And also the world that Shakespeare creates with his language, his storylines, his characters - it's an incredible world." Monette said Hutt "spoke Shakespeare as though he had written the words himself." With his rumbling voice and his lion-in-winter mane of white hair, Hutt commanded the stage well into his 80s, winning praise for his last turn onstage at Stratford as Prospero in 2005.
In honour of Monette, who will retire from his post at the southwestern Ontario theatre company this year, Hutt agreed to return for a role in Edward Albee's "A Delicate Balance" scheduled for this season. He eventually had to withdraw from that performance, however, because of ill health. "He was our northern star," said festival general director Antoni Cimolino.
"He shone strong, bright and true, helping the rest of us find our way." Born in Toronto in 1920, Hutt was a member of the 7th Canadian Field Ambulance from 1941 to 1946, serving in Italy, France, Belgium and Holland. Monette said Hutt rarely spoke about his service in the Second World War, but it was never far from his mind.
The actor once told Monette his tombstone would read: "William Hutt: soldier-actor." Upon his return from the war, Hutt graduated from Trinity College at the University of Toronto in 1949. He spent several summers in various theatre productions and joined the Stratford Shakespearean Festival Company in its inaugural year in 1953 under Tyrone Guthrie's direction.
That year, the actors rehearsed while workmen raced to get the theatre built in time for opening night. Hutt would remain with the company for some four decades, except for an absence in the mid-'80s when he moved to the Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the Lake, Ont., for a couple of years.
Throughout his glittering career, Hutt travelled the world, acting and directing, and wowing Broadway in 1964 when he played the lawyer in Edward Albee's "Tiny Alice" alongside Gielgud. Petersburg, Warsaw and Hollywood, and just about every theatre in Canada. Despite his command of the stage, Hutt was never a snob about theatre versus television or film.
He was praised for his role as Sir John A. Macdonald in the mid-1970s TV miniseries "The National Dream." And in recent years, fans were able to catch him on the acclaimed TV show "Slings Arrows," in which he played a somewhat grumpier version of himself, an aging Shakespearian master.
"He had such a majestic scale, an ability to create other worlds of great size and detail," actor Paul Gross, who co-starred with Hutt on the show, said in an interview from Calgary. "I suspect we shall not see his like again, to quote Hamlet. I just can't see anyone coming along who would be quite like him.
His influence has been huge." It was the stage, however, to which Hutt returned again and again. "I like the association with people who breathe, and I can hear them breathing," he explained in a 2006 interview.
When it came to awards, Hutt's were legion: an Earl Grey ACTRA for "The National Dream" in 1975, the inaugural Governor General's Lifetime Achievement Award in Performing Arts in 1992, a special one-time Dora Award for contribution to Canadian theatre in 1995, a Genie for playing Tyrone in "Long Day's Journey Into Night" in 1996, and a star on Canada's Walk of Fame in 2000, to name a few. Hutt was also named a companion of the Order of Canada in 1969. A funeral will be held at St.
James Anglican Church in Stratford, the festival said, but did not immediately provide a date. Monette said the flag at the festival would fly at half-mast Wednesday and that the season had been dedicated to Hutt. "It marks the end of something," said Gross.
"The end of an age I think, for me anyway, in the culture of theatre in this country." And also the world that Shakespeare creates with his language, his storylines, his characters - it's an incredible world.
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