John Hurt
Sir John Vincent Hurt CBE (22 January 1940 – 25 January 2017) was a British actor whose career spanned over five decades. Hurt was regarded as one of Britain's finest actors. Director David Lynch described him as "simply the greatest actor in the world".[1][2] He possessed what was described as the "most distinctive voice in Britain".[3][4] He received numerous awards including the BAFTA Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema Award in 2012[5] and was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 2015 for his services to drama.
Not to be confused with John Heard (actor) or John Hirt. For other uses, see John Hurt (disambiguation).
John Hurt
25 January 2017 (aged 77)
Actor
1961–2017
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Donna Peacock(m. 1984; div. 1990)
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Joan Dalton(m. 1990; div. 1996)
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Anwen Rees-Myers(m. 2005)
- Marie-Lise Volpeliere-Pierrot (1967–1983; her death)
- Sarah Owens (1995–2002)
2
He came to prominence playing Richard Rich in the film A Man for All Seasons (1966) and won the British Academy Television Award for Best Actor for The Naked Civil Servant (1975). He played Caligula in the BBC TV series I, Claudius (1976). Hurt earned Academy Award nominations for Best Supporting Actor for Midnight Express (1978), and Best Actor for The Elephant Man (1980). Other films include Alien (1979), Heaven's Gate (1980), Champions (1984), Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984), The Hit (1984), Scandal (1989), The Field (1990), Rob Roy (1995), and Contact (1997).[6]
Hurt gained further prominence portraying Garrick Ollivander in the Harry Potter film series (2001–11), as well as appearing in the 2004 and 2008 Hellboy films, V for Vendetta (2005), Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008), Outlander (2008), and Snowpiercer (2013). He also acted in the acclaimed films Melancholia (2011), Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011), Only Lovers Left Alive (2013) and Jackie (2016).
Hurt reprised his role as Quentin Crisp in An Englishman in New York (2009), which brought his seventh BAFTA nomination. He portrayed an incarnation of the Doctor known as the War Doctor in Doctor Who.[7][8] He voiced roles in Watership Down (1978), The Lord of the Rings (1978), The Plague Dogs (1982), The Black Cauldron (1985), Dogville (2003), Valiant (2005) and BBC's Merlin (2008–2012), as well as The Gruffalo's Child (2011), and Thomas & Friends: Sodor's Legend of the Lost Treasure (2015).
Early life and education[edit]
John Vincent Hurt was born on January 22, 1940, in Chesterfield, Derbyshire,[9][10] the son of Phyllis (née Massey; 1907–1975), an engineer and one-time actress, and Arnold Herbert Hurt (1904–1999), a mathematician who became a Church of England clergyman and served as vicar of Holy Trinity Church in Shirebrook, Derbyshire.[11][12] His father was previously vicar of St John's parish in Sunderland, County Durham. In 1937, he moved his family to Derbyshire, where he became Perpetual Curate of Holy Trinity Church. When Hurt was five, his father became the vicar of St Stephen's Church in Woodville, Derbyshire, and remained there until 1953.[13]
At the age of eight, Hurt was sent to the Anglican St Michael's Preparatory School in Otford, Kent,[14] where he eventually developed his passion for acting. He decided he wanted to become an actor after his first role as a girl in a school production of The Blue Bird by Maurice Maeterlinck.[15] Hurt stated that a senior master at the school would abuse him and others by removing his two false front teeth and putting his tongue in the boys' mouths, as well as rubbing their faces with his stubble, and that the experience affected him hugely.[16] Hurt, aged 12, became a boarder at Lincoln School (then a grammar school) because he had failed the entrance examination for admission to his brother's school. His headmaster at Lincoln School laughed when Hurt told him he wanted to be an actor, telling him, "Well, you may be all right in school plays but you wouldn't stand a chance in the profession."[17]
Hurt's father moved to St Aidan's Church in Cleethorpes, Lincolnshire. In a Guardian interview Hurt states the family lived in a vicarage opposite a cinema, but he was not allowed to go there, as films were "frowned upon." However, watching theatre was considered "fine" and encouraged particularly by his mother, who took him regularly to the repertory theatre in Cleethorpes. His parents disliked his later acting ambitions and encouraged him to become an art teacher instead.[17] Aged 17, Hurt enrolled in Grimsby Art School (now the East Coast School of Art and Design), where he studied art. In 1959, he won a scholarship allowing him to study for an Art Teacher's Diploma at Saint Martin's School of Art in London.[18] Despite the scholarship, paying his tuition fees and living expenses was difficult, so he persuaded some of his friends to pose naked and sold the portraits. In 1960, he won a scholarship to Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, where he trained for two years,[16] graduating in 1962 with an Acting (RADA Diploma).[19]