Versatile actor Joseph Ziegler was endlessly watchable in roles at Stratford and elsewhere

Globe and Mail

2 days ago

Two of the late actor Joseph Ziegler's biggest fans were the eminent theatre critic Robert Cushman and his wife, Arlene Gould. Mr. Cushman deemed Mr. Ziegler the kind of actor with so much depth and skill that he could elevate even a less-than-fabulous production. In a tribute, published on his website, Cushman Collected, Mr. Cushman writes of the time when he and Ms. Gould were watching just such a show – a 'dismal' revival of Oscar Wilde's An Ideal Husband. When Mr. Ziegler exited the stage after his first brief scene, Mr. Cushman overheard his wife murmuring, 'please come back.'
That was a sentiment shared by many theatregoers. Mr. Ziegler, who died on July 28 at the age of 71, was an endlessly watchable actor, whose deep reserves of humanity made him captivating in whatever role he played. They ran the gamut from the monumental part of Willy Loman, the tragically deluded anti-hero of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, to that of the blind, wheelchair-confined Hamm in Samuel Beckett's bleak masterpiece Endgame. Mr. Ziegler could have you roaring with laughter at his gum-chewing prowess in the William Saroyan comedy The Time of Your Life, or quietly squeeze your heart as an all-too-real and pitiable miser in his inimitable take on Charles Dickens's Ebenezer Scrooge.
Those cherished Ziegler performances and many more illuminated the stages of Toronto's Soulpepper Theatre, of which he was a founding member. When he and 11 like-minded professional actors launched that risky – and, as it turned out, highly successful – venture in 1998, Mr. Ziegler had already made his mark both acting and directing at the Stratford and Shaw festivals, as well as at the majority of Canada's regional theatres. Soulpepper, however, was to give him a home base in middle age where his sizable talents could expand and flourish.
In turn, Mr. Ziegler gave the fledgling company its first big, popular hit, directing a winning version of Thornton Wilder's Our Town that he would later remount in 2006 to inaugurate Soulpepper's current home, the Young Centre for the Performing Arts in the Distillery District.
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Soulpepper also allowed Mr. Ziegler more opportunities to perform opposite his wife, fellow company co-founder Nancy Palk. Over time, the two became one of Canada's great acting couples, playing the Lomans in Salesman and the Tyrones in Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night. One of their more unusual vehicles was A Tender Thing, British playwright Ben Power's 'Shakespeare remix,' in which they embodied Romeo and Juliet as an aging married couple, with Mr. Ziegler's Romeo caring lovingly for Ms. Palk's Juliet as she struggled with a terminal illness.
As it turned out, it was Ms. Palk who took on the real-life role of devoted caregiver after Mr. Ziegler was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in 2022. It forced his retirement from acting, but he had gone out with a blaze of glory: a four-season return to Stratford whose highlights included his superbly tragicomic portrayal of Shakespeare's Timon of Athens and, inevitably, another complex exploration of another iconic Miller role, as the culpable father Joe Keller in All My Sons.
His instinct for doing such American classics was native. Joseph Patrick Ziegler was born on Nov. 7, 1953, in Minneapolis and grew up in rural Minnesota, the son of farmer and property owner Donald Ziegler and his wife Ramona (née Lefebvre). An aspiring actor from an early age, he studied theatre at the University of Minnesota, where he obtained a bachelor of arts degree. His fascination with both Shakespeare and Canada were stoked by a Michael Langham-directed production of Love's Labour's Lost, starring Canadian Kenneth Welsh, at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis. After learning of Mr. Langham's association with Ontario's Stratford Festival, and the fact that Mr. Welsh was an alumnus of Montreal's National Theatre School (NTS), Mr. Ziegler set his sights on both school and festival.
He attended NTS, graduating in 1979. And by 1983, he was a member of Stratford's Young Company, starring in a Love's Labour's Lost once again directed by Mr. Langham. It was with that same determination that he courted and wed a fellow NTS student, Winnipeg-born Nancy Palk. Ziegler family legend has it that Ms. Palk at first refused Mr. Ziegler's proposal – until he said that meant he'd have to move back to the U.S.
The couple settled in Toronto as Mr. Ziegler waited for his break at Stratford. In the meantime, he scored roles at Theatre Passe Muraille and Tarragon Theatre and, in a nice bit of foreshadowing, participated in a CBC Radio broadcast of Our Town starring the legendary Lorne Greene. He also began his association with the Shaw Festival in 1980 as part of the acting company under new artistic director Christopher Newton.
He was more than ready for his Stratford debut and quickly graduated from the Young Company to the main one, playing a host of major roles over five seasons. He also made first contact with some of his future Soulpepper partners, including a then-24-year-old Diego Matamoros, who was part of the Love's Labour's cast. The two became lifelong friends who would later do some of their finest work together at Soulpepper.
'He was a tremendous force as an actor,' Mr. Matamoros said of Mr. Ziegler. 'He had this great combination of extraordinary confidence and humility. And he was also great fun – we laughed a lot. When a friendship is there, then there's mutual respect and trust, which are key elements in making good theatre. We had that from the get-go.'
After his first stint at Stratford – he would return intermittently in the early 2000s and then, finally, for the 2015-18 seasons – Mr. Ziegler headed to New York. He and Ms. Palk performed Shakespeare for the Off-Broadway company Theatre for a New Audience and, in 1990, played opposite Denzel Washington in Richard III for the Public Theater in Central Park. The director was the great Robin Phillips, who would become godfather to the Soulpepper project, and who clearly admired Mr. Ziegler's work. When Mr. Phillips famously took the reins of Edmonton's Citadel Theatre in the 1990s, he coaxed Mr. Ziegler west to play Hamlet, among many other roles, and also gave him his first directing gigs, including a staging of The Diary of Anne Frank that also featured Ms. Palk.
Thereafter, Mr. Ziegler built his directing credentials, with shows at Theatre New Brunswick, Halifax's Neptune Theatre, London's Grand Theatre and Toronto's Canadian Stage, as well as seven productions for the Shaw Festival between 1997 and 2008. Martha Burns, another Soulpepper co-founder, remembered the ease with which Mr. Ziegler directed and the way he demolished the hierarchal structure in the rehearsal hall. 'It was like one actor talking to another,' she said. 'He created this equanimity in the room.'
In 2000, Mr. Ziegler returned to Stratford to guide Ms. Burns's husband, Paul Gross, in a celebrated production of Hamlet. Mr. Gross had previously acted with Mr. Ziegler, both onstage and on television – Mr. Ziegler appeared in the pilot for Mr. Gross's hit series Due South – and asked him to direct the Stratford production. 'It was the most extraordinary experience I'd ever had,' Mr. Gross recalled. 'His memory was like a superpower. Not only did he know every single line in the authoritative text of Hamlet, but also in the early versions that nobody reads.'
Mr. Ziegler's knowledge of Shakespeare was matched by his empathy. After an invited dress rehearsal in which Mr. Gross struggled through the play, he made a panicked call to Mr. Ziegler, weeping and telling him he was going to back out. Mr. Ziegler calmly agreed to seek an 11th-hour replacement. 'He said to me, 'Just do me one favour, try playing it for one preview audience.'' Mr. Gross reluctantly agreed and, by the time he hit Hamlet's first soliloquy, realized he would be fine. 'Other directors would have freaked out,' Mr. Gross said, 'but Joe was exceptionally good at understanding the psychology of his actors and knowing what they needed.'
Mr. Ziegler increased his TV presence in the 1990s. After years of guest appearances in Canadian series, he landed regular roles in the 1994-96 medical drama Side Effects (alongside another Soulpepper co-founder, Albert Schultz) and, most memorably, the shot-in-Nova Scotia Black Harbour (1996-99).
While he was working on Black Harbour, the Soulpepper enterprise took flight. Mr. Ziegler returned to Toronto to direct Our Town for the company's second season. From then on, he was a steady presence at the theatre for most of its first two decades, as a director and, increasingly, as an actor. His performances netted him a pair of Dora Mavor Moore Awards, for The Time of Your Life (2008) and Death of a Salesman (2011).
As the most senior of the founding members, Mr. Ziegler also became the upholder of its artistic ideals: actor-focused work that put the play's text foremost. 'With Joe, what you did was always in service of the text, the author,' Mr. Matamoros said. And he never let the actor's ego get in the way of the author's intentions.
'He was not afraid to be ugly,' said Gregory Prest, one of the younger generation of Soulpepper artists mentored by Mr. Ziegler. 'He knew how a play worked and no matter how despicable a character may be, he never tried to manipulate the audience into liking him.' That may have been best exemplified in his stunning 2005 performance as a drunken, tyrannical Irish patriarch in Tom Murphy's A Whistle in the Dark for Toronto's Company Theatre.
There was no ugliness in rehearsals with Mr. Ziegler, however – only a passionate commitment to the work, leavened with a sense of mischief and play. He and Ms. Palk also led by example when it came to personal relationships. 'I was lucky enough to see Joe and Nancy work together many times,' Mr. Prest said. 'They were grace personified. It was a great lesson in working with your partner – full of respect, love and humour.'
At home, Mr. Ziegler and Ms. Palk were raising three boys – Tim, Charlie and Henry – in the same manner. Not that Mr. Ziegler couldn't be a tough dad. 'He was incredibly unpleasant to argue with,' Tim Ziegler admitted with a rueful laugh. 'He'd issue an edict and it would be 'My way or the highway.'' But he was always there for his sons. 'He was frequently doing two shows, performing in one and rehearsing another, but at no time was he ever too busy for you.'
Mr. Ziegler's gift to other families was his recurring role as Scrooge in Soulpepper's beloved annual version of A Christmas Carol. To younger theatre artists he gave his knowledge and wisdom, whether teaching at the Soulpepper Academy, George Brown College or NTS, or in the rehearsal hall.
'His was one of the most influential legacies,' Mr. Gross reflected. 'He left behind a generation of people who learned from him and benefitted from it.'
Mr. Ziegler died of complications of Alzheimer's disease. He leaves his wife, Ms. Palk; his sons, Timothy, Charles and Henry; and four grandchildren.
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