Bay Street Theatre co-founder Sybil Christopher dies at 83

Sybil Christopher, co-founder of Sag Harbor's Bay Street Theatre, who once was best-known as the wife Richard Burton left for Elizabeth Taylor, died Thursday in Manhattan. She was 83.

Christopher, artistic director of Bay Street for 22 years, lived in Sag Harbor until her health deteriorated in December. She founded Bay Street in 1991 with partners Emma Walton and Steve Hamilton as a summer showcase for writers and theater artists living full- or part-time in the Hamptons.

The first play Bay Street produced was "Men's Lives" by Joe Pintauro of Sag Harbor, a drama about the plight of East End baymen. Among the shows Bay Street premiered that appeared on Broadway or Off-Broadway were "Love Janis," "Nobody Don't Like Yogi," starring Ben Gazzara, "Hedda Gabler" and "Three Hotels" by Jon Robin Baitz.

Long before her Bay Street venture, Christopher had endured the glare of celebrity as the first Mrs. Richard Burton. Both were Welsh-born actors who met on the set of the British film "The Last Days of Dolwyn" (1949). They married the same year and Christopher never acted in another movie.

The couple moved to Southern California where in 1963 it was revealed that Burton and Taylor were having an affair -- scandalous at the time, as the Burtons had two young daughters.

Following their divorce, Christopher moved to Manhattan, opening a discothèque in 1965 with the help of friends of the former couple, including Leonard Bernstein, Julie Andrews and Stephen Sondheim. She called the club Arthur, inspired by George Harrison's joke in "A Hard Day's Night" that his hairstyle is called "Arthur." The club drew such celebrities as Tennessee Williams and Rudolph Nureyev.

In 1966, the former Sybil Williams of South Wales married Jordan Christopher, lead singer of Arthur's house band, The Wild Ones. He died in 1996; Richard Burton in 1984.

Emma Walton Hamilton, a Bay Street co-founder and daughter of Julie Andrews and Tony Walton, recalls, "Sybil knew everybody, in her community and the world. She knew The Beatles! You could always tell when Sybil was in the audience. She laughed the loudest . . . I remember a gala we attended. We all received a rose we took back to our desks. After all the other roses had long-since died, Sybil's remained. I guess laughter's good for roses."

"She was our heart and soul," said Gary Hygom, Bay Street's managing director, production.

Christopher is survived by daughters Kate and Jessica Burton and Amy Christopher.

At her request, no public memorial services are planned.