Mark Rylance announces that his wife, Claire van Kampen, died on his birthday

Mark Rylance mourns the loss of his wife Claire van Kampenwho died of cancer at the age of 71 on Saturday, January 18 — his 65th birthday.

“Claire Louise van Kampen, Lady Rylance, died this morning, Saturday January 18 at 11:47 a.m., in the ancient city of Kassel, Germany, surrounded by her family,” the Rylances and their daughter Juliet announced in statement.

“Claire died of cancer on Mark Rylance’s 65th birthday. Her youngest daughter died in 2012, she leaves her eldest daughter Juliet Rylance, her two husbands and countless dear friends in England and America.’

Claire is a British theater director and composer who was the first female music director of the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theater – described by her family as “one of the funniest and most inspiring women we’ve ever known”.

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“We thank her for filling our lives with her magic, music, laughter and love,” they added.

Rylance married Claire in December 1989 and became stepfather to her children by her ex-husband Chris van Kampen: Juliet, 45, and Natasha, who died suddenly in 2012 aged 28 after suffering a brain haemorrhage on board a flight from New York to London.

“It’s uncharted territory when something tragic like this happens to you. You realize that this has happened to many people. You make your own decisions about how to experience it,” Rylance said The Sunday Times in 2016.

Posthumously, Nataashi Rylance was nominated for an Emmy and won a BAFTA for his portrayal of Thomas Cromwell, advisor to Henry VIII, grieving father and widower in the television series Wolf Hall. He also won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in 2015 for his role in Steven Spielberg‘s Spy bridge.

Claire was diagnosed with cancer before her death. Born in London in 1953, she eventually attended the Royal College of Music, studying piano and music theory. BBC News. She then began a theater career, joining the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1986 and a year later the Royal National Theatre, where she met Rylance. She later became Rylance’s artistic partner at the Globe Theater, where she worked for 20 years.

She composed original scores for Broadway productions, including The real West, Boeing-Boeing and La Betteas well as adaptations of Shakespeare’s works Twelfth night and Richard III.

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“Claire completely changed my life… She introduced me to the world of classical and contemporary music, and it was around music that we fell in love,” Rylance said of Claire in 2023, according to Guardian.

“Claire came to me with two children that I raised with her and Chris, but we never had any children of our own, so to a certain extent our projects were our children. They’re incredible,” he continued, adding that Claire was “the rock of my life.”