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In this article, Neville Thiele, the 91 year old brother of veteran Australian actor Leonard Teale, talks about his brother’s life and times on the occasion of the first publication of a Fine Poets Collection audio CD called LEONARD TEALE, Famous Australian Poems “MY BROTHER LEN Len's grandparents were immigrants, and the daughters of immigrants, from Denmark, England and Germany. His father was a pharmacist, or apothecary as Len liked to describe him, who had been a choir boy at St. John's Anglican Cathedral in Brisbane and used to sing Peter Dawson songs and recite poems by Banjo Paterson, Henry Lawson and Robbie Burns at RSL "Smokos", as they were called in the twenties and thirties. He brought up his two sons to sing and was keen to have us perform in public, and it was as a boy soprano at the age of ten that Len first came to perform on radio. His mother gave him steadfast love all her life. His father was a firm disciplinarian. Len's portrayal of the Captain in "Seven Little Australians" was not only a fine acting performance but an aching tribute to a father who was determined to maintain discipline but unable to show his love. At one stage, our father became friendly with the local Catholic priest, who shared his enthusiasm for music and the occasional beer. One day he took us to Stuartholme convent high on the hills to the west of Brisbane where we sang to the nuns. And one old nun - I don't know how old, everyone over twenty five is incredibly ancient to a boy of twelve - said to him "That voice of yours is a gift from God. You must always remember that and do the very best you can with it." I believe that conviction informed all of Len's life. That and the attitude instilled by Brisbane Grammar School that if you had a special talent that made you part of an elite, it conferred not only privileges but responsibilities. Everything Len set out to do he was determined to do well. But such a determination can make some people impatient. Len was kindness itself to those who needed it, but he didn't suffer fools gladly and at times some found him "difficult". When Len and I became attracted to the great new medium in the mid thirties, we were told that if you wanted to become a good performer on radio, you should read aloud for half an hour every day. So Len did just that. When I came home from night classes, he would be sitting on the edge of his bed reading aloud from a newspaper. Thus from stammering at the age of ten, he had full control of his voice by the age of sixteen and went on of course to excel at narration. In the late thirties he was acting on radio and in little theatre in Brisbane. During the war, as a Flight Lieutenant in the RAAF, he was piloting Wellingtons of Coastal Command from bases in the Middle East, Italy and Gibraltar. After he returned to Australia, his performance in the radio serial of Superman made him a household name by the time he was 27. He thus became aware early of the pressures and perils in being a public figure. He used to say "whatever you do, never believe your own publicity". He went on to work assiduously at his craft of acting, storing up a wide range of emotions and expressing them in what is now called body language. He took singing lessons, and when he was working in Homicide, where the actors did most of their own stunts, he took pride in what he called acting with a motor car. He made himself proficient in a wide range of performance areas. Even when he was making a good living at radio, he kept fresh his abilities as a stage actor. Shakespeare's comedies gave scope to his sometimes wicked sense of humour. Those who think of him as a figure of authority as Sergeant Mackay in Homicide or the Captain in Seven Little Australians, or even Macbeth or Duke Orsino in Twelfth Night, might be surprised that he played some of Shakespeare's clowns marvellously, Bardolph in Henry V, Dr. Caius in Merry Wives of Windsor and Trinculo in The Tempest. In the early fifties he was singing and reciting the old bush ballads, narrating voice-overs for countless film documentaries and of course acting in films and television. He wrote his own one-man shows, like "When Your Pants Begin to Go", presenting Henry Lawson's life, with his stories and poems, which became more and more moving over the years that he played it, travelling all over Australia. And he used his high public profile to promote causes that he believed in, World Vision for example. He was early into Cambodia and Ethiopia, bringing back some of the earliest pictures of the terrible things that had happened there, and appealing for help for their people. Most recently he helped save Mae Gibbs' house Nutcote. Above all he wanted everyone to join him in demonstrating our love for Australia. So there are Len's two sides. On the one hand, the wonderfully talented and flexible performer and on the other the man who cared greatly for others. His fellow performers have told many times of his kindness and help and I treasure specially the memory of an incident the last time I was with him when a derelict who had been dossing in the Domain approached him for a couple of dollars when we were walking back from the Anzac Day march. Some have said that he was fortunate that he "did not grow old as those who are left grow old", but those of us who were close to him and loved him still feel the pain and the sadness of knowing that at an active 71, there were so many more good things that he could have done. Above all though, we are grateful that our lives have been so greatly enriched by knowing him. Fine Poets Shop Fine Poets Bandcamp Fine Poets Ebay Leonard Teale Leonard Teale Leonard Teale Leonard Teale Fine Poets iTunes Leonard Teale, Famous Australian Poems is available from Fine Poets.com
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