John Gielgud
Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH [ ɡi lɡʊd ː ] ( born April 14, 1904 in Kensington, England; † 21 May 2000 Wotton Underwood, England ) was a British actor. He won the 1982 Oscar for Best Supporting Actor.
Biography
Gielgud is one of the most important British actors of the 20th century. A graduate of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art ( Rada short ) played in London in 1930 for the first time Hamlet and was next to Sir Laurence Olivier and Sir Alec Guinness as the most important interpreter of the great roles of William Shakespeare of his time. Early on, he also directed and produced records later versions of plays, such as Oscar Wilde Bunbury for the Columbia.
Gielgud made his film debut in 1924 and has always found its way back to the screen and also the cinema gave highlights the art of acting and this was up to his last film from the year 2000. Way each cinema generation since the 1930s their own John Gielgud - climax in 1936, he starred in Alfred Hitchcock's secret Agent starring. In 1953 he was the Cassius in Joseph L. Mankiewiczs film adaptation of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. He received an Oscar nomination for the role of King Louis VII in the film adaptation of the play Becket by Jean Anouilh (1964). In 1982, he won an Oscar for the role of the sarcastic butler in the comedy Arthur - No child of sadness. The younger generation, he will surely be remembered as a piano teacher of David Helfgott in Shine 1996.
1953 Gielgud was convicted of an offense during a visit flaps. The public has not rejected him why, but he received for his next stage performance a standing ovation. This helped to promote the decriminalization of homosexuality in England and Wales. In the same year he was defeated by Queen Elizabeth II knighted. His 40 years younger, longtime life companion Martin Hensler ( 1944-1999 ), whom he had met in the 1960s at an exhibition at the Tate Gallery, died a few months before Sir John.
For a slightly morbid secret makes today a letter from Gielgud to his fellow actor Stringer Davis (known from the Miss Marple films ), the unopened this contributed to his death in his pajama jacket. The letter was unopened buried with Davis. The content Gielgud has retained until his death in silence.
Filmography (selection)
Awards
Literature (selection )
- John Gielgud: Acting Shakespeare. Pan Books, London 1997, ISBN 0-330-35224-5 ( with John Miller).
- John Gielgud: An Actor and his Time. Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, 1981 ISBN 0-1400-5636- X ( autobiography ).
- John Gielgud: Stage directions. Greenwood Press, Westport, Conn. 1979, ISBN 0-313-21035-7.
- Robert Mangan (ed.): Correspondence of Sir John Gielgud. A life in Letters. Arcade Publ, New York 2004, ISBN 1-55970-729-1 ).
- Robert Tanitch: Gielgud. Harrap, London, 1988, ISBN 0-245-54560-3 (biography).