Rupert Rhymes, who has died aged 83 following a stroke, was one of the key London theatre managers and administrators in the postwar period of recovery and renewal. Building on the pre-war legacy of Lilian Baylis and her colleagues at the Old Vic and Sadler’s Wells, Rhymes joined the energetic expansion that picked up pace after several years of austerity with the foundation of the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1960 and the National Theatre in 1962.
He started as a box-office clerk at the RSC’s London base, the Aldwych theatre, in 1963 before joining the famous manager of this period, Stephen Arlen, as his assistant at Sadler’s Wells. There, guided by Arlen, he learned the ropes backstage and front-of-house, and the fine art of contracts with union members and their agents.
