Miller began directing operas in the 1970s. His 1982 production of a "
Mafia"-styled Rigoletto was set in 1950s
Little Italy, Manhattan. In its early days, he was an associate director at the
National Theatre. He later ran the
Old Vic Theatre. As a writer and presenter of more than a dozen BBC documentaries, Miller became a television personality and public intellectual in Britain and the United States.
Life and career
Early life
Miller grew up in
St John's Wood, London, in a well-connected Jewish family. His father
Emanuel (1892–1970), who was of
Lithuanian descent and suffered from severe
rheumatoid arthritis, was a military psychiatrist and subsequently a paediatric psychiatrist at Harley House. His mother,
Betty Miller (née Spiro) (1910–1965), was a novelist and biographer who was originally from
County Cork, Ireland. Miller had an elder sister, Sarah (died 2006) who worked in television for many years and retained an involvement with
Judaism that Miller, as an
atheist, always eschewed. As a child Miller had a
stammer and was
attention-seeking, compensating for his stammer by speaking in foreign accents. He also developed an astonishing talent for mimicry, including chickens and steam trains. The young Miller was assessed by to several
child psychiatrists, including
Donald Winnicott. He had many sessions, as a teenager with the psychiatrist Leopold Stein. Miller enjoyed the sessions and said that they "simply conversed about philosophy and
Hughlings Jackson's early neurological theories."[1]
Miller moved between several different schools prior to attending
Taunton School,[2] including for a time at the
Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (a
Waldorf school) where he was taught by two of
Ivy Compton-Burnett's sisters and says of that time that he "never learnt anything at all".[3][4] Miller concluded his secondary school education at
St Paul's School, London[5] where he developed an early (and ultimately lifelong) interest in the biological sciences. While at St Paul's School at the age of 12, Miller met and became close friends with
Oliver Sacks and Sacks's best friend Eric Korn, friendships which remained crucial throughout the rest of their lives. In 1953, before leaving secondary school, he performed comedy several times on the BBC radio programme Under Twenty Parade.[6] Miller studied
natural sciences and medicine at
St John's College, Cambridge (
MB BChir, 1959), where he was a member of the
Cambridge Apostles and one of cast’s three
Granta cartoonist, before going on to train at
University College Hospital in London.[citation needed]
Miller helped to write and produce the satirical
revueBeyond the Fringe, which premiered at the
Edinburgh Festival in August 1960. This launched, in addition to his own, the careers of
Alan Bennett,
Peter Cook and
Dudley Moore. Miller quit the show shortly after its move from London to
Broadway in 1962, and took over as editor and presenter of the
BBC's arts programme Monitor in 1965. The Monitor appointment arose because Miller had approached
Huw Wheldon about taking up a place on the BBC's director training course. Wheldon assured him that he would "pick it up as he went along".[citation needed]
Miller drew upon his own experiences as a physician as writer and presenter of the BBC television series The Body in Question (1978).[12] The series was nominated for two 1979
BAFTAs: Best Factual Television Series and Most Original Programme/Series and caused some controversy for showing the dissection of a cadaver. For a time, he was a vice-president of the
Campaign for Homosexual Equality.[13] In 1971, he defended multiracial immigration to the UK at length with
Enoch Powell on The Dick Cavett Show.[14]
In 1990, Miller wrote and presented a joint BBC/Canadian production titled, Born Talking: A Personal Inquiry into Language. The four-part series looked into the acquisition of language, and complexities surrounding language production, with special focus on sign language used by deaf people. This interest was contemporaneous with his friend Oliver Sacks' immersion in, and writing/publishing a book about Deaf Culture and deaf people entitled Seeing Voices. Miller then wrote and presented the television series Madness (1991) and Jonathan Miller on Reflection (1998). The five-part Madness series ran on
PBS in 1991. It featured a brief history of madness and interviews with psychiatric researchers, clinical psychiatrists, and patients in therapy sessions. In 1992,
Opera Omaha staged the United States premiere of the
Gioachino Rossini's 1819 opera Ermione, directed by Miller.[citation needed]
2000s: Atheism and return to directing
In 2004, Miller wrote and presented a television series on
atheism entitled Atheism: A Rough History of Disbelief (more commonly referred to as Jonathan Miller's Brief History of Disbelief) for
BBC Four, exploring the roots of his own atheism and investigating the history of atheism in the world. Individual conversations, debates and discussions for the series that could not be included due to time constraints were aired in a six-part series entitled The Atheism Tapes. He also appeared on a BBC Two programme in February 2004, called What the World Thinks of God appearing from New York. The original three-part series aired on
public television in the United States in 2007.[15]
In 2007, Miller directed The Cherry Orchard at
The Crucible, Sheffield, his first work on the British stage for 10 years. He also directed
Monteverdi'sL'Orfeo in Manchester and Bristol, and Der Rosenkavalier in Tokyo and gave talks throughout Britain during 2007 called An Audience with Jonathan Miller in which he spoke about his life for an hour and then fielded questions from the audience. He also curated an exhibition on camouflage at the
Imperial War Museum. He appeared at the
Royal Society of the Arts in London discussing humour (4 July 2007) and at the
British Library on religion (3 September 2007).[citation needed]
In January 2009, after a break of 12 years, Miller returned to the
English National Opera to direct his own production of La bohème, notable for its 1930s setting. This same production ran at the
Cincinnati Opera in July 2010, also directed by Miller.
On 25 November 2015, the
University of London awarded Miller an honorary degree in Literature.[19]
Personal life
Miller married Rachel Collet in 1956. They had two sons and a daughter.[20] From 1961 to his death he lived on
Gloucester Crescent in
Camden Town, north London.[21] On 27 November 2019, Miller died at the age of 85, following a long battle with
Alzheimer's.[22]
Parodies and representations
Stevie Smith, a friend of his mother Betty Miller, "rather disloyally" included a thinly disguised and uncomplimentary version of the nine-year-old Miller, "precocious and brattish... constantly demanding attention", in her short story 'Beside the Seaside: A Holiday with Children' (1949).[1]
Private Eye (which had a falling-out with Miller[23]) occasionally lampooned him under the name "Dr Jonathan", depicting him as a
Dr Johnson-like self-important man of learning.[24]
In the film for television Not Only But Always about the careers of
Peter Cook and
Dudley Moore,
Jonathan Aris played Jonathan Miller as a young man; Aris reprised the role in the BBC Radio 4 play Good Evening (2008) by Roy Smiles.
Along with the other members of Beyond the Fringe, he is portrayed in the play Pete and Dud: Come Again by Chris Bartlett and
Nick Awde.
In the BBC Radio Four series The Burkiss Way edition 35, broadcast on 2 April 1979, he was impersonated by
Nigel Rees in a fairly lengthy parody "The Blood Gushing All over the Screen in Question", in which the history of nasty diseases was traced and the style of Miller's presentation was sent up. It was written by
Andrew Marshall and
David Renwick.
In the 1980s a puppet of Miller appeared frequently in Spitting Image sketches, most notably "
Bernard Levin and Jonathan Miller Talk Bollocks".
Honours and awards
Special Tony Award (1963), with co-stars Alan Bennett, Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, "for their brilliance which has shattered all the old concepts of comedy" in the musical revue Beyond the Fringe.
Miller, Jonathan (1983). The Human Body. Viking Press. (1994 Jonathan Cape [pop-up book])
Miller, Jonathan (1983). States of Mind. Conversations with Psychological Investigators. BBC /Random House.
Miller, Jonathan (1984).
"The Facts of Life". Canadian Medical Association Journal. 94 (3). Jonathan Cape: 147.
PMC1935180.
PMID20328473. (pop-up book intended for children)
Miller, Jonathan (1986). Subsequent Performances. Faber.
Miller, Jonathan & John Durrant (1989). Laughing Matters: A Serious Look at Humour. Longman.
Miller, Jonathan (1990). Acting in Opera. Applause Theatre & Cinema Books. (The Applause Acting Series)
Miller, Jonathan (1992). The Afterlife of Plays. San Diego State Univ Press. (University Research Lecture Series No. 5)
Miller, Jonathan (1998). Dimensional Man. Jonathan Cape.
Miller, Jonathan; Alan Bennett; Peter Cook; Dudley Moore (1987). The Complete Beyond the Fringe. Methuen.
ISBN0-413-14670-7.
Sokol, B. J., ed. (1993). The Undiscover'd Country: New Essays on Psychoanalysis and Shakespeare.
Free Association Books.
ISBN1-85343-197-4. – Jonathan Miller: "King Lear in Rehearsal: A Talk" and seven other essays
In 1988 Miller made an extended appearance on the discussion programme After Dark, described
here.
BBC. Great Composers of the World. Miller appears on the Puccini and Bach DVDs of this BBC series. In the Bach episode, he discusses his affection for the famous "Erbarme Dich" aria of the St Matthew Passion.
PBS. Vermeer: Master of Light. Miller appears in this one-hour program on the painter.
St Matthew Passion (Director;
St. George's Theatre, London, February 1994) with
Paul Goodwin. A dramatised production of
J. S. Bach's masterpiece, recorded for BBC Television. This production was also revived at London's National Theatre in September/October 2011 with Southbank Sinfonia, conducted by Paul Goodwin.
Over four decades, Miller has directed more than 50 operas in cities including London, New York, Florence, Milan, Berlin, Munich, Zurich, Valencia and Tokyo.
Così fan tutte (Stage director;
Kent Opera, 1974). The first of seven operas Miller directed for Kent Opera.
Rigoletto (Stage director; 1975). Set in the 19th century.
Bergan, Ronald (1990). Beyond the Fringe...and Beyond: A Critical Biography of Alan Bennett, Peter Cook, Jonathan Miller, Dudley Moore. Virgin Books.
ISBN1-85227-175-2.
Carpenter, Humphrey (2000). That Was Satire, That Was: Beyond the Fringe, the Establishment Club, "Private Eye" and "That Was the Week That Was". Weidenfeld & Nicolson.
ISBN0-575-06588-5.