Hugh Bonneville
As he prepares to host Conquering the Antarctic in Cambridge this weekend (Saturday, February 4) here's everything you need to know about the nation's favourite Edwardian aristocrat.
:: Hugh Richard Bonneville Williams was born in London on November 10, 1963.
:: His father was a surgeon and his mother a nurse.
:: Hugh got the acting bug early and, as a child, joined the National Youth Theatre.
:: He read Theology at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, where one of his teachers was the now Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams.
:: While in Cambridge, he appeared in several productions at the city’s Corpus Playroom.
:: He spent six years, from his O-levels to his finals, writing theology notes in a Bible. One afternoon, he lent it to a friend – who promptly lost it.
:: His Cambridge contemporary Sam Mendes later directed him in a production of – fittingly – Alan Bennett’s Habeas Corpus.
:: He speaks fluent French.
:: Bonneville made his professional debut at the Open Air Theatre, Regent’s Park, in 1986, bashing a cymbal in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and understudying Ralph Fiennes as Lysander.
:: After completing just one term at drama school, he started his theatre career with rep seasons in Leicester and Colchester.
:: He has described his time with the Royal Shakespeare Company as “the happiest I’ve ever been” and says he was “devastated” when his contract wasn’t renewed, adding: “I thought I would never work again.”
:: In the early part of his career he was credited as Richard Bonneville.
:: He appeared in a 1995 episode of EastEnders, playing a head teacher.
:: Keep your eyes peeled and you’ll spot him as a military officer in Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies.
:: Years before Downton Abbey’s Earl of Grantham, he played another titled East Anglian – Lord Wisbeach – in the film Piccadilly Jim, also written by Downton creator Julian Fellowes.
:: In 2006, he appeared in the film Scenes of a Sexual Nature, the directorial debut of former King’s School Ely pupil Ed Blum.
:: Bonneville lives in West Sussex with his wife, Lulu Williams, who he met as a teenager, though they didn’t get together until meeting up again years later – after his mum rang her marquee hire company for some chairs.
:: They have a 10-year-old son, Felix.
:: He played the young version of Jim Broadbent’s John Bayley in the 2001 film Iris – and later claimed American audiences hadn’t realised it was two different actors.
:: He loved working with Kate Winslet in Iris, saying of her performance: “You don’t know what to expect, every take is full of possibility. I like the unexpected, even though I’m c**p at delivering it myself. Performance-wise, I’m like a dray horse and they’re colts or bucking broncos.”
:: Asked why Bonneville was perfect to play the Earl of Grantham in Downton Abbey, Julian Fellowes said: “He’s not embarrassed to play an authority figure and is relaxed within it. He is also good looking in a kind of unobvious but realistic way. And I thought he and Elizabeth McGovern as his wife were a very convincing couple. One could imagine them clambering into bed together every night.”
:: Bonneville calls Elizabeth McGovern – who plays Lady Grantham – his “working wife” because it’s the third time they’ve played a married couple.
:: He almost didn’t play the Earl of Grantham: In 2009, Bonneville filmed the pilot for a US series called Legally Mad, in which he played the head of a Chicago law firm. A proposed series was cancelled shortly before it was due to go into production – freeing him up to do Downton Abbey instead.
:: He doesn’t think he’d have made a very good Edwardian earl in real life. “I break into a sweat just thinking about which knife to use when shovelling peas into my mouth,” he says.
:: He can’t understand why people find Lord Grantham sexy. “I don’t get it. I’m a guy in a suit with a labrador – what's sexy about that?”
Read more: http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Whats-on-leisure/Choice/Hugh-Bonneville-02022012.htm
Hugh Bonneville (c) Philip Thorne
:: His father was a surgeon and his mother a nurse.
:: Hugh got the acting bug early and, as a child, joined the National Youth Theatre.
:: He read Theology at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, where one of his teachers was the now Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams.
:: While in Cambridge, he appeared in several productions at the city’s Corpus Playroom.
:: He spent six years, from his O-levels to his finals, writing theology notes in a Bible. One afternoon, he lent it to a friend – who promptly lost it.
:: His Cambridge contemporary Sam Mendes later directed him in a production of – fittingly – Alan Bennett’s Habeas Corpus.
:: He speaks fluent French.
:: Bonneville made his professional debut at the Open Air Theatre, Regent’s Park, in 1986, bashing a cymbal in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and understudying Ralph Fiennes as Lysander.
:: After completing just one term at drama school, he started his theatre career with rep seasons in Leicester and Colchester.
:: He has described his time with the Royal Shakespeare Company as “the happiest I’ve ever been” and says he was “devastated” when his contract wasn’t renewed, adding: “I thought I would never work again.”
:: In the early part of his career he was credited as Richard Bonneville.
:: He appeared in a 1995 episode of EastEnders, playing a head teacher.
:: Keep your eyes peeled and you’ll spot him as a military officer in Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies.
:: Years before Downton Abbey’s Earl of Grantham, he played another titled East Anglian – Lord Wisbeach – in the film Piccadilly Jim, also written by Downton creator Julian Fellowes.
:: In 2006, he appeared in the film Scenes of a Sexual Nature, the directorial debut of former King’s School Ely pupil Ed Blum.
:: Bonneville lives in West Sussex with his wife, Lulu Williams, who he met as a teenager, though they didn’t get together until meeting up again years later – after his mum rang her marquee hire company for some chairs.
:: They have a 10-year-old son, Felix.
:: He played the young version of Jim Broadbent’s John Bayley in the 2001 film Iris – and later claimed American audiences hadn’t realised it was two different actors.
:: He loved working with Kate Winslet in Iris, saying of her performance: “You don’t know what to expect, every take is full of possibility. I like the unexpected, even though I’m c**p at delivering it myself. Performance-wise, I’m like a dray horse and they’re colts or bucking broncos.”
Downton Abbey
:: Bonneville calls Elizabeth McGovern – who plays Lady Grantham – his “working wife” because it’s the third time they’ve played a married couple.
:: He almost didn’t play the Earl of Grantham: In 2009, Bonneville filmed the pilot for a US series called Legally Mad, in which he played the head of a Chicago law firm. A proposed series was cancelled shortly before it was due to go into production – freeing him up to do Downton Abbey instead.
:: He doesn’t think he’d have made a very good Edwardian earl in real life. “I break into a sweat just thinking about which knife to use when shovelling peas into my mouth,” he says.
:: He can’t understand why people find Lord Grantham sexy. “I don’t get it. I’m a guy in a suit with a labrador – what's sexy about that?”
Read more: http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Whats-on-leisure/Choice/Hugh-Bonneville-02022012.htm
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