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Tony Richardson (June 5, 1928 – November 14, 1991) was an English theatre and Academy Award-winning film director and producer.

Richardson was born Cecil Antonio Richardson in Shipley, Yorkshire in 1928, the son of Elsie Evans (Campion) and Clarence Albert Richardson, a chemist.[1] He attended Ashville College, Harrogate.

Representative of the British "New Wave" of directors, he developed the ideas that led to the formation of the English Stage Company, along with his close friend George Goetschius and George Devine. He directed John Osborne`s seminal play Look Back in Anger at the Court, writing both that theatre and that playwright into British theatre history. In the same period he directed Shakespeare in Stratford-upon-Avon. Richardson later co-founded Woodfall Films with John Osborne, and, as Woodfall`s debut, directed the film version of Look Back in Anger despite having no track record in film at all. Richardson and Osborne eventually fell out[2] during production of the film Charge of the Light Brigade.

In 1964 Richardson received two Academy Awards (Best Director and Best Picture) for Tom Jones (1963). Richardson later began work on Mahogany (1975), starring Diana Ross, but was fired by Motown head Berry Gordy shortly after production began. Gordy took over direction himself.

He was married to the actress Vanessa Redgrave between 1962 and 1967 (he left her for actress Jeanne Moreau), and had two daughters, Natasha Richardson (born 1963) and Joely Richardson (born 1965), both of whom are actresses.

Richardson was bisexual (which he had carefully hidden for as long as possible), and died of complications from AIDS at 63 in 1991.