Sam Wanamaker; Actor Led Globe Theater Effort

Sam Wanamaker, whose enduring vision of restoring Shakespeare’s Globe Theater was nearing reality, died Saturday at his London home.

The trustees of the Globe Playhouse Trust, which Wanamaker founded, said he died after a five-year fight against cancer.

The silver-haired actor with the patrician air that closely matched his features was 74.

Trained as a stage actor, Wanamaker had a short but promising run in Hollywood films until his leftist affiliations put him on the blacklist of the 1950s. For several years he confined himself to stage work but made a resurgence in films of the 1970s and 1980s after he had settled permanently in England.

His quest to restore the Globe, which burned down in 1613, began more than 40 years ago when he was working as an actor in England.

Shakespeare had been a joint owner and resident playwright during the theater’s 14-year existence and it was there that “Hamlet,” “Macbeth,” “King Lear” and “Twelfth Night” were first presented.

It was rebuilt soon after and torn down in 1644, two years after the Puritans under Oliver Cromwell closed all playhouses.

In 1949, Wanamaker visited the site of the old theater on the south bank of the Thames.

He said later that he was astonished to find nothing but a plaque, and the idea of establishing a new Globe became a near-obsession. It was to prove an arduous task.

He spent more than 20 years overcoming bureaucratic obstacles and occasional hostility, brought about partly, he said, “because I am American. They assumed I was going to create a Disneyland or that I was interested in property development and personal profit.”

“It is a Holy Grail, a dream, an ambition I will have spent one-quarter of my life trying to fulfill,” he said.

Wanamaker finally received permission to found the Shakespeare Globe Trust in 1971 to develop the site, and he lived to see Prince Edward unveil the first part of construction last year.

Although Wanamaker’s interest in the Globe never waned, his career suffered as the project took more and more of his time.

“Now I do perhaps three films or 17 TV movies a year,” he told The Times at the 1990, star-studded London premiere of “Hamlet” starring Mel Gibson. Proceeds from the premiere went to the Globe, as did money from other premieres and fund-raisers in England and the United States.

“I take jobs which will pay me as much as I can get in the shortest possible time,” he said.

Wanamaker’s clippings reflect his diligence.

Since the early 1970s, there has been little written about the onetime stage actor who would go on to a film career in which he portrayed imperious fathers or father figures.

With the exception of several operatic productions, including a 1986 production of “Tosca,” the Puccini opera he directed in San Diego, Wanamaker was nearly always mentioned in connection with the $30 million or more it was to take to rebuild the 1,500-seat Globe and construct a Shakespeare-oriented center around it.

Completion is scheduled for April, 1995, two years behind Wanamaker’s original schedule.

Born in Chicago and trained at Drake University, Wanamaker worked in stock theater and on Broadway in small roles.

After service in World War II, he made his screen debut in 1948 in “My Girl Tina.” Wanamaker was not named by the House Un-American Activities Committee in either its 1947 or 1951 investigations of communist influence in the film industry. But because of his affiliations with such leftists as director Edward Dmytryk, he said he was more comfortable living and working in England.

His decision proved prophetic because he did eventually show up on a blacklist of filmmakers.

Among Wanamaker’s many pictures were “The Spy Who Came in From the Cold,” “The Competition,” “Superman IV, the Quest for Peace,” “Baby Boom,” “Raw Deal,” “Private Benjamin” and more.

He was Moses Weiss in the 1978 TV mini-series “Holocaust” and most recently was seen in the TV miniseries “Murder in the Family.”

In the 1970s he directed such television series as “Columbo” and “Hawaii Five-0,” and directed opera at London’s Covent Garden and in San Francisco, Sydney, Chicago and elsewhere.

He was made an honorary Commander of the Order of the British Empire in recognition of his campaign to rebuild the Globe.

Wanamaker is survived by his wife, Charlotte, and three daughters: Abby, Jessica and the actress Zoe Wanamaker.