Jules Croiset

Jules Croiset (1937) is part of a large Belgian/Dutch theatre family: father Max Croiset, mother Jeanne Verstreate and brother Hans Croiset. Jules started professionally at the age of 17 in the theatre business, or the craft as he prefers to call it himself, at the Amsterdam youth company PUCK. Since then, he has played various leading roles at all major theatre companies in plays by, among others, Shakespeare, Sophocles, Feydeau, Chekhov, Vondel, Albee and Yasmina Reza. For his title role in Platonov by Chekhov he received the Louis d'Or in 1979.

He achieved great international fame with his solo programmes such as the one about Van Gogh (A Certain Vincent), Dostoevsky (A gentle Spirit), Chekhov (Talking about Chekhov) and Kafka (De Gedaanteverwisseling). His last major roles in the Dutch theatre were in 2003 at the National Theatre (Willy Loman in The Death of a Salesman), in 2014 at Bostheater (Albert Heijn in the production of De Verleiders), at Hummelinck Stuurman Theatre Productions: Stroomkoning in Karakter van Bordewijk (2010) and BINT in the eponymous piece by the same writer Bordewijk (2016).

Jules Croiset was a lecturer at the theatre schools in Maastricht and Amsterdam and he also directed at various theatre companies. He is married and has 2 sons (Vincent and Niels), both of whom are also actors. His role of Vianny in Het hout is his debut (at the age of 81) at the International Theatre Amsterdam.