Alec Guinness

At 86 years old, Alec Guinness has this physical status:

Sir Alec Guinness de Cuffe (born Alec Guinness de Cuffe, dated 2 April 1914 – 5 August 2000) was an English actor.

Guinness appeared in many of the Ealing Comedies, including The Ladykillers and Kind Hearts and Coronets, during which he appeared in nine different characters.

He is best known for his six collaborations with David Lean (1946), Fagin in Oliver Twist (1948), Col.

Nicholson in The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), for which he received the Academy Award for Best Actor), Prince Faisal in Lawrence of Arabia (1960), Professor George Zhivago (1965), and Professor Godbole in A Passage to India (1984).

He is also known for his role as Obi-Wan Kenobi in George Lucas' original Star Wars trilogy; for the original film, he was nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the 50th Academy Awards. Guinness was one of three British actors, along with Laurence Olivier and John Gield, who made the transition from theater to film following the Second World War.

During the invasion of Sicily and Elba, Guinness served in the Royal Naval Reserve during the conflict and commanded a landing craft.

He was granted permission to appear in the stage play Flare Path about RAF Bomber Command during the war. Guinness has been nominated for an Academy Award, a BAFTA, a Golden Globe, and a Tony Award.

He was knighted by Elizabeth II in 1959 for services to the arts.

In 1960, he was a member of the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and the Academy Honorary Award for lifetime achievement in 1980 and 1989 BAFTA Academy Fellowship Fellowship.

Guinness appeared in nine films that were included in the BFI's 100 best British films of the twentieth century, five of Lean's films.

Early life

Alec Guinness de Cuffe was born in Maida Vale, London, at 155 Mansions South. Agnes Cuff, his mother's maiden name, was born on December 8th, 1890 to Edward Cuff and Mary Ann Benfield. Agnes de Cuffe's mother's name is given on Guinness' birth certificate; the baby's name (where first names are not included) is listed as Alec Guinness, but there are no details about him.

Guinness's father's identity has never been disclosed. The father's name could only be entered on the certificate if he were present and gave his consent from 1875, when an illegitimate child was born. Andrew Geddes (1861-1908), who paid for Guinness's boarding-school education at Pegwell Lodge and Roborough in Eastbourne, is Guinness's father. Geddes and his mother, posing as an uncle, visit Guinness and his mother on occasion. Guinness's mother later married Stiven, a Scottish army captain whose behavior was often erratic or even violent.

Personal life

Guinness married actress Merula Silvia Salaman (1914–2000), but the artist, playwright, and actress Merula Salaman (1940–2005) married Marlene Guinness; later, they had a son named Matthew Guinness, who later became an actor. The family lived at Kettlebrook Meadows, near Steep Marsh, Hampshire, since the 1950s. Eusty Salaman, Merula's brother, was involved in the building's construction. Nesta Guinness-Walker, his great-grandson, is a professional footballer.

Alec Guinness: The Unknown, Garry O'Connor's biography, claims Guinness was arrested and fined 10 guineas (£10.50) for a homosexual infringement in a public lavatory in Liverpool in 1946. Guinness is accused of avoiding public view by giving his name to investigator and court as "Herbert Pocket," the name of the character he played in Great Expectations. However, there has been no evidence of any arrests since being discovered. "The rumour, Piers Paul Read's book, suggests, is possibly a conflation of tales about Alec's 'cottaging' and the detention of John Gield in a Chelsea public lavatory after dining with the Guinnesses at St. Peter's Square." This remark was not made until April 2001, eight months after his death, when a BBC showbiz article linked that Guinness was bisexual and that his sexuality was kept private from the public eye, and that only his closest friends and relatives knew he had sexual relations with men.

Guinness had hoped to become an Anglican priest while serving in the Royal Navy. A local boy mistakenly identified Father Brown in Burgundy, Guinness, as a Catholic priest. Guinness was far from fluent in French, and the child seemed to have no idea that Guinness did not know him but took his hand and chattered while strolling; the child then waved and trotted off; Guinness was disobeyed. The actor's clerical clothing seemed to instill in him a deep impression. Guinness's son was sick with polio at the age of 11, so they began going to the church to pray. Guinness converted to the Roman Catholic Church a few years later, in 1956. His wife, who was of paternal Sephardi Jewish descent, followed suit in 1957 while filming The Bridge on the River Kwai in Ceylon, but she only told him after the fact. Guinness recited a passage from Psalm 143, "Cause me to hear your loving kindness in the morning."

Source

Early career

Guinness was the first one to write advertising copy. On his 20th birthday (2 April 1934), he was a student at the Fay Compton Studio of Dramatic Art in Hammersmith, opening at the old King's Theatre, Hammersmith, and then moving to the West End's Playhouse, where his salary was increased from a walk-on to understudying two lines. He appeared in the New Theatre in 1936 at the age of 22, as Osric in John Gield's smashing production of Hamlet. Guinness debuted with the Old Vic in 1936, where he appeared in a sequence of classic roles. He took classes at the London Theatre Studio in the 1930s. In 1939, he took over for Michael Redgrave as Charleston's Thunder Rock, a road show revival of Robert Ardrey's Thunder Rock. Guinness worked with many actors and actresses who would be his colleagues and frequent co-stars in the future, including Gielson, Ralph Richardson, Peachcroft, Anthony Quayle, and Jack Hawkins. Stan Laurel, a film star who Guinness adored, was a source of early influence.

Guinness continued to act in Shakespearean roles throughout his career. He appeared in Richard II and Lorenzo in The Merchant of Venice under John Gield's direction in 1937. He appeared in Hamlet's 1938 production, earning him acclaim on both directions of the Atlantic. He appeared in Romeo and Juliet (1939), Malvolio in Twelfth Night, and in Henry V in 1937, both opposite Laurence Olivier and Ferdinand in The Tempest, opposite Gield as Pro Prospero. He adapted Charles Dickens' book Great Expectations for the stage in 1939, starring Herbert Pocket. The play was a success. David Lean, a young British film editor who would later have Guinness reprise his appearance in Lean's 1946 film version of the play, was one of its viewers.

Postwar stage career

Guinness returned to the Old Vic in 1946 and remained in that role until 1948, playing Abel Drugger in Ben Jonson's The Fool in King Lear opposite Laurence Olivier in the title role, DeGuiche in Cyrano de Bergerac opposite Ralph Richardson in the title role, and then acting as Shakespeare's Richard II. Eric Birling played Eric Birling in J. after leaving the Old Vic. In October 1946, B. Priestley's An Inspector Calls at the New Theatre. He appeared in T. S. Eliot's The Cocktail Party (1950, revived at the Edinburgh Festival in 1968). In 1951, Hamlet appeared at the New Theatre in the West End under his own direction.

Guinness, a Canadian boy invited by his friend Tyrone Guthrie to attend the Stratford Festival of Canada's premiere season, lived for a short time in Stratford, Ontario. Guinness sang the first lines of Shakespeare's first play, Richard III, on July 13, 1953: "Now is the winter of our dissatisfied summer by this sun of York."

Guinness was named after a Tony Award for his Broadway appearance as Welsh poet Dylan Thomas in Dylan. He appeared in Macbeth opposite Simone Signoret at the Royal Court Theatre in 1966. In the play A Walk in the Woods, Guinness made his final stage appearance at the Comedy Theatre in the West End on May 30th. All in all, he appeared in 77 productions between 1904 and 1989.

Film career

Guinness made his film debut in the drama Grand Expectations (1946). However, he was first well-known for the Ealing Comedies (1949), and particularly for his appearance in nine characters in Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949). His other films from this period included The Lavender Hill Mob, The Man in the White Suit (both 1951) and The Ladykillers (1955), with all three of them ranked among the Top British films of the time. In 1950, he portrayed 19th-century British prime minister Benjamin Disraeli in The Mudlark, which included an uninterrupted seven-minute speech in Parliament. Guinness played in his first romantic lead role in 1952, opposite Petula Clark in The Card. Exhibitors voted him the most popular British celebrity in 1951. Peter Sellers, who would be best known for starring a variety of characters in a film, was inspired by Guinness, with Sellers' first major film role appearing alongside his idol in The Ladykillers.

Guinness' other notable film appearances of this period included The Swan (1956) with Grace Kelly and the accompanying film script; The Horse's Mouth (1958), which Guinness starred in; and The Last Ten Days (1973), which he described as his best film performance; critics disagreed; And the lead in Jean-George's The Swan (1964) with Richard Coveney (1971); and Marcus Autry's The Swan (1966), which was also a nominees Major Jock Sinclair of Tunes of Glory (1960) is another role that is often referred to as one in which he considered his finest, and is also considered by many observers. In the 1976 Neil Simon film Murder by Death, Guinness appeared as Jamessir Bensonmum, the blind butler.

Guinness received particular praise for his collaboration with director David Lean, which today is his most celebrated work. He had a starring role opposite William Holden in The Bridge on the River Kwai after appearing in Lean's Great Expectations and Oliver Twist. Guinness received the Academy Award for Best Actor and the BAFTA Award for Best Actor for his service as Colonel Nicholson, the unyielding British POW commanding officer. Despite a difficult and often adversary friendship, Lean, who referred to Guinness as "my good fortune charm," continued to film Guinness in his later films: Arab President Prince Faisal in Lawrence of Arabia; the title character's half-brother, Bolshevik leader Yevgraf, in A Passage to India; Indian mystic Professor Godbole. He had also appeared in Lean's Ryan's Daughter (1970), but decided against it. Guinness "mistrusted" Lean, and suspected the once close relationship to be broken, although he recalled it at Lean's funeral that the respected director had been "charming and affable." Guinness appeared in five Lean films that were ranked in the British Film Institute's 50 Best British Films of the 20th Century (Lawrence of Arabia), 5th (Great Expectations), 11th (The Bridge on the River Kwai), 27th (Doctor Zhivago) and 46th (Oliver Twist).

Guinness's role as Obi-Wan Kenobi in the original Star Wars trilogy, which began in 1977, brought him worldwide recognition, as well as Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations. Guinness referred to the film as "fairy-tale garbage," but the film's sense of moral – as well as the studio's doubling of his initial salary – convinced him to accept the role of Kenobi, but he did not have to do any publicity to advertise the film.

Guinness's share increased by 0.2 percent to 2% of the film's royalties paid to the film's director, George Lucas, who, upon the warm reception of the film by journalists and film reviewers, and as a sign of goodwill for the film's positive revisions and suggestions, Guinness said to Guinness's screenplay, increasing his share to 4.5 percent. Kurtz revised Lucas's offer down by 0.2 percent when Guinness inquired about the film's producer Gary Kurtz's ownership and sought a written deal so as to quantify his earnings, the director's share dropped by 0.2 percent, bringing Guinness's share of the royalties paid to the director down by 0.2 percent (Lucas received one-fifth percent of the overall box office profits down by 0.3 percent). In his later years, he was very wealthy.

Guinness wrote in his diary, "It's a very surprising film as spectacle and technically brilliant." Very loud, very crowded, and warm-hearted. The battle scenes at the end last five minutes, to me, are excruciating, and a lot of it is lost in chaos, but it is still a vivid experience."

Following that the Star Wars trilogy was released, Guinness became dissatisfied with being identified with the role and expressed dissatisfaction with the fan. Lucas says Guinness was not content with the script rewrite in which Obi-Wan is killed in the original Star Wars DVD commentary. Guinness said in a 1999 interview that it was really his idea to murder Obi-Wan, persuading Lucas that it would make him a better character, and that Lucas agreed to the proposal. "I didn't tell Lucas that I couldn't go on speaking those bloody, banal lines," Guinness said in the interview. "I had enough of the mumbo jumbo." When Star Wars was mentioned to him, he "shrivelled up."

Despite Guinness's dissatisfaction with the fame that followed and he did not hold the position in high regard, Lucas and fellow cast members Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Kenny Baker, Kenny Baker, and Anthony Daniels have all praised his courtesy and professionalism on and off the set. Lucas credited him with causing the cast and crew to work harder, and he claims that Guinness played a key role in the film's completion. Guinness was quoted as saying that the royalties he gained from working on the films had left him "no complaints; let me leave it by saying that I can live for the rest of my life in a more modest manner than I am used to, that I have no debts, and I can afford to avoid work that doesn't interest to me." Guinness' autobiography, Blessings in Disguise, tells an imaginary interviewer, "Blessed be Star Wars" about the money that was received. As a force ghost apparition to the trilogy's main character Luke Skywalker, Guinness appeared in the film's sequels The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Return of the Jedi (1983).

The American Film Institute selected Obi-Wan Kenobi as the 37th-greatest hero in cinema history in 2003. Guinness's voice was recorded digitally enhanced in the films Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019).

Source