Sir John Gielgud Obituary by Kathy Pepmiller
As Shakespeare said, "A Great Spirit gone."
Sir John Gielgud died peacefully "of old age" on Sunday 5/21/00 at the age of 96 at his home in Buckinghamshire, England.
Most of us will remember him as the smooth voiced upper crust gentleman's gentleman from the 1981 film Arthur. A film that according to Gielgud "I turned down a couple of times… I thought (the script) was rather smutty, rather common." A film that also gleaned him a Best Supporting Oscar.
Gielgud continued to work right up to the end. "It's my
whole life," he said. "It's all I can do."
An actor whose portrayal of Hamlet was considered the finest of the 20th century, Gielgud began his career as a stage designer and only turned to acting to please his parents. Making his professional stage debut in 1921 in Shakespeare's Henry V, his final stage role was in Hugo Whitemore's "The best of friends" in 1989.
Gieldgud's made his film debut in 1924 in Who is the Man? going on to complete well over a hundred roles for both the big screen and television. Roles including the voice of King Arthur in Dragonheart (1996), King Constant in TV's Merlin (1998). The voice of Merlin in the Quest for Camelot (1998), and his final role as Pope Paul IV in Elizabeth (1998).
"One's had the odd horror and mishap, but on the whole I have very, very much to be thankful for," he said when he was 87. "And that I can still go on working at this age is extraordinary really; the only sadness is so many of my contemporaries are gone. Most of the actors that I knew well and worked with have died."
He leaves no survivors.
Somehow six paragraphs doesn't seem to be enough to encapsulate a career that spanned 75 years. An era has truly ended.
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