Cary Elwes
Cary Elwes | |
---|---|
![]() Elwes in June 2014. | |
Born | Ivan Simon Cary Elwes 26 October 1962 |
Nationality | British |
Occupation | Actor |
Years active | 1979–present |
Spouse |
Lisa Marie Kurbikoff
(m. 2000) |
Children | 1 |
Parent(s) | Dominick Elwes † Tessa Kennedy |
Relatives | Cassian Elwes (brother) Damian Elwes (brother) |
Ivan Simon Cary Elwes (/ˈɛlwɪs/; born 26 October 1962),[1][2] known professionally as Cary Elwes, is an English actor and best-selling author [3] best known for his roles in The Princess Bride, Robin Hood: Men in Tights, Days of Thunder, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Hot Shots!, Twister, Liar, Liar and as Dr. Lawrence Gordon in Saw.[4] He has also had recurring roles in television series such as The X-Files (playing Brad Follmer) and Psych (playing Pierre Despereaux).
Early life
Elwes was born in Westminster, London, England. He is the youngest of three boys born to portrait-painter Dominic Elwes[5] and interior designer and socialite Tessa Kennedy. His brothers are Damian Elwes, an artist,[6] and Cassian Elwes, an independent film producer. He was the stepson of Elliott Kastner, an American film producer.[5] Elwes' paternal grandfather was painter Simon Elwes,[6] whose father was the diplomat and tenor Gervase Elwes (1866–1921).[7] His other great-grandfathers were diplomat Rennell Rodd, 1st Baron Rennell, Sir John Macfarlane Kennedy, and Croatian industrialist Ivan Rikard Ivanović. Elwes' ancestry is English, Irish, Scottish, Croatian Jewish (later Catholic converts), and Serbian (the latter two through his maternal grandmother, Daška McLean, born Daška Marija Ivanović-Banac; her brother, Elwes' great-uncle, was diplomat Vane Ivanović). One of Elwes' ancestors is John Elwes, who is alleged in some sources to have been the inspiration for Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol (1843)[8] (Elwes played five roles in the 2009 film adaptation of the novel).[8]
He was brought up as a Roman Catholic and was an altar boy at Westminster Cathedral, although he did not attend denominational schools, unlike most of the men on his father's side of the family, including his own father.[9] His paternal forbears include such clerics as Dudley Charles Cary-Elwes (1868–1932), the Roman Catholic Bishop of Northampton (1921–32), as well as Abbott Columba Cary-Elwes (Ampleforth Abbey, Saint Louis Abbey), and Father Luke Cary-Elwes (Fort Augustus Abbey). He discussed some of this background in an interview while he was filming the 2005 CBS television film, Pope John Paul II, in which Elwes played the young priest Karol Wojtyła, many years before he was elected pontiff in 1978.
When he was four-years-old his parents divorced and in 1975, when Elwes was thirteen, his father committed suicide. For his education Elwes attended Harrow School[6] and then the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art.[10] In 1981, he moved to the United States to study acting at Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, New York.[11] While living there, Elwes studied acting at both the Actors Studio[11] and the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute.[10] As a teenager he also worked as a production assistant on the films Octopussy and Superman, where he worked for a week assigned to Marlon Brando. When Elwes introduced himself, Brando told him that his (Elwes') name was actually Rocky.[12]
Career
Film
Elwes made his acting debut in 1984 with Marek Kanievska's film Another Country. He played James Harcourt, a young and sentimental homosexual student from an English boarding school.[6] He went on to play Guilford Dudley in the British film Lady Jane, co-starring Helena Bonham Carter. He was cast as a stable boy turned swashbuckler Westley in Rob Reiner's fantasy-comedy The Princess Bride, based on the novel of the same name by William Goldman. It was a modest box office success,[13] but received critical acclaim, earning a score of 96% on the review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes.[14] Since being released on home video and television it has become a cult classic.[13] In an interview around the film's DVD release in 2001, Elwes said, "The studio didn't know how to sell it – as an adventure, fantasy, comedy or love story, it had to rely on word of mouth". He also acknowledged the film's cult following saying, "People tell me they have it in their video collection; it's a family film... that has been passed down from one generation to the next".[15]
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fe/CaryElwesApr10.jpg/170px-CaryElwesApr10.jpg)
He continued working steadily, varying between dramatic roles, as in The Bride (1985) with Sting and Jennifer Beals, to the Academy Award-winning Glory (1989), and comedic roles, as in Hot Shots! (1991). In 1993, he starred as Robin Hood in Mel Brooks's comedy, Robin Hood: Men in Tights. Elwes also appeared in such films as Francis Coppola's adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula, The Crush, Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book, Twister, Liar Liar, and Kiss the Girls. In 1999, he portrayed famed theatre and film producer John Houseman for Tim Robbins in his ensemble film based on Orson Welles's musical, Cradle Will Rock. And months after that he traveled to Luxembourg to work with John Malkovich and Willem Dafoe in the Academy Award Nominated Shadow of the Vampire. In 2001, he traveled to Berlin to work on Peter Bogdanovich's The Cat's Meow portraying the doomed movie mogul Thomas Ince.
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/53/Cary_Elwes_at_2010_Collectormania.jpg/170px-Cary_Elwes_at_2010_Collectormania.jpg)
In 2004, he starred in the horror–thriller Saw which, at a budget of a little over $1 million, grossed over $100 million worldwide.[16] The same year he appeared in Ella Enchanted, this time as the villain not the hero. He made an uncredited appearance as Sam Green, the man who introduced Andy Warhol to Edie Sedgwick, in the 2006 film Factory Girl. In 2007, he appeared in Garry Marshall's Georgia Rule opposite Jane Fonda. Two years later he appeared in Robert Zemeckis’s motion capture adaptation of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol portraying five roles. That same year he was chosen by Steven Spielberg to appear in his motion capture adaptation of Belgian artist Hergé's popular comic strip The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn.
Elwes returned to the Saw franchise in Saw 3D (2010), the seventh and final film in the series, as Dr. Lawrence Gordon.[17] In 2011, he was selected by Ivan Reitman to star alongside Natalie Portman in No Strings Attached. That same year, Elwes and Garry Marshall teamed up again in the romantic comedy New Year’s Eve.
In 2012, Elwes appeared in the independent drama The Citizen.[18] In 2013 Elwes joined Selena Gomez for the comedy ensemble, Behaving Badly directed by Tim Garrick. This year he has completed four movies: John Herzfeld's comedy Reach Me opposite Sylvester Stallone; the ensemble drama, Sugar Mountain directed by Richard Gray; and the dramas H8RZ, directed by Derrick Borte, The Greens Are Gone, opposite Catherine Keener directed by Peer Pedersen and Indiscretion, opposite Mira Sorvino directed by John Stewart Muller.
On 13 December 2012, The Hollywood Reporter announced that Elwes would be making his directorial debut in an independent film about the life of Kit Lambert, manager of the iconic rock group The Who, working with a script by Pat Gilbert, a former editor of the British music magazine Mojo.[19] The film is based on interviews and recordings with Lambert made by journalist Jon Lindsay, and is being produced by Orian Williams.
On 7 November 2014, The Guardian announced that Kevin Spacey and Michael Shannon have signed on to portray Richard Nixon and Elvis Presley respectively in a feature film entitled Elvis & Nixon, written by Elwes with Hanala and Joey Sagal, about the pair's famous meeting at the White House in 1970.[20]
Television
In 1996, Elwes made his first television appearance as David Lookner on the sitcom Seinfeld. In 1998, he played astronaut Michael Collins in the Golden Globe Award-winning HBO miniseries From the Earth To the Moon. The following year Elwes was nominated for a Golden Satellite Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television for his portrayal of Colonel James Burton in The Pentagon Wars directed by Richard Benjamin. In 1999, he guest starred as Dr. John York in an episode of the television series The Outer Limits. Shortly afterward he received another Golden Satellite Award nomination for his work on the ensemble NBC Television movie Uprising opposite Jon Voight directed by Jon Avnet. Elwes had a recurring role in the final season (from 2001 to 2002) of The X-Files as FBI Assistant Director Brad Follmer.
In 2004, he portrayed serial killer Ted Bundy in the A&E Network film The Riverman, which became one of the highest rated original movies in the network’s history and garnered a prestigious BANFF Rockie Award nomination. The following year, Elwes played the young Pope John Paul II in the CBS television film Pope John Paul II opposite Jon Voight again. The TV film was highly successful not only in North America, but also in Europe, where it broke box office records in the late pope's native Poland and became the first film ever to break $1 million (GBP588,200) in three days.[21]
In 2007, he made a guest appearance on the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Dependent" as a Mafia lawyer. In 2009, he played the role of Pierre Despereaux, an international art thief, in the fourth season premiere of Psych.[22] In 2010, he returned to Psych, reprising his role in the second half of the fifth season, and again in the show's sixth season.[23] In 2014, Elwes played Hugh Ashmeade, the CIA Director, in the second season of the BYUtv series, Granite Flats.
Voiceovers
Elwes' voice-over work includes the narrator in James Patterson's audio book The Jester,[24] as well as characters in film and television animations such as Quest for Camelot, Pinky and The Brain, Batman Beyond, and the English versions of the Studio Ghibli films, Porco Rosso, Whisper of the Heart and The Cat Returns. For the 2004 video game The Bard's Tale, he served as scriptwriter, improviser, and voice actor of the main character The Bard. In 2009, Elwes performed the English voice over for Indian film, Delhi Safari.[25] The following year Elwes portrayed the part of Gremlin Gus in Disney's video game, Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two.
Theatre
In 2003, he performed in New York in the off-Broadway play The Exonerated, directed by Bob Balaban (18–23 March 2003).[26]
Literature
In October 2014, Touchstone (Simon & Schuster) published Elwes' memoir of the making of The Princess Bride, entitled As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of The Princess Bride, which Elwes co-wrote with Joe Layden. The book is filled with never-before-told stories, exclusive photographs, and interviews with costars Robin Wright, Wallace Shawn, Billy Crystal, Christopher Guest, Fred Savage and Mandy Patinkin, as well as author and screenwriter William Goldman, producer Norman Lear, and director Rob Reiner. The book debuted on The New York Times Best Seller list.[27][28]
Personal life
Elwes met still photographer Lisa Marie Kurbikoff in 1991 at a Malibu chili cook-off and became engaged in 1997.[29] They married in 2000 and have one child.[30]
In August 2005, Elwes filed a lawsuit against Evolution Entertainment, his management firm and producer of Saw. He said he was promised a minimum of one percent of the producers' net profits of the film and did not receive the full amount.[31] The case eventually was settled out of court. In 2010, he reprised his role in Saw 3D.[32]
Filmography
Year | Title | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
1979 | Yesterday's Hero | Disco Dancer | |
1984 | Another Country | James Harcourt | |
Oxford Blues | Lionel | ||
1985 | The Bride | Captain Josef Schoden | |
1986 | Lady Jane | Guilford Dudley | |
1987 | Maschenka | Ganin | |
The Princess Bride | Westley/The Dread Pirate Roberts | ||
1988 | Never on Tuesday | Tow Truck Driver | Uncredited |
1989 | Glory | Major Cabot Forbes | |
1990 | Days of Thunder | Russ Wheeler | |
1991 | Hot Shots! | Lieutenant Kent Gregory | |
1992 | Bram Stoker's Dracula | Lord Arthur Holmwood | |
Kurenai no buta | Curtis | aka Porco Rosso Voice English version | |
Leather Jackets | Dobbs | ||
1993 | Robin Hood: Men in Tights | Robin Hood | |
The Crush | Nick Eliot | ||
1994 | Felidae | Francis | Voice English Dub |
The Jungle Book | Captain William Boone | ||
The Chase | Steve Horsegroovy | ||
1995 | Whisper of the Heart | Baron Humbert von Jikkingen | Voice English version |
1996 | Twister | Dr. Jonas Miller | |
1997 | Kiss the Girls | Detective Nick Ruskin/Casanova | Nominated – Blockbuster Entertainment Awards Best Supporting Actor |
The Informant | Lieutenant David Ferris | ||
Liar Liar | Jerry | ||
1998 | Quest for Camelot | Garrett | Voice |
1999 | Cradle Will Rock | John Houseman | |
2000 | Shadow of the Vampire | Fritz Arno "Firtzy" Wagner | |
2001 | The Cat's Meow | Thomas H. Ince | |
2002 | Wish You Were Dead | Mac "Macbeth" Wilson | |
The Cat Returns | Baron Humbert von Gikkingen | Voice English version | |
Comic Book Villains | Carter | Direct-to-video | |
2004 | Saw | Dr. Lawrence Gordon | Nominated – MTV Movie Award for Best Frightened Performance |
Ella Enchanted | Sir Edgar | ||
The River Man | Ted Bundy | ||
American Crime | Albert Bodine | Direct-to-video | |
2005 | Edison | Reigert | aka Edison Force |
Neo Ned | Dr. Magnuson | ||
National Lampoon's Pucked | Norman | aka National Lampoon's The Trouble with Frank | |
Saw II | Dr. Lawrence Gordon | Uncredited; Archive Sound | |
2006 | Factory Girl | Sam Green | Uncredited |
2007 | Walk the Talk | Erik | |
Georgia Rule | Arnold | ||
2008 | The Alphabet Killer | Capt. Kenneth Shine | |
2009 | A Christmas Carol | Portly Gentleman #1/Dick Wilkins/Mad Fiddler/Guest #2/Business Man #1 | |
2010 | Psych 9 | Dr. Clement | |
Flying Lessons | Steven Jennings | ||
As Good as Dead | Ethan Belfrage | ||
Little Murder | Barry Fitzgerald | ||
Saw 3D | Dr. Lawrence Gordon | ||
2011 | No Strings Attached | Dr. Metzner | |
Delhi Safari | English voiceover | ||
The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn | Pilot | ||
New Year's Eve | Stan's doctor | ||
The Story of Luke | Uncle Paul | Released | |
Camilla Dickinson | Rafferty Dickinson | ||
Hellgate | Jeff Mathews | ||
2012 | The Oogieloves in the Big Balloon Adventure | Bobby Wobbly | |
The Citizen | Miller | ||
2013 | Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox | Orin/Arthur Curry/Aquaman | Voice |
2014 | Reach Me | Kersey | |
2015 | A Mouse Tale | Sir Thaddeus | |
H8RZ | Francis | ||
The Greens Are Gone | Frank Harper | ||
Sugar Mountain | Jim Huxley | ||
Indiscretion | Jake Simon |
Year | Title | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
1996 | Seinfeld | David Lookner | Episode: "The Wait Out" |
1998 | The Pentagon Wars | Lt. Col. James Burton | HBO television film |
From the Earth to the Moon | Michael Collins | Episodes: "Can We Do This" "1968" "Mare Tranquilitatis" | |
Pinky and the Brain | Director/Hamlet | Voice Episodes: "Brainie the Poo/Melancholy Brain" "Whatever Happened to Baby Brain/Just Say Narf" | |
Hercules | Paris of Troy | Voice Episode: "Hercules and the Trojan War" | |
1999 | The Outer Limits | Dr. John York | Episode: "Ripper" |
Batman Beyond | Paxton Powers | Episode: "Ascension" | |
2000 | Race Against Time | Burke | Television film |
2001 | Night Visions | Gerald | Episode: "Quiet Please" |
Uprising | Dr. Fritz Hippler | Television film | |
2001–2002 | The X-Files | FBI Assistant Director Brad Follmer | Episodes: "Nothing Important Happened Today" "Nothing Important Happened Today II" "4-D" "Provenance" "Providence" "Release" |
2004 | The Riverman | Ted Bundy | Television film |
2005 | Pope John Paul II | Young Karol Wojtyla | TV mini-series |
2006 | Haskett's Chance | Television film | |
2007 | Law & Order: Special Victims Unit | Sidney Truex | Episode: "Dependent" |
2009–2014 | Psych | Pierre Despereaux | Episodes: "Extradition: British Columbia" "Extradition II: The Actual Extradition Part" "Indiana Shawn and the Temple of the Kinda Crappy, Rusty Old Dagger" "Lock, Stock, Some Smoking Barrels and Burton Guster's Goblet of Fire" |
2011 | Wonder Woman | Henry Detmer | Pilot episode (Unsold pilot) |
2012 | Leverage | Scott Roemer | Episode: "The (Very) Big Bird Job" |
Perception | British Intelligence Officer | Episode: "Cipher" | |
2013 | The Anna Nicole Story | E. Pierce Marshall | Television film |
2014 | Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey | Edmond Halley, Robert Hooke | Voice Episode: "When Knowledge Conquered Fear" |
Granite Flats | Hugh Ashmead | Episodes: "Put Away Childish Things" "The Stories We Tell......" "Cor Unum, Corambis" "Project Madman" | |
Family Guy | Dr. Watson | Voice Episodes: "Secondhand Spoke" "Chap Stewie" |
Books
- Elwes, Cary; Layden, Joe (2014). As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of The Princess Bride. New York: Touchstone. ISBN 9781476764023. OCLC 878812649.
References
- ^ "The Almanac". UPI. 26 October 2008. Retrieved 29 July 2012.
- ^ "World Almanac". Kent County Daily Times. 26 October 2010.
Today's Birthdays: Cary Elwes
- ^ http://www.nytimes.com/best-sellers-books/2014-11-02/hardcover-nonfiction/list.html
- ^ "Cary Elwes Movie Box Office Results". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 27 September 2011.
- ^ a b Cerio, Gregory (6 February 1995). "A Hero to the Hilt". People. 43 (5). Archived from the original on 26 September 2011. Retrieved 26 September 2011.
{{cite journal}}
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suggested) (help) - ^ a b c d Kim, Jae-Ha (12 January 1990). "British actor takes turn as American in 'Glory'". Chicago Sun-Times: 25.
- ^ Thompson, Damian (22 June 2004). Loose Canon: A Portrait of Brian Brindley. Continuum. p. 134. ISBN 0-8264-7418-7.
- ^ a b "Disney's A Christmas Carol Production Notes". Cinematic Intelligence Agency. 21 October 2009. p. 6. Archived from the original (152KB .DOC file; HTML version) on 9 October 2010.
{{cite web}}
: External link in
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suggested) (help) - ^ Guthrie, Marisa (4 December 2005). "The spirit moved him". Daily News. Archived from the original on 26 September 2011. Retrieved 13 September 2010.
Elwes, who grew up a Catholic...
{{cite web}}
: Unknown parameter|deadurl=
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suggested) (help) - ^ a b "Dr Gordon is back in Saw – Cary Elwes's character from the first Saw film is back by popular demand". The Straits Times. 5 January 2011.
- ^ a b Tam Jr, Henry (13 August 1993). "The 'Robin' Who Has Sherwood Forest Chuckling". San Francisco Chronicle: C6.
- ^ "Mark & Brian w/Cary Elwes on Marlon Brando". YouTube. 8 May 2008. Retrieved 23 June 2013.
- ^ a b Gray Streeter, Leslie (9 December 2007). "'The Princess Bride' Turns 20". The Palm Beach Post: 6J.
[w]as a modest hit. But it became a raging cult classic after being released on video and shown on cable.
- ^ "Prince Bride (1987)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved 3 November 2014.
- ^ Westbrook, Bruce (6 September 2001). "'Bride' basks in glow of video". Houston Chronicle.
- ^ "Saw (2004)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 16 August 2011.
- ^ "Cary Elwes Confirmed for 'Saw 3D', Full Synopsis and Cast". Bloody Disgusting. 25 April 2010. Archived from the original on 25 April 2010. Retrieved 25 April 2010.
{{cite web}}
: Unknown parameter|deadurl=
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suggested) (help) - ^ Sneider, Jeff (13 July 2011). "4 thesps apply for 'The Citizen'". Variety. Archived from the original on 26 September 2011. Retrieved 26 September 2011.
{{cite web}}
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suggested) (help) - ^ Cary Elwes to direct biopic about Kit Lambert, hollywoodreporter.com; accessed 4 March 2014.
- ^ http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/nov/07/michael-shannon-and-kevin-spacey-to-play-elvis-and-nixon
- ^ "Pope Picture Breaks Box Office Records". contactmusic.com. 3 September 2006.
- ^ "First Two Teaser Clips Psych: 9". DreadCentral. CraveOnline. 2 January 2010. Archived from the original on 26 September 2011. Retrieved 26 September 2011.
{{cite web}}
: Unknown parameter|deadurl=
ignored (|url-status=
suggested) (help) - ^ Slezak, Michael (21 July 2011). "Psych First Look: The Season 6 Scene Everyone Will Be Talking About! Plus, Musical Update!". TVLine. Archived from the original on 27 September 2011. Retrieved 27 September 2011.
{{cite web}}
: Unknown parameter|deadurl=
ignored (|url-status=
suggested) (help) - ^ Paterson, James; Gross, Andrew (1 March 2003). The Jester (Abridged ed.). Hachette Audio. ISBN 1-58621-535-3.
- ^ "Delhi Safari to feature voice over by Vanessa Williams and Jason Alexander". Bollywood Hungama. 30 May 2011. Archived from the original on 26 September 2011. Retrieved 26 September 2011.
{{cite web}}
: Unknown parameter|deadurl=
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suggested) (help) - ^ Hernandez, Ernio (18 March 2003). "Cary Elwes and Brooke Shields Join Off-Broadway's Exonerated, 18-23 March". Playbill.com. Archived from the original on 27 September 2011. Retrieved 27 September 2011.
{{cite web}}
: Unknown parameter|deadurl=
ignored (|url-status=
suggested) (help) - ^ As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of The Princess Bride, nytimes.com, 2 November 2014; accessed 18 November 2014.
- ^ 'Cary Elwes wrote book about the making of the film, The Princess Bride, geekwithcurves.com, June 2014; accessed 18 November 2014.
- ^ "Celebrities – DeGeneres 'Bedding' Talk-Show Guests". Watertown Daily Times: D2. 3 May 2007.
Elwes and Lisa Marie (née Kurbikoff) met in 1991 at a Malibu chili cook-off. They were engaged in 1997 and tied the knot three years later.
- ^ Silverman, Stephen M.; Jordan, Julie (27 April 2007). "Cary Elwes, Wife Welcome a Girl". People. Archived from the original on 26 September 2011. Retrieved 26 September 2011.
{{cite web}}
: Unknown parameter|deadurl=
ignored (|url-status=
suggested) (help) - ^ Mitchell, Peter (20 August 2005). "Not everyone happy with their cut from Saw". The Age. AAP. Archived from the original on 26 September 2011. Retrieved 26 September 2011.
{{cite news}}
: Unknown parameter|deadurl=
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suggested) (help) - ^ Gingold, Michael (25 April 2010). ""Saw VII" Synopsis and Cast Revealed – Including Cary Elwes!". Fangoria. Archived from the original on 26 September 2011. Retrieved 26 September 2011.
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External links
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/30px-Commons-logo.svg.png)
- Cary Elwes at IMDb
- Use dmy dates from October 2012
- 1962 births
- 20th-century English male actors
- 21st-century English male actors
- British expatriate male actors in the United States
- English male film actors
- English male stage actors
- English male television actors
- English male voice actors
- English people of Croatian-Jewish descent
- English people of Serbian descent
- English people of Scottish descent
- English Roman Catholics
- English memoirists
- Living people
- Male actors from London
- People educated at Harrow School
- People from Westminster
- People of Anglo-Irish descent
- Sarah Lawrence College alumni