The recent obituary of Nadine Baylis focused mainly on her designs for dance. However, she was also a brilliant and prolific designer for drama. Working originally with Ralph Koltai, she became my resident designer at the Oxford Playhouse company in 1979, just as we created the new thrust stage for the theatre.
In that year she designed the Goldoni Villeggiatura Trilogy (translated as The Country Holiday) and continued with King Lear, both of which played in Oxford and on tour. The following year she designed Much Ado About Nothing, Peer Gynt (which gained a nomination for best new musical from James Fenton in what became the Olivier awards) and Mephisto, which returned to Oxford in 1981, prior to a month’s run at the Round House.
In 1982, also at the Round House, she designed The Cherry Orchard that had been scheduled to be directed by Robert Sturua, the director of the Rustaveli theatre in Tblisi, Georgia. Travel permission was refused by the Soviet Union and the production was directed by Mike Alfreds. Later that year, Nadine and I worked on a production of The White Devil at Oxford starring Geraldine James. In 1984 Nadine designed my last production at Oxford, The Dance of Death, in a new translation by Ted Whitehead that starred Barbara Jefford.
At the Citadel theater in Edmonton, Canada, Nadine designed Henry IV, Part I for me in 1982 and King Lear with Len Cariou in 1983. When I took over as artistic director there, she designed new productions of The Country Holiday and Mephisto in 1984-85.
Nadine was a designer who continually tried new ideas but whose essence was simplicity. I would outline complex themes and she would reduce them to minimalist forms which worked with a stunning efficacy. She was also a good friend with sound advice. When I would fret over delays in travel she would say: think of yourself as a parcel.
It’s an image I use for many situations in modern life, be it in hospitals or airports.
