (1959).{{cite web|title=Cyril Butcher|url=http://www.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b9f27dea5|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180123190623/http://www.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b9f27dea5|url-status=dead|archive-date=23 January 2018|website=British Film Institute|accessdate=23 January 2018}}
On the death of Nichols in 1984, Butcher was the main beneficiary in his will, amounting to £131,750 (£{{formatnum:{{inflation|UK|131750|1984}}}} in {{Inflation-year|UK}} sterling).{{cite journal|title=Beverley Nichols' will – 22 Jan 1984, Sun • Page 5|journal=The Observer|date=1984|page=5|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/16787118/the_observer/|accessdate=23 January 2018}}
Butcher died on 23 February 1987 aged 77 at Sudbrook Cottage, the house he shared with Nichols, at Ham Common in Richmond, Surrey.
References
{{Reflist}}
External links
[https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1044941/?ref_=tt_ov_st Cyril Butcher] at IMDb
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Category:20th-century English male actors
Category:English male film actors
Category:English theatre directors
Category:LGBTQ theatre directors
Category:20th-century English LGBTQ people
Category:Actors from the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames