Beloved ‘Beyond the Fringe’ Sir Jonathan Wolfe Miller Dies At 85

LONDON, UK. (THECOUNT) — Jonathan Miller, a member of the Beyond the Fringe comedy team, writer, theatre and opera director, has passed away Wednesday. He was 85.

Miller was also a doctor, broadcaster and even a sculpture later in his life.

Miller rose to prominence in the 1960s as part of the irreverent satirical show, Beyond the Fringe alongside Peter Cook, Dudley Moore and Alan Bennett, reports TheGuardian.

Miller studied medicine at Cambridge, qualifying as a doctor in 1959. He combined his early stage appearances with hospital rounds. But he was soon in demand as a theatre director, in both London and New York, and also worked with the BBC presenting cultural programmes and adapting plays for television.

Miller directed a series of critically acclaimed operas in the 1980s and 90s.

Oliver Mears, director of opera at the Royal Opera House, said: “Jonathan Miller was one of the most important figures in British theatre and opera of the past half century. Combining a supreme intellect with a consistently irreverent perspective, formed from his experiences in both comedy and medicine, Miller shone a unique light on our art form.”

DEVELOPING::

Geo quick facts: London, the capital of England and the United Kingdom, is a 21st-century city with history stretching back to Roman times. At its centre stand the imposing Houses of Parliament, the iconic ‘Big Ben’ clock tower and Westminster Abbey, site of British monarch coronations. Across the Thames River, the London Eye observation wheel provides panoramic views of the South Bank cultural complex, and the entire city – wikipedia.