Lieutenant Michael Bawtree Obituary
Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry
General Sir Robert Pascoe writes:
Michael Bawtree, the announcement of whose death has saddened his many friends, was a most accomplished player, actor, director, theatre buff and all round brilliant and amusing man. He completed his two years National Service in Cyprus as a subaltern in the Oxfordshire & Buckinghamshire Light Infantry (43rd & 52nd) then stationed in PolymedhiaCamp overlooking the southern port of Limassol.
While there near Christmas 1957 his artistic talents became apparent to his regimental colleagues when he wrote and directed an excellent pantomime called ‘Aladdin and His Magic Tilley Lamp’ the cast being mainly his fellow officers with music provided by the Regimental band.
Michael was born in Australia, educated at Radley and on leaving the Army he went up to Oxford to read English at Worcester College. He obtained his BA in 1961 and MA in 1963. In 1962 he left England and settled in Canada spending three years in Toronto where he acted on stage and television as well as teaching for a year in Victoria College, Toronto. Then, for the next 40 years, Michael worked in the theatre in many and varied roles. He was appointed Director of English Theatre in Ottawa and later he directed the annual Stratford Festival in Stratford, Ontario.
He spent time in theatres in New York and in Colombia where he learned Spanish and added more success to his name in writing and producing. In 1981 he founded a music training programme and became a member of the International Theatre Institute’s Music Theatre Committee which involved him in working visits to Europe as well as to Russia and Turkey.
An invitation to Finland came in 1988 where he directed ‘Oh ! What a Lovely War’ after which he returned to Canada and settled in Wolfsville, Nova Scotia as Director of Drama in Acadia University, a post he held until 2003. During that time he was responsible for turning a disused ice rink into a 500 seat thrust stage theatre which in 2017 was named after him and his partner Colin Bernhardt the ‘Bawtree Bernhardt Festival Stage’.
Michael happily reconnected with several of his regimental friends during visits to UK when he gave readings of ‘Three Men in a Boat’ and ‘A Christmas Carol’. In 2008 he brilliantly performed his own work ‘The Pegasus Bridge Show’ describing his regiment’s coup de main operation on D-Day 1944 and later he turned the successful show into book form and, in his usual generous way, all proceeds went to the Veterans Charity of which he was a great supporter.
Michael had settled his home in Wolfsville, Nova Scotia, where he lived with his longtime partner the voice and speech teacher, Colin Bernhardt, who died in 2012 which affected Michael badly. In his later years Michael published two volumes of memoirs and later worked on a final volume. He died at his home on 24 August 2024, at the age of 86 following a diagnosis of Motor Neurone Disease. In true Bawtree style he had planned a party for his 87th birthday which he missed by one day.
RAP