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Denholm Mitchell Elliott (31 May 1922 – 6 October 1992) was an English actor. He appeared in numerous productions on stage and screen, receiving BAFTA awards for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for Trading Places (1983), A Private Function (1984) and Defence of the Realm (1986), and a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of Mr. Emerson in A Room with a View (1985). He is also known for his performances in Alfie (1966), A Doll's House (1973), A Bridge Too Far (1977), Maurice (1987), September (1987), and Noises Off (1992). He portrayed Marcus Brody in Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989). On television, Elliott won the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in 1981 and was nominated for a second for Hotel du Lac (1986).
The American film critic Roger Ebert described Elliott as "the most dependable of all British ." The New York Times called him "a star among supporting players" and "an accomplished scene-stealer". He was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) by Queen Elizabeth II in 1988.
Elliott attended Malvern College and joined the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) in London. He was asked to leave after one term. As Elliott later recalled, "They wrote to my mother and said, 'Much as we like the little fellow, he's wasting your money and our time. Take him away!'"BBC Radio. Desert Island Discs, 14 September 1974.
In the Second World War, he joined the Royal Air Force, training as a wireless operator/air gunner and serving with No. 76 Squadron RAF under the command of Leonard Cheshire. On the night of 23/24 September 1942, his Handley Page Halifax DT508 Record for Halifax DT508, LostAircraft.com bomber took part in an air raid on the U-boat pens at Flensburg, Germany. The aircraft was hit by flak and subsequently ditched in the North Sea near Sylt, Germany. Elliott and four of his crewmen survived, and he spent the rest of the war in Stalag VIII-B, a prisoner-of-war camp in Lamsdorf (now Łambinowice), Silesia. While imprisoned, he became involved in amateur dramatics. He formed a theatre group that was so successful it toured other POW camps playing Twelfth Night.
Elliott made many television appearances, which included plays by Dennis Potter such as Follow the Yellow Brick Road (1972), Brimstone and Treacle, (1976) and Blade on the Feather (1980). He starred in the BBC's adaptation of Charles Dickens's short story The Signalman (1976). He also co-starred with Jack Palance in the Canadian-American television film The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1968).
In the 1980s, Elliott won three consecutive British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) Awards for Best Supporting Actor, for playing the butler to Dan Aykroyd and Eddie Murphy in the American comedy film Trading Places (1983), Dr. Swaby in the British comedy film A Private Function (1984), and the drunken journalist Vernon Bayliss in the British political thriller film Defence of the Realm (1986). He received an Academy Award nomination for playing Mr. Emerson in A Room with a View (1985). He also played Marcus Brody, an academic and friend of Indiana Jones, in Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989). A photograph of his character appears in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008), and a reference is made to Brody's death. A statue was also dedicated to Brody outside Marshall College, the school where Indiana Jones teaches. In 1988 Elliott played the Russian mole Povin, around whom the entire plot revolves, in the television miniseries .
Having filmed Michael Winner's The Wicked Lady (1983), Elliott was quoted in a BBC Radio interview as saying that Marc Sinden and he "are the only two British actors I am aware of who have ever worked with Winner more than once, and it certainly wasn't for love. But curiously, I never, ever saw any of the same crew twice." (Elliott in You Must Be Joking! (1965) and The Wicked Lady and Sinden in The Wicked Lady and Decadence). Elliott had worked with Sinden's father, Donald Sinden, in The Cruel Sea. He co-starred with Katharine Hepburn and Harold Gould in the television film Mrs. Delafield Wants to Marry (1986) and with Nicole Kidman in Bangkok Hilton (1989).
In 1988, Elliott was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for his services to acting. His career included many stage performances, including with the Royal Shakespeare Company, and an acclaimed turn as the twin brothers in Jean Anouilh's Ring Round the Moon. His scene-stealing abilities led Gabriel Byrne, his co-star in Defence of the Realm, to say, "Never act with children, dogs, or Denholm Elliott."
Described by the British Film Institute's Screenonline as an actor of "versatile understanding and immaculate technique," Elliott described himself as an instinctive actor and was a critic of Stanislavski's system of acting, saying, "I mistrust and am rather bored with actors who are of the Stanislavski school who think about detail."
Elliott was diagnosed with HIV in 1987 and died of AIDS-related tuberculosis at his home in Santa Eulària des Riu on Ibiza, on 6 October 1992, aged 70. Tributes were paid by actors Donald Sinden and Peter Ustinov, the dramatist Dennis Potter, and Virginia McKenna. Sinden said: "He was one of the finest screen actors and a very special actor at that. He was one of the last stars who was a real gentleman. It is a very sad loss." Ustinov said: "He was a wonderful actor and a very good friend on the occasions that life brought us together." Potter called him "a complicated, sensitive, and slightly disturbing actor" and "a dry, witty, and slightly menacing individual." McKenna added, "It is absolutely dreadful, but the person I am thinking of at the moment more than anybody is his wife. It must be terrible for her." Ismail Merchant described Elliott as "an all-giving person, full of life ... He had an affection and feeling for other actors, which is very unusual in our business."
Elliott's widow set up a charity, the Denholm Elliott Project, and collaborated on his biography.Elliott, Susan; Turner, Barry (1994). Denholm Elliott: Quest for Love. She worked closely with the UK Coalition of People Living with HIV and AIDS. She died on 12 April 2007, aged 65, in a fire in her flat in Hornsey, London. Their daughter Jennifer committed suicide in Ibiza in 2003. In 1995, News of the World had published an article exposing her addiction to heroin and alleging that she was a beggar and prostitute, a piece which the tabloid's former deputy features editor Paul McMullan later admitted had "totally humiliated and destroyed her."
Filmography
Film
1952 1953 1954 1955 1965 1968 1970 1971 1973 1976 1978 1979 1980 1982 Brimstone and Treacle Mr. Tom Bates 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1991
Television
1958 Alfred Hitchcock Presents Jack Lyons Season 3 Episode 34: "The Crocodile Case" 1959 John Manbridge Season 4 Episode 21: "Relative Value" 1963 Hancock Peter Dartford 1 episode 1965 Danger Man Basil Jordan Season 3 Episode 18: The Hunting Party 1966 The Man in Room 17 Defraits 13 episodes Mystery and Imagination Roderick Usher Episode: The Fall of the House of Usher 1968 The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde George Devlin TV film 1968 Mystery and Imagination Count Dracula Episode: Dracula 1972 The Persuaders! Roland Episode: A Death in the Family Follow the Yellow Brick Road Jack Black TV play 1975 Thriller Dr. Frank Henson Episode: The Crazy Kill 1976 Brimstone and Treacle Mr. Tom Bates TV play: Play for Today Clayhanger Tertius Ingpen 9 episodes The Signalman The Signalman TV play 1977 Ripping Yarns Mr. Gregory Episode: Across The Andes by Frog 1980 Hammer House of Horror Norman Shenley Episode: Rude Awakening 1980 Blade on the Feather Jack Hill TV film 1980 Tales of the Unexpected Harold TV Series, Season 3 ep 7, 'The Stinker' 1982 Marco Polo Niccolò Polo 8 episodes 1983 The Hound of the Baskervilles Dr. Mortimer TV film 1984 Camille Count de Noilly TV film 1985 Bleak House John Jarndyce 7 episodes 1986 Mrs. Delafield Wants to Marry George Parker TV film 1987 Hotel du Lac Phillip Neville TV film Scoop Mr. Salter TV film A Child's Christmas in Wales Old Geraint TV film The Happy Valley Sir Henry 'Jock' Delves Broughton TV film 1988 Povin 4 episodes Tom Cotter Episode: The Coffin The Bourne Identity Dr Geoffrey Washburn TV mini-series Noble House Alastair Struan 4 episodes 1989 Bangkok Hilton Hal Stanton 3 episodes 1990 A Green Journey James O'Hannon TV film 1991 A Murder of Quality George Smiley TV film One Against the Wind Father LeBlanc TV film The Black Candle William Filmore TV film
Stage
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!Year
!Title
!Role(s)
!Notes
!Ref. 1946 The Guinea Pig West End debut 1950 Venus Observed Edgar 1950 Ring Round the Moon Frederic, Hugo Broadway debut 1951 The Green Bay Tree Julian 1951 A Sleep of Prisoners 1953 The Confidential Clerk 1957 Monique Fernand Ravinel 1958 Traveller Without Luggage 1960 The Merchant of Venice Bassanio 1960 The Two Gentlemen of Verona Valentine 1960 Troilus and Cressida Troilus 1961 Write Me a Murder The Hon. Clive Rodingham 1964 The Seagull Trigorin 1964 The Crucible Reverend John Hale 1967 The Imaginary Invalid Dr. Diaforus 1967 A Touch of the Poet Cornelius Melody 1967 Tonight at 8.30 Alec Harvey 1970 Come As You Are 1975 The Return of A. J. Raffles A. J. Raffles 1977 The New York Idea 1977 Three Sisters 1989 A Life in the Theatre Robert
Awards and nominations
BBC2 Playhouse: Gentlefolk & In Hiding
Blade on the Feather
Tales of the Unexpected: The Stinker
See also
Notes
External links
Categories: 1922 Births, 1992 Deaths, 20th-century Deaths From Tuberculosis, 20th-century English Lgbtq People, 20th-century English Male Actors, Actors From The Royal Borough Of Kensington And Chelsea, Aids-related Deaths In Spain, Alumni Of The Royal Academy Of Dramatic Art, Best Actor Bafta Award Winners, Best Supporting Actor Bafta Award Winners, British World War Ii Prisoners Of War, Commanders Of The Order Of The British Empire, Donaldson Award Winners, English Bisexual Male Actors, English Expatriates In Spain, English Male Film Actors, English Male Shakespearean Actors, English Male Stage Actors, English Male Television Actors, English Male Voice Actors, English People With Disabilities, Lgbtq People From London, Male Actors From London, People Educated At Malvern College, People From Ibiza, People From Kensington, Aids, Royal Air Force Airmen, Royal Air Force Personnel Of World War Ii, Royal Shakespeare Company Members, Shot-down Aviators, Tuberculosis Deaths In Spain, World War Ii Prisoners Of War Held By Germany
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