An iconic actor who spent 42 seasons in Stratford, acting in over 100 productions, was recently honoured for another of his passions: the sport of cricket.

Mervyn ‘Butch’ Blake was born in 1907 in India, before he moved to Canada in the mid-1950s, bringing his love of theatre and cricket. Blake was a key player in the founding of the annual cricket match between the Stratford Festival and the Shaw Theatre, which has now been an annual tradition for 51 years. Now his favourite spot to watch the sport he brought to Stratford has a bench with a plaque in his honour.

“He was an older guy when I first started playing, and he would sit roughly right here,” explained Johanna Billings as she pointed to the new bench memorializing Blake while speaking about how she came to know through work and sport. “He would pull up in his brown Buick when we were practicing, and he would make his way down to the pitch ever so slowly and stand right next to us, and gave us pointers. He kind of reminded me of my grandfather.”

Gerald Altenburg also worked with and got to know Blake personally, and he shared that Blake was fearless, and always smiling.

“He was a jolly old elf, he was really was, and you know, he looked like it as well,” Altenburg shared. “He absolutely was the spirit of the game. My first game was in 1984 when I was at the Shaw Festival. I remember the Stratford bus arriving, and Butch was already an icon by then, and playing with him present made it feel that much more special.”

Towards the end of his life, Blake’s love of cricket never wavered ,and he would attend games with the support of a specialized transportation service. Fast forward to now, and the game he helped build locally is entering its 51st year of competition against the Shaw Festival, a legacy that is nearly as impressive as his own.

“He was involved with the first season of the Festival in 1953, and he had a long legacy, that still lives on for today, as he got people excited about cricket,” Billings said.

Altenburg shared that everyone has a fond memory of Butch, including himself.

“In addition to being a really talented actor, spirited cricketer, and he really was an influencer of the game of cricket,” Altenburg shared. “He was also an incredible makeup artist, I worked in the wigs and makeup area, and he taught us a bunch of makeup tricks he used in the 1950s and 60s, so we benefited from that as well as his knowledge on the cricket pitch.”

Blake was a Dora Award, Queen’s Silver Jubilee Medal (1978), and was made a Member of the Order of Canada in 1995. Sadly, he passed away in 2003 at the age of 95.

Earlier this year the local cricket community came together to install a permanent cricket pitch in Lower Queens Park, which will affectionately be known as the Butch Blake Memorial Cricket Ground. The new site will play host to this year’s annual matchup with the Shaw Festival on August 25.

By Rob Ross for www.stratfordtoday.ca.

Photos: The memorial plaque, © 2025 Howard Clarke; Mervyn Blake as Adam in As You Like It at the Stratford Festival, © 1987 Michael Cooper.