Casper Wrede

Baron Casper Gustaf Kenneth Wrede af Elimä, known as Caspar Wrede (8 February 1929 – 25 September 1998), was a Finnish theatre and film director. He was long active in the English theatre, co-founding the Royal Exchange theatre company in Manchester.

Casper Wrede came from a noble Finnish family of Livonian origin, which owned large estates mainly in eastern Finland between the 17th and 19th centuries, and had been created barons in 1652 by Queen Christina. He was born in Viipuri, Finland, and was the nephew of actor Gerda Wrede. He died in Helsinki, Finland, in 1998.

In 1951, he left Finland and enrolled at the Old Vic Theatre School in London run by the French director Michel Saint-Denis. He was much influenced by Saint-Denis and his ideas had a great effect on the theatre companies that Wrede helped establish. In 1956, he was involved with the setting up of the Piccolo Theatre company in Chorlton-cum-Hardy, Manchester (which only survived for a year) and in 1959 he founded the 59 Theatre Company, based at the Lyric Theatre (Hammersmith). Michael Elliott was appointed assistant artistic director and, although short-lived, the company achieved considerable success with productions of Brand, Little Eyolf and Danton's Death. During this time, Wrede also directed both the stage debut of Alun Owen's play The Rough and Ready Lot and its 1959 television adaptation. Wrede and Elliott ran a season of plays at the Old Vic in 1961.