Theatre director.

Born: April 10, 1935; Died: April 20, 2013.

Patrick Garland, who has died aged 78, was an artistic polymath whose career ranged across theatre directing, broadcasting, acting, writing, producing and interviewing. He worked with many of the greats of theatre, including Noel Coward and John Gielgud, and helped launch the careers of a few others, most notably Alan Bennett. He also helped define the career of Rex Harrison with his definitive biography The Incomparable Rex.

Garland, who was raised in Southampton, was the son of Captain Ewart Garland, a colourful member of the Royal Flying Corps in the First World War who was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross (Garland later fictionalised his father's adventures in the 1989 novel The Wings of the Morning).

He read English at Oxford and began a career as an actor, appearing at Bristol Old Vic for two years. Then, in one of many career switches he would perform his whole life, he wrote two plays for television: The Hard Case and Flow Gently Sweet Afton, which starred John Thaw.

This led to more work for television – for 12 years, Garland was a director and producer in the BBC's arts department; he was also a presenter for the arts programme Monitor and interviewed many prominent figures in the arts, including Gielgud, Coward, Marcel Marceau, Ralph Richardson and Philip Larkin.

By the late 1960s, Garland was developing what was probably his true love: directing for the theatre. In 1968, he had two triumphs. The first was Alan Bennett's first west end play, Forty Years On, starring Gielgud as a public school headmaster coming to terms with the changes in British society since the First World War. The same year, there was Brief Lives, a one-man play starring Roy Dotrice as the 17th century philosopher and writer John Aubrey.

Further success followed for Garland and at one point he had four plays running in the West End at the same time. One of the other undoubted highlights was the 1980s revival of My Fair Lady on Broadway starring Rex Harrison; Garland's experiences later formed the basis of his book on Harrison.

Also in the 1980s, Garland served as artistic director of the Chichester Festival Theatre, a role he returned to in the 1990s, staging Goodbye Mr Chips, As You Like It and The Merchant of Venice.

In 1986, as part of the Queen's 60th birthday celebrations, he directed Fanfare for Elizabeth at Convent Garden and in 1989, he masterminded the thanksgiving service for Laurence Olivier at Westminster Abbey.

There were some disappointments for Garland – he always wanted to direct films, but this part of his career never really flourished, although he did direct 1971's The Snow Goose starring Richard Harris and Jenny Agutter.

He is survived by his wife, Alexandra Bastedo.