Legendary RSC voice coach Cicely Berry dies

Cicely Berry died peacefully in her sleep on Monday night, in the care home in Cornwall where her family settled her earlier this year. She was 92.

The RSC broke the news with a tribute written by RSC Artistic Director Gregory Doran on the company's website.

He said: "It is with profound sadness that I have to report the death of Cicely Berry. She was frequently described as the RSC’s legendary voice guru, and though she always hated that description, it describes her perfectly.

"Cis joined the RSC in 1969, on the invitation of Trevor Nunn. When he made her head of voice the following year, we became the first company ever to have a permanent full-time voice department. Over the next five decades she changed the way we thought about voice and text.

"She had a founding role in the tradition of modern voice teaching, and her influence today, not only on the acting community, in this country and around the world; and on generations of directors; but on the way we transform young lives by introducing her rehearsal working methods into the classroom through our education work, is immense."

He finished the post, by recalling the last time Cicely had worked with the company: "Her last encounter with the acting company was on the stage of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre conducting a warm up for the press night of my own production of The Tempest in 2016. Sparrow-thin and supported on her stick, she had the actors running around the space connecting to every corner of the theatre, filling their breath down into their lungs, and deep into their bodies, preparing them to connect to the language and honour the task before them.

See next week's Herald for more tributes.