Mavor Moore

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James Mavor Moore, CC, OBC, BA, D.Litt (March 8, 1919 – December 18, 2006) was a Canadian writer, producer, actor, public servant, critic, and educator.

Born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of Francis John Moore, an Anglican theologian, and Dora Mavor Moore, who helped establish Canadian professional theatre in the 1930s and 1940s, Moore graduated with a BA from the University of Toronto in 1941. During World War II, he was an intelligence officer.

As a director, Moore was a pioneer of Canadian television in the 1950s and was the creator of the CBC National News, later known as The National selecting the programs first regular newsreader, Larry Henderson. He is better known for his contribution to drama having created more than 100 plays, documentaries, musicals and librettos for stage, radio and television. From 1970 to 1984, Mavor taught theatre history as a professor at York University. He was the first artist to chair the Canada Council from 1979 to 1983.

In 1994 he wrote a biography, Reinventing Myself.

In 1973 he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada and was promoted to Companion in 1988. In 1999 he was appointed to the Order of British Columbia.

In 1943, he married Darwina Faessler, with whom he had four daughters. His second marriage, in 1968, was to Phyllis Grosskurth, ending in divorce in 1978. In 1980, he married opera singer Alexandra Browning. He died in 2006 after several years of ill health.