British actor David Warner, who has starred in several classics and specializes in playing villains, died on Sunday (24/7) in a nursing home in London at the age of 80. . A note written by his children Luke and Melissa Warner made it clear that his death was due to cancer.
“Over the past 18 months he has approached his diagnosis with characteristic grace and dignity … a father whose legacy of overtime has touched the lives of so many over the years. We are heartbroken,” they told the BBC.
David Hattersley Warner was born on July 29, 1941 and trained in the dramatic arts. His classical training led him to work with Peter Hall, head of the prestigious Royal Shakespeare Company, and Tony Richardson, one of the most respected directors in London’s West End. The two were the godfathers of his passage to the screens.
Warner’s film debut was in Tony Richardson’s “The Adventures of Tom Jones” (1963), which gave him the role of Tom Jones’s antagonist brother (Albert Finney) after directing him on stage. He was also the first of several villains in the actor’s career. And after starring in Shakespeare’s productions – and being considered the best Hamlet on the stage -, he was chosen by Peter Hall in a BBC miniseries which adapted four plays by the famous playwright, “The War of the Roses” (1965), as well as to a version of the film for “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” (1968).
For this reason, he did not experience his first contemporary role until 1966, as Vanessa Redgrave’s husband in the comedy “Delicious Madness of Love”.
After working with American directors John Frankenheimer (in “The Kiev Man”) and Sydney Lumet (“The Seagull”) in the UK, Warner was invited to shoot in Hollywood by Sam Peckinpah. But he had a panic attack when he got on the plane and threatened to give up, persuaded by the director to travel by ship to the United States and complete the train journey to the shooting location in the Nevada desert.
Peckinpah was so insistent that he landed Warner for the role of traveling preacher Joshua Duncan Sloane in “Death Keeps No Message” (1970). And he also extended the partnership, going to the UK to shoot “The Realm of Fear” (1971), one of the best films of his career, in which the actor played a key character: a naive man with mental problems, stuck in the the middle of a fight between the American tourist played by Dustin Hoffman and the violent men of a small country town.
Warner was involved in a scandal at the time – he allegedly broke his legs jumping out of a hotel window when his wife surprised him with another woman, presumably Claudia Cardinale – and she didn’t want to get attention with a movie, but instead. director didn’t care. He took advantage of the injury as a character trait and even suggested acting without his name appearing in the credits. For this reason, Warner said in an old interview: “Peckinpah has a place, if not in my heart, in my life.”
Later, the American even cast him as a German officer in “Iron Cross” (1977), a brutal war film that Peckinpah shot in Europe.
Panic attacks worsened and in 1972 Warner escaped an unwelcome montage of “I, Claudius” directed by Tony Richardson. A month later, while watching another show, she began to sweat and feel sick. “I was like, ‘How can they stand there in front of all these people? How do they learn the lines?’ I panicked and left at half-time. “
This made him leave the theater. As a result, his filmography has skyrocketed, earning nearly 100 appearances in films, many of them considered absolute classics, such as Richard Donner’s horror “The Omen” (1976), in which the hapless journalist who discovers the Satanist conspiracy to put the devil’s son into an influential family.
After playing serial killer Jack the Ripper in Nicholas Meyer’s fantasy time travel “A Century in 43 Minutes” (1979) and the evil Evil in Terry Gilliam’s “Time Bandits” (1981), he still stood out as the villain. of “Tron” (1982), which steals the pioneering work of Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) and corrupts it.
He also played comic villains, such as the mad scientist in Carl Reiner’s “The Erotic Doctor” (1983) and three different characters in the “Star Trek” franchise. After debuting as a human representative of the Federation in “Star Trek V: The Final Frontier” (1989), he was a Klingon Chancellor in “Star Trek VI: The Unknown Land” (1991) and a Cardassian officer in two episodes of the series. “Star Trek: The Next Generation” (in 1992).
He has also appeared in many horror films, such as Arthur Hiller’s “The Night Terrors” (1979), Neil Jordan’s “The Company of Wolves” (1984), Anthony Hickox’s “The Passage” (1988), Beira from Madness “(1994), by master John Carpenter, and also in the comedy” My Sweet Vampire “(1987), being approached by Wes Kraven to play Freddy Krueger in the first” A Nightmare on Elm Street “(1984), which ended up not happening Even so, he was directed by Kraven in “Scream 2” (1997).
Warner was also one of the villains in James Cameron’s hit film “Titanic” (1997): the ruthless bodyguard of industrialist Cal Hockley (Billy Zane). He is one of the ape villains in Tim Burton’s remake of “Planet of the Apes” (2001).
His villain experience extended to television and earned him an Emmy for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of the evil Pomponius Falco in the miniseries “Masada” (1981).
Other highlights from his more than 100 television roles include recurring appearances on “Twin Peaks” (in 1991) and “The Larry Sanders Show” (in 1993 and 1994) and the voice acting of two supervillains: Cerebelo, in “Freakazoid!” , and Ra’s al Ghul in three animated Batman and Superman series in the 90s.
His latest works were the characters of the series “Wallander” (from 2008 to 2015), “Ripper Street” (2016) and “The Alienist” (2018), followed by a participation in the film “Mary Poppins Returns” (2018) and one last dub in “Teen Titans Go!” (2020), in which he revived Cerebellum.
Source: Terra
Camila Luna is a writer at Gossipify, where she covers the latest movies and television series. With a passion for all things entertainment, Camila brings her unique perspective to her writing and offers readers an inside look at the industry. Camila is a graduate from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) with a degree in English and is also a avid movie watcher.
