Goodbye to a legend: acting world mourns John Hurt
HE played the Elephant Man, mad Emperor Caligula and the world’s most flamboyant gay icon Quentin Crisp. Last night as news of his death broke, John Hurt’s wife Anwen led tributes to the veteran actor who died aged 77. She said it will be a “strange world” without her husband, who she described as the “most gentlemanly of gentlemen”.
Hurt, one of Britain’s most treasured actors, also famously starred in Alien – providing the memorable stomach-bursting scene – and in the movie version of George Orwell’s 1984.
The Oscar-nominated actor passed away at his home in Norfolk after a long battle with pancreatic cancer.
Since being diagnosed in June 2015 he had continued working, starring recently in the Oscar-nominated biopic of President John F Kennedy’s widow, Jackie. He spent the last years of his life working on a number of films still to be released. He will be seen starring as Ralph, a successful screenwriter who is facing terminal illness, in That Good Night, which takes its name from the poem by Dylan Thomas. A spokesman for the producers of That Good Night expressed their “sincere condolences” following his death.
He completed filming for the role, described as “poignant” by producers, months before his death as he continued to work at a prodigious rate. He will also be seen starring in the thriller Damascus Cover and the upcoming biopic of boxer Lenny McLean, My Name Is Lenny. He was also filming Darkest Hour, in which he starred as Neville Chamberlain opposite Gary Oldman’s Winston Churchill. It is due to be released on December 29.
As he was battling cancer in 2015 Hurt said he did not wish for an afterlife. “I hope I shall have the courage to say, ‘Vroom! Here we go! Let’s become different molecules!”
Hurt, who said in October 2015 that the cancer was in remission, had been due to appear in The Entertainer in July last year but had been forced to withdraw due to ill health. He had been due to play Billy Rice in the Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company production, directed by Rob Ashford.
The actor, known for his unmistakable voice, got his Oscar nominations for The Elephant Man and Midnight Express. But it was his role in the 1975 landmark TV film The Naked Civil Servant, based on Crisp’s memoirs of life as a young gay man growing up in 1920s Britain, that helped propel Hurt to prominence and earned him a Bafta. This was despite warnings that he would be typecast as a gay man after the role. With the film credited with helping change British attitudes toward homosexuality, he reprised the role in a follow-up 24 years later. An Englishman in New York chronicled the years Crisp spent in the US.
The son of a vicar, he played a huge variety of characters. He recently found new fans when he starred as a “forgotten” incarnation of the Doctor, known as the War Doctor, in Doctor Who. He won four Bafta Awards, including a lifetime achievement accolade in recognition of his outstanding contribution to British cinema in 2012. Mel Brooks, who produced the Elephant Man, described Hurt as “cinematic immortality” as tributes poured in for the star.
Hurt also played the part of wand-maker Mr Ollivander in the Harry Potter films. Author of the books, JK Rowling said: “So very sad to hear that the immensely talented and deeply beloved John Hurt has died. My thoughts are with his family and friends.”
Scots actor John Barrowman posted: “Sir John Hurt showed us that your career can be diverse as the characters you play. So many wonderful performances.”
Michael Caton-Jones, who directed the actor in several films, described him in 2006, as “one of the greatest screen actors ever, and one of the bravest – because he’s all about honest emotion. People think actors have to pretend or lie. The best actors, like John, know they have to search for the truth.” Hurt is survived by his wife and sons Alexander and Nick, from his third marriage to Jo Dalton.