John Van Eyssen (born Matthew John Du Toit Van Eyssen, 19 March 1922 – 13 November 1995) was a South African born actor, agent and film production executive. He moved to

Britain Britain most often refers to: * The United Kingdom, a sovereign state in Europe comprising the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland and many smaller islands * Great Britain, the largest island in the United King ...

following the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, attending the

Central School of Speech and Drama The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama was founded by Elsie Fogerty in 1906, as The Central School of Speech Training and Dramatic Art, to offer a new form of training in speech and drama for young actors and other students. It became a ...

. In 1951 and in 1954 he played the role of Lucifer in the York Cycle of Mystery Plays, first revived in 1951 as part of the

Festival of Britain The Festival of Britain was a national exhibition and fair that reached millions of visitors throughout the United Kingdom in the summer of 1951. Historian Kenneth O. Morgan says the Festival was a "triumphant success" during which people: ...

. Van Eyssen appeared in films from 1950 as well as on stage (playing Cassio in Orson Welles' 1951 production of ''Othello'', for example) but achieved his greatest fame as an actor when he portrayed Jonathan Harker in the

Hammer Film Productions Hammer Film Productions Ltd. is a British film production company based in London. Founded in 1934, the company is best known for a series of Gothic horror and fantasy films made from the mid-1950s until the 1970s. Many of these involve clas ...

version of ''

Dracula ''Dracula'' is a novel by Bram Stoker, published in 1897. As an epistolary novel, the narrative is related through letters, diary entries, and newspaper articles. It has no single protagonist, but opens with solicitor Jonathan Harker taking ...

'' (released as ''Horror of Dracula'' in the US) in 1958. He left acting in 1961 to become head of the Grade Organisation literary agency.'Van Eyssen named MD Columbia (British)', ''Kinematograph Weekly'' vol. 625 no. 3223 19 July 1969 His subsequent clients were

Franco Zeffirelli Gian Franco Corsi Zeffirelli (12 February 1923 – 15 June 2019), was an Italian stage and film director, producer, production designer and politician. He was one of the most significant opera and theatre directors of the post-World War II era, ...

Tennessee Williams Thomas Lanier Williams III (March 26, 1911 – February 25, 1983), known by his pen name Tennessee Williams, was an American playwright and screenwriter. Along with contemporaries Eugene O'Neill and Arthur Miller, he is considered among the thre ...

and

Arthur Miller Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are '' All My Sons'' (1947), ''Death of a Salesman'' ( ...

. He left the business in 1965 to work for the UK division of

Columbia Pictures Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production studio that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the mu ...

, eventually becoming Managing Director in July 1969. Among the films he oversaw were '' A Man for All Seasons'' (1966), ''

Born Free ''Born Free'' is a 1966 British drama film starring the real-life couple Virginia McKenna and Bill Travers as Joy and George Adamson, another real-life couple who raised Elsa the Lioness, an orphaned lion cub, to adulthood, and released her in ...

'' (1966), ''

Georgy Girl ''Georgy Girl'' is a 1966 British romantic comedy-drama, starring Lynn Redgrave in the titular role, with Charlotte Rampling, Alan Bates, and James Mason. Directed by Silvio Narizzano, the film was based on the 1965 novel by Margaret Forster. ...

'' (1966), ''

To Sir, with Love ''To Sir, with Love'' is a 1967 British drama film that deals with social and racial issues in an inner city school. It stars Sidney Poitier and features Christian Roberts, Judy Geeson, Suzy Kendall and singer Lulu making her film debut. Jam ...

'' (1967), ''

The Taming of The Shrew ''The Taming of the Shrew'' is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1590 and 1592. The play begins with a framing device, often referred to as the induction, in which a mischievous nobleman tricks a drunken ...

'' (1967), and ''

Oliver! ''Oliver!'' is a coming-of-age stage musical, with book, music and lyrics by Lionel Bart. The musical is based upon the 1838 novel '' Oliver Twist'' by Charles Dickens. It premiered at the Wimbledon Theatre, southwest London in 1960 before op ...

'' (1968). Both ''Oliver!'' and ''A Man for All Seasons'' won Best Picture Academy Awards. In 1970, he was promoted to Worldwide Head of Production (ex-USA) and moved to New York. After his tenure at Columbia, Van Eyssen became an independent producer, returning to the UK in 1991 to establish Britain's premier showcase for talented young filmmakers, the Chelsea Film Festival. He was longtime companion to

Ingrid Bergman Ingrid Bergman (29 August 191529 August 1982) was a Swedish actress who starred in a variety of European and American films, television movies, and plays.Obituary ''Variety'', 1 September 1982. With a career spanning five decades, she is often ...

in the years before her death in 1982. His son, David Van Eyssen, is a visual artist, and a producer-director known for the science fiction streaming series ''

RCVR RCVR (pronounced ''Receiver'') is a transmedia science fiction series created for the Internet by producer-director David van Eyssen, which offers an explanation for the exponential growth in science and technology since the late 19th century. The ...

''.

Filmography

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Van Eyssen, John South African male film actors Literary agents 1922 births 1995 deaths South African film producers South African male stage actors 20th-century South African male actors Alumni of the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama South African emigrants to the United Kingdom