Robert Trotter


Robert Trotter was a Scottish actor, director, and photographer.

Biography

Robert Trotter was born in Dumbarton, Scotland, on 7 March 1930. After completing national service in the 1950s, he became an English teacher at Bellahouston Academy in Glasgow. Following his departure from the academy, he was a lecturer in drama at Glasgow University from 1964 to 1971.
Trotter played an active role in the Scottish arts in the 1960s, working on stage, radio, and television. His work reached a worldwide audience when he joined the cast of the long-running TV drama Take the High Road in 1982.
In the 1990s, he started to pursue his lifelong interest in photography. In 2001, he published a collection of photographs from Glasgow and New York called Sing the City. The archive at Glasgow School of Art contains 300 of his photos, where they are currently on display to the public.

Theatre

Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, London
  • Bright Scene Fading - Tom Gallacher
King's Head Theatre Club, London
  • Recital - Tom Gallacher
Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh
  • The Gay Gorbals - Hector MacMillan
  • Every Good Boy Deserves Favour - Tom Stoppard
Pitlochry Festival Theatre
Dundee Repertory Company
  • The Deep Blue Sea - Rattigan
  • The Winslow Boy - Rattigan
  • Getting On - Alan Bennett
  • Travesties - Tom Stoppard
  • A Delicate Balance - Edward Albee
  • Wise Child - Simon Gray
  • I Have Been Here Before - J. B. Priestley
  • The Boy Friend - Sandy Wilson
Perth Repertory Theatre
  • What Every Woman Knows - J. M. Barrie
  • The Odd Couple - Neil Simon
  • The Government Inspector - Gogol
  • She Stoops to Conquer - Goldsmith
Bedlam Theatre
  • The Jungle Book - Kipling / Stephen MacDonald
Theatremakers, Stirling
  • Waiting for Godot - Samuel Beckett
Stage Company
  • The Fall of Kelvin Walker - Alasdair Gray
Arts Theatre, Glasgow University - 1965–1972
  • The Restoration of Arnold McMillan - David Storey
  • The Changeling - Middleton & Rowley
  • The Forrigan Reel - James Bridie
  • The Man of Mode - Etherege
  • The Entertainer - Osborne
  • Entertaining Mr Sloane - Orton
  • The Cocktail Party - Eliot
  • The Shadow of a Gunman - O'Casey
  • Play with a Tiger - Doris Lessing
  • Uncle Vanya - Chekhov
Selected plays directed
  • Scottish Theatre Company - The Man of the World -
  • Pitlochry Festival Theatre - Translations -, Deadline -
  • Dundee Repertory Theatre - Gigi -, Too true to be Good -, The Father -, Last of the Red Hot Lovers -, Sleuth -
  • Tron Theatre, Glasgow - Josef and Maria -
  • Arts Theatre, Glasgow University - Tango-, Shelley -, Macbeth and New Plays by Eric MacDonald and Joan Ure

Selected filmography

Selected radio

  • The Doctor's Dilemma - - dir. John Tydeman
  • The Knocker - - dir. John Tydeman
  • The Idiot - - dir. Kay Patrick
  • The Beautiful Garden - dir. Jane Morgan
  • Peer Gynt - dir. Jane Morgan
  • For the Whale - dir. John Theocharis
  • Nunaga - dir. John Theocharis
  • Tusitala and Swift Cloud - dir. Christopher Venning
  • Hatter's Castle - dir. Stewart Conn
  • They've taken the Swings Away - dir. Stewart Conn
  • Putting it Right - - dir. Stewart Conn
  • Annie S. Swan, The People's Friend - dir. Marilyn Imrie
  • The Bride of Lammermoor - - dir. Marilyn Imrie
  • Strathinver - - dir. John Arnott - Winner of Sony Award 1985
  • The Bell in the Tree - - dir. Hamish Wilson
  • The Horror at Bly - - dir. Maurice Leitch
  • Eden Scenes on Chrystal Jed - - dir. Alec Reid
  • Deacon Brodie - dir. Hamish Wilson
  • Audio Books - Scottish and English Classics published by Schiltron and Canongate Books

Photography

Sing the City, published in 2001, is a collection of Trotter's photographs. They were taken in Glasgow and New York City between 1995 and 1999 and depict the people of both cities. This publication resulted in an exhibition at the Glasgow School of Art in 2004. and the acquisition of much of his work by them and the Scottish National Photography Collection held within the Scottish National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh.