Obituary:

Hamdi Geith (1924-2006)

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Hamdi Geith

The death of Hamdi Geith last week brings to a close a multi-faceted career that enriched the worlds of theatre, television and cinema for over half a century.

Born in Kafr Shalshamoun in Sharqiyya Governotate, Geith was to move to Cairo with his family after his father's death. Having initially studied law, Geith soon also enrolled in the Actors' Institute. Upon his graduation from the latter in 1948, he travelled to France to audit courses in directing.

Back in Egypt, he was to play a key role in the revival of the Egyptian theatre in the late 1950s and '60s. He was the first, for example, to direct plays by the late Alfred Farag such as Suquot Far'oun (The Fall of Pharoah) in a collaboration that was to continue into the 1960s when Geith staged his Al-Zayr Salim. In addition to the stage, Geith's acting career spanned notable roles in radio and television dramas, as well as films, most memorably as Richard the Lion Heart in Youssef Chahine's Al-Nasir Salah al-Din (Saladin, 1963).

The director of the National Theatre for a year, Geith also served as head of the Syndicate for Actors for almost a decade. A member of staff at the Arts Academy, he published a number of articles on the psychoanalysis of theatre. Geith received the Medal of Arts and Sciences of the First Order in 1966 and the State Merit Award in 1986.