Joseph Ziegler, the actor and director who co-founded the Soulpepper Theatre Company and, in a career that spanned more than four decades, took on a bevy of classic roles on stages across Canada, died on July 28. He was 71.
His death was confirmed in an obituary issued by his family. No cause was provided.
A performer and director of inimitable range, Ziegler was one of a dozen artists in 1998 who helped to establish Soulpepper, a Toronto company focused on presenting classic repertoire. When the organization moved from the Harbourfront Centre to the Distillery District in 2006, it was Ziegler’s production of Thornton Wilder’s “Our Town” that inaugurated the new space.
As an actor, Ziegler won two Dora Mavor Moore Awards for his work on stage. His first came in 2008 for his performance in the Pulitzer Prize-winning comedy “The Time of Your Life,” in which Ziegler played a wealthy man who helps a group of outcasts at a San Francisco saloon find purpose in their lives.
He followed it up with another Dora in 2011 for his star turn in the Soulpepper production of “Death of a Salesman.” Richard Ouzounian, the Toronto Star’s former theatre critic, wrote in his review at the time that Ziegler was giving “the most emotionally moving performance” on a Toronto stage that year.
“In his crumpled face, we can see all the dreams we ever let die, all the hopes we ever held on to for a bit too long, all the people who we thought could give us more than they were capable of providing,” remarked Ouzounian. “Let’s clean all the debris off the much-abused word ‘heartbreaking’ and offer it up fresh again to describe Ziegler’s work.”
Ziegler later said that playing Willy Loman was among the highlights of his career. But prior to taking on the part, it was a role that was never on his radar. “It surprised me a lot because I had never thought of myself being old enough to play Willy,” he said in a 2017 interview with The Performers Podcast. “But while we were rehearsing and working on it, it suddenly occurred to me that this is a perfect play. It was such a startling work, such a shocking play, and it was shocking to perform it.”
Ziegler was also a familiar face at both the Shaw and Stratford Festivals. He first joined the acting ensemble at the Shaw Festival in 1980, appearing in productions such as “Cyrano de Bergerac” and “The Voysey Inheritance.” He frequently returned to the company throughout his career, both as a performer and director, helming Shavian classics including “Major Barbara” and “Getting Married.”
At the Stratford Festival, where he spent 10 seasons, Ziegler tackled meaty roles including Edgar in “King Lear,” Joe Keller in “All My Sons” and the title role in “Timon of Athens.” In 2000, he also famously directed the Canadian actor Paul Gross in “Hamlet.”
For Toronto audiences, however, Ziegler will likely be most remembered for his performance as the misanthropic Ebenezer Scrooge in Soulpepper’s “A Christmas Carol,” a role he originated in 2001 and reprised on and off for more than a decade.
Joseph Patrick Timothy Ziegler was born on Nov. 7, 1953 in Minneapolis, Minn., to family of six children. His mother was a homemaker, while his father ran a factory that manufactured cleaning chemicals for dairy equipment.
As a child, Ziegler often performed in school plays. (He was cast, he always presumed, because of his loud voice). By age 12, he knew that he wanted to pursue acting as a career.
After high school, Ziegler earned a theatre degree from the University of Minnesota. He then studied at the National Theatre School of Canada.
Ziegler’s move to Canada was inspired, in part, by Michael Langham, who ran the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis and previously headed the Stratford Festival. “I saw many of his plays and a lot of the people in them went to the National Theatre School,” he said in the 2017 interview. “So I went to the National Theatre School, and I’ve been here ever since.”
It was at theatre school where Ziegler met fellow actor Nancy Palk, who was in his same class. They dated throughout their program and married in September 1979, several months after graduating. “I knew Joe was really something when he came over to my roach-infested student housing and attacked the problem like a manly man and then cleaned my kitchen on his hands and knees,” said Palk in a 2011 interview with Streets of Toronto. “I knew he was a keeper.”
Palk, who’s also a founding member of Soulpepper, occasionally performed opposite her husband over the years. She played Linda Loman to his Willy in “Death of a Salesman,” and Mary Tyrone to his James in a 2012 Soulpepper production of “Long Day’s Journey Into Night.”
Ziegler is survived by Palk, their three sons — Henry, Charles and Timothy — and their four grandchildren.
