Present
In 2002, the purpose-built theatre at Homewood School, Ashford Road, Tenterden, Kent was named the Sinden Theatre.
On 12 July 2005, he was awarded the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Letters by the University of Leicester and on 20 July 2011, the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Arts by the University of Canterbury.
Sinden is a patron of ME Solutions, a charity dedicated to finding a breakthrough in the treatment of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis through targeted and comprehensive biomedical research, focusing on the physical causes of M.E.
Sinden is Honorary President of the Garden Suburb Theatre, an amateur theatre group based in the Hampstead Garden Suburb where he was resident for many years.
On 9 October 2012, Sir Donald celebrated his 89th birthday and his retirement after 30 years as the longest-standing President of the Royal Theatrical Fund (founded by Charles Dickens in 1839) with a celebration lunch for 350 guests at the Park Lane Hotel, London which was compered by Russ Abbott and the charity auction was conducted by Lord Jeffrey Archer. Leading the tributes was movie legend Jean Kent, 91, who co-starred with Sir Donald in Bernard Delfont’s 1951 stage production of Frou-Frou and letters from HRH Queen Elizabeth 11 and HSH Prince Albert of Monaco were read out, with speeches from Downton Abbey writer Lord Julian Fellowes, Ray Cooney and Gyles Brandreth.
Read more about this topic: Donald Sinden
Famous quotes containing the word present:
“We should be blessed if we lived in the present always, and took advantage of every accident that befell us, like the grass which confesses the influence of the slightest dew that falls on it; and did not spend our time in atoning for the neglect of past opportunities, which we call doing our duty.”
—Henry David Thoreau (18171862)
“If one defends the bourgeois, philistine virtues, one does not defend them merely from the demonism or bohemianism of the artist but from the present bourgeoisie itself.”
—Lionel Trilling (19051975)
“An immoderate fondness for dress, for pleasure, and for sway, are the passions of savages; the passions that occupy those uncivilized beings who have not yet extended the dominion of the mind, or even learned to think with the energy necessary to concatenate that abstract train of thought which produces principles.... that women from their education and the present state of civilized life, are in the same condition, cannot ... be controverted.”
—Mary Wollstonecraft (17591797)