Birthday:
2 April 1914, Marylebone, London, England, UK
Height:
5' 10" (1.78 m)
Biography
Alec Guinness de Cuffe was born on April 2, 1914 in
Marylebone, London, England. While working in advertising, he studied at
the Fay Compton Studio of Dramatic Art, debuting on stage in 1934 and
played classic theater with the Old Vic from 1936. In 1941, he entered
the Royal Navy as a seaman and was commissioned the next year. Beyond an
extra part in Evensong (1934), his film career began after World War II
with his portrayal of Herbert Pocket in Great Expectations (1946). A
string of films, mostly comedies, showed off his ability to look
different in every role, eight of them, including a woman, in one movie
alone, Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949). His best known recent work was
as the Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars (1977) and its sequels.
He earned a Best Actor Oscar and Golden Globe in The Bridge on the River
Kwai (1957) and an Honorary Academy Award (1980) for "advancing the art
of screen acting through a host of memorable and distinguished
performances". Academy nominations have included The Lavender Hill Mob
(1951) (actor); The Horse's Mouth (1958) (screenplay); Star Wars (1977)
(supporting) and Little Dorrit (1988) (supporting). He was awarded
Knight Bachelor of the Order of the British Empire in the 1959 Queen's
Honours List for his accomplishments in theater and the film industry.
Sir Alec Guinness died at age 86 of liver cancer on August 5, 2000
Film career
In films, Guinness was initially associated mainly with the Ealing Comedies, and particularly for playing eight different characters in Kind Hearts and Coronets. Other films from this period included The Lavender Hill Mob, The Ladykillers, and The Man in the White Suit. In 1952, director Ronald Neame cast Guinness in his first romantic lead role, opposite Petula Clark in The Card. In 1951, exhibitors voted him the most popular British star.[13]
Other notable film roles of this period included The Swan (1956) with Grace Kelly, in her second to last film role; The Horse's Mouth
(1958) in which Guinness played the part of drunken painter Gulley
Jimson as well as contributing the screenplay, for which he was
nominated for an Academy Award; the lead in Carol Reed's Our Man in Havana (1959); Marcus Aurelius in The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964); The Quiller Memorandum (1966); Marley's Ghost in Scrooge (1970); Charles I in Cromwell (1970); Pope Innocent III in Franco Zeffirelli's Brother Sun, Sister Moon (1972); and the title role in Hitler: The Last Ten Days (1973), which he considered his best film performance, though critics disagreed.[14]
Guinness also played the role of Jamessir Bensonmum, the blind butler, in the 1976 Neil Simon film Murder by Death.
Filmography
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1934 | Evensong | Extra (World War I soldier in audience) | uncredited |
| 1946 | Great Expectations | Herbert Pocket | |
| 1948 | Oliver Twist | Fagin | |
| 1949 | Kind Hearts and Coronets |
|
National Board of Review Award for Best Actor |
| 1949 | A Run for Your Money | Whimple | |
| 1950 | Last Holiday | George Bird | |
| 1950 | The Mudlark | Benjamin Disraeli | |
| 1951 | The Lavender Hill Mob | Henry Holland |
|
| 1951 | The Man in the White Suit | Sidney Stratton | |
| 1952 | The Card | Edward Henry 'Denry' Machin | released in the United States as The Promoter |
| 1953 | The Square Mile | narrator | short subject |
| 1953 | Malta Story | Flight Lt. Peter Ross | |
| 1953 | The Captain's Paradise | Capt. Henry St. James | |
| 1954 | Father Brown | Father Brown | |
| 1954 | The Stratford Adventure | Himself | short subject |
| 1955 | Rowlandson's England | narrator | short subject |
| 1955 | To Paris with Love | Col. Sir Edgar Fraser | |
| 1955 | The Prisoner | The Cardinal | Nominated—BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role |
| 1955 | The Ladykillers | Professor Marcus | |
| 1956 | The Swan | Prince Albert | |
| 1957 | The Bridge on the River Kwai | Col. Nicholson |
|
| 1957 | Barnacle Bill | Captain William Horatio Ambrose | released in the United States as All at Sea |
| 1958 | The Horse's Mouth | Gulley Jimson |
|
| 1959 | Our Man in Havana | Jim Wormold | |
| 1959 | The Scapegoat | John Barratt/Jacques De Gue | |
| 1960 | Tunes of Glory | Maj. Jock Sinclair, D.S.O., M.M. | Nominated—BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role |
| 1962 | A Majority of One | Koichi Asano | |
| 1962 | H.M.S. Defiant | Captain Crawford | |
| 1962 | Lawrence of Arabia | Prince Faisal | |
| 1964 | The Fall of the Roman Empire | Marcus Aurelius | |
| 1965 | Pasternak | Himself | short subject |
| 1965 | Situation Hopeless ... But Not Serious | Wilhelm Frick | |
| 1965 | Doctor Zhivago | Gen. Yevgraf Zhivago | |
| 1966 | Hotel Paradiso | Benedict Boniface | |
| 1966 | The Quiller Memorandum | Pol | |
| 1967 | The Comedians in Africa | Himself | uncredited, short subject |
| 1967 | The Comedians | Major H.O. Jones | Kansas City Film Critics Circle Award for Best Supporting Actor |
| 1970 | Cromwell | King Charles I | |
| 1970 | Scrooge | Jacob Marley's ghost | |
| 1972 | Brother Sun, Sister Moon | Pope Innocent III | |
| 1973 | Hitler: The Last Ten Days | Adolf Hitler | |
| 1976 | Murder by Death | Jamesir Bensonmum | |
| 1977 | Star Wars | Obi-Wan Kenobi |
|
| 1979 | Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy | George Smiley | British Academy Television Award for Best Actor |
| 1980 | The Empire Strikes Back | Obi-Wan Kenobi | |
| 1980 | Raise the Titanic | John Bigalow | |
| 1980 | Little Lord Fauntleroy | Earl of Dorincourt | |
| 1982 | Smiley's People | George Smiley |
|
| 1983 | Lovesick | Sigmund Freud | |
| 1983 | Return of the Jedi | Obi-Wan Kenobi | |
| 1984 | A Passage to India | Professor Godbole | |
| 1985 | Monsignor Quixote | Monsignor Quixote | |
| 1988 | Little Dorrit | William Dorrit |
|
| 1988 | A Handful of Dust | Mr. Todd | |
| 1991 | Kafka | The chief clerk | |
| 1993 | A Foreign Field | Amos | |
| 1994 | Mute Witness | The Reaper | |
| 1996 | Eskimo Day | James |
Box office ranking in Britain
For a number of years, British film exhibitors voted Guinness among
the most popular stars in Britain at the box office via an annual poll
in the Motion Picture Herald.
- 1951: most popular British star (5th overall)[13]
- 1952: 3rd most popular British star[33]
- 1953: 2nd most popular British star
- 1954: 6th most popular British star
- 1955: 10th most popular British star[34]
- 1956: 8th most popular British star[35]
- 1958: most popular star[36]
- 1959: 2nd most popular British star[37]
- 1960: 4th most popular star
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