Sir Ronald Harwood – a life in pictures

Sir Ronald Harwood, the playwright and screenwriter best known for The Dresser and his Oscar-winning script for The Pianist, has died aged 85

Adrien Brody in The Pianist, directed by Roman Polanski. For his screenplay, Harwood adapted the memoir of Władysław Szpilman.

Photograph: Dreamworks/Sportsphoto Ltd/Allstar

Harwood with his best adapted screenplay award for The Pianist at the Oscars in 2003.

Photograph: Frank Micelotta/Getty Images

Tom Courtenay and Freddie Jones in Harwood’s best known play, The Dresser, at the Queen’s theatre, London, 1980. The play explores the relationship between an actor and his personal assistant.

Photograph: Alastair Muir/Rex/Shutterstock

Monique Chaumette and Jacques Francois in a French production of The Dresser, directed by Stephan Meldegg in Paris in 1980.

Photograph: Boris Lipnitzki/Roger Viollet/Getty Images

Sara Kestelman and Janet Suzman in Another Time by Ronald Harwood at Wyndham’s theatre, London, in 1989.

Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian

Stephen Moore and Albert Finney in Reflected Glory at the Vaudeville theatre, directed by Elijah Moshinsky, in 1992.

Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian

Michel Bouquet and Claude Brasseur in a 1999 French production of Taking Sides, Harwood’s play about the denazification investigation of German composer and conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler.

Photograph: Bruno Bachelet/Getty Images

Michael Pennington as Furtwängler in Taking Sides at the Minerva, Chichester, in 2008.

Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian

Collaboration is a companion piece to Taking Sides. David Horovitch, Sophie Roberts, Isla Blair and Michael Pennington starred in the 2008 Minerva production.

Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian

In 2008, Harwood won a Bafta award for best adapted screenplay for The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, based on Jean-Dominique Bauby’s memoir about living with locked-in syndrome.

Photograph: Joel Ryan/PA

Harwood and his wife, Natasha, at the Oscars in 2008.

Photograph: Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic

Harwood was knighted in 2011.

Photograph: WPA/Getty Images

Nick Stringer, Frank Finlay, Kate Lynn-Evans and Hugh Bonneville in The Handyman at Chichester Festival theatre in 1996.

Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian

Quartet, set in a home for retired opera singers, starred Alec McCowen, Angela Thorne, Donald Sinden and Stephanie Cole at the Albery, London, in 1999.

Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian

Patsy Kensit and Ardal O’Hanlon in Harwood’s comedy See You Next Tuesday at the Albery in 2003.

Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian

Mahler’s Conversion starred Antony Sher as the composer at the Aldwych, London, in 2001.

Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian

The Dresser became a BBC drama in 2015. Harwood, centre, poses with the stars Ian McKellen, Emily Watson, Vanessa Kirby and Edward Fox.

Photograph: Geoff Pugh/REX/Shutterstock

Reece Shearsmith as Norman and Ken Stott as Sir in Sean Foley’s acclaimed revival of The Dresser at the Duke of York’s in London in 2016.

Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian

Shearsmith, Foley, Harwood and Stott at the press-night party for The Dresser in 2016.

Photograph: David M Benett/Getty Images

Harwood died on 8 September at his home in Sussex. Among those paying tribute was Gyles Brandreth, who said he was ‘full of heart, humanity, wit and high intelligence’.

Photograph: Mark Mainz/Getty Images for AFI