
John Hurt
Sir John Vincent Hurt (January 22, 1940 – January 25, 2017) was an English actor whose career spanned over five decades. He came to prominence for his role as Richard Rich in the film A Man for All Seasons (1966) and gained BAFTA Award nominations for his portrayals of Timothy Evans in 10 Rillington Place (1971) and Quentin Crisp in television film The Naked Civil Servant (1975) – winning his first BAFTA for the latter. He played Caligula in the BBC TV series I, Claudius (1976). Hurt's performance in the prison drama Midnight Express (1978) brought him international renown and earned Golden Globe and BAFTA Awards, along with an Academy Award nomination. His BAFTA-nominated portrayal of astronaut Kane, in the science-fiction horror film Alien (1979), notably included a scene where an alien creature burst out of his chest, named by several publications as one of the most memorable moments in cinema history. Hurt earned his third competitive BAFTA, along with his second Oscar and Golden Globe nominations, as Joseph Merrick in David Lynch's biopic The Elephant Man (1980). Other significant roles during the 1980s included Bob Champion in biopic Champions (1984), Mr. Braddock in the Stephen Frears drama The Hit (1984), Winston Smith in Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984) and Stephen Ward in the drama depicting the Profumo affair, Scandal (1989). Hurt was again BAFTA-nominated for his work in Irish drama The Field (1990) and played the primary villain, James Graham, in the epic adventure Rob Roy (1995). His later films include the Harry Potter film series (2001–11), the Hellboy films (2004 and 2008), supernatural thriller The Skeleton Key (2005), western The Proposition (2005), political thriller V for Vendetta (2005), action adventure Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008), sci-fi action Outlander (2008) and the Cold War espionage film Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011). Hurt reprised his role as Quentin Crisp in An Englishman in New York (2009), which brought his seventh BAFTA nomination. He portrayed the War Doctor in the BBC TV series Doctor Who's 50th anniversary special, "The Day of the Doctor", in 2013. Hurt was regarded as one of Britain's finest actors; director David Lynch described him as "simply the greatest actor in the world". He possessed what was described as the "most distinctive voice in Britain", likened by The Observer to "nicotine sieved through dirty, moonlit gravel". His voice acting career encompassed films such as Watership Down (1978), The Lord of the Rings (1978), The Plague Dogs (1982), The Black Cauldron (1985), Dogville (2003) and Planet Dinosaur (2011) as well as BBC TV series Merlin (2008–2012). In 2012, he was honoured with the Lifetime Achievement BAFTA Award, in recognition of his "outstanding contribution to cinema". He was knighted in 2015 for his services to drama.
268 acting credits
Acting · 268

Doctor Who
2005

Saturday Night Live
1975

NOVA
1974

Golden Globe Awards
1944

Play for Today
1970

Great Performances
1971

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
2001

Merlin
2008

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1
2010

Natural World
1983

Alien
1979

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2
2011

The Sweeney
1975

ITV Playhouse
1967

GMTV
1993

Who Do You Think You Are?
2004

Performance
1991

Parkinson
1998

Playhouse Presents
2012

Hercules
2014

The Storyteller
1988

The Hollow Crown
2012

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
2008

Snowpiercer
2013
Drama 61-67
1961

V for Vendetta
2006

Spaceballs
1987

Perfume: The Story of a Murderer
2006

Gideon's Way
1965

Contact
1997

ScreenPlay
1986

I, Claudius
1976

ITV Saturday Night Theatre
1969

Hellboy
2004

Hellboy II: The Golden Army
2008

A Ghost Story for Christmas
1971

Immortals
2011

Dogville
2003

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
2011

The Jim Henson Hour
1989

Thumbelina
1994

Outlander
2008

The Tigger Movie
2000

New York, I Love You
2008

The Elephant Man
1980

A Turtle's Tale: Sammy's Adventures
2010
HypaSpace
2002

The Skeleton Key
2005

Melancholia
2011

Watership Down
1999

Masters of Science Fiction
2007

The Lord of the Rings
1978

The Black Cauldron
1985

Dead Man
1995

Midnight Express
1978

The Hollywood Greats
1977

Nineteen Eighty-Four
1984

The Confession
2011

Valiant
2005

The Last Panthers
2015

Human Planet
2011

Labyrinth
2012

Picture Windows
1995

Doctor Who: The Day of the Doctor
2013

Rob Roy
1995
The Sunday Drama
1977

Only Lovers Left Alive
2013

Heaven's Gate
1980

Jackie
2016

The Alan Clark Diaries
2004

The Gruffalo
2009

Scandal
1989

A Man for All Seasons
1966

The Proposition
2005

Watership Down
1978

Armchair Theatre
1956

White Mischief
1987

Aria
1987

Captain Corelli's Mandolin
2001

Lost Souls
2000

The Plague Dogs
1982

Manderlay
2005

Waking Sleeping Beauty
2009

Planet Dinosaur
2011

Wessex Tales
1973

King Ralph
1991

Ultramarines: A Warhammer 40,000 Movie
2010

Even Cowgirls Get the Blues
1994

Wild Bill
1995

The Shout
1978

Live Aid
1985

The Hit
1984

Hellboy Animated: Blood and Iron
2007

Crime and Punishment
1979

Recount
2008

Inside the Actors Studio
1994

The Oxford Murders
2008

Sightseers
2012

The Field
1990

Brighton Rock
2010

Thomas & Friends: Sodor's Legend of the Lost Treasure: The Movie
2015

The 50 Greatest Television Dramas
2007

History of the World: Part I
1981

The Gruffalo's Child
2011

Hannibal Hopkins & Sir Anthony
2021

10 Rillington Place
1971

Doctor Who at the Proms
2024

Shooting Dogs
2006

Owning Mahowny
2003

Champions
1984

The Limits of Control
2009

Partners
1982

Damascus Cover
2017

Doctor Who: Wish World & The Reality War
2025

Hiroshima
2005

Little Malcolm and His Struggle Against the Eunuchs
1974

Pride
2004

Miranda
2002

Muse of Fire
2013

Monolith
1993

The Osterman Weekend
1983

Once Upon a Halloween
2005

Doctor Who: The Husbands of River Song
2015

Richard Attenborough: A Life in Film
2014

From the Hip
1987

Frankenstein Unbound
1990

The Pied Piper
1972

Jayne Mansfield's Car
2013

The Disappearance
1977

Hellboy: The Seeds of Creation
2004

The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot
2013

The Beast Within: Making Alien
2003

Night Crossing
1982

The Strange Case of Yukio Mishima
1985

The World of Jim Henson
1994

The Journey
2017

New Blood
1999

Swan Lake 3D - Live from the Mariinsky Theatre
2013

Second Best
1994

Jonathan Ross Presents for One Week Only: David Lynch
1990

Jake Speed
1986

Alpha to Omega: Exposing 'The Osterman Weekend'
2004

Crime and Punishment
2002

44 Inch Chest
2009

The Alien Saga
2002

Brute
1997

The Bengali Night
1988

The Naked Civil Servant
1975

Doctor Who Live: The Afterparty
2013

Who Bombed Birmingham?
1990

An Englishman in New York
2009

That Good Night
2017

King Lear
1983

East of Elephant Rock
1977

Little Sweetheart
1989

Love and Death on Long Island
1998

If... Dog... Rabbit
1999

ChickLit
2016

All the Little Animals
1999

Mr. Forbush and the Penguins
1971

Spectre
1977

Tabloid
2001

Making History: Mel Brooks on Creating the World
2009

The Wild and the Willing
1962

Doctor Who: The Night of the Doctor
2013

Hello: A Portrait Of Leslie Phillips
2013

More Than Honey
2012

The Commissioner
1998

The Ghoul
1975

Romeo.Juliet
1990

The Climb
1998

Verity Lambert: Drama Queen
2008

Planet Dinosaur: Ultimate Killers
2012

Dmitri Shostakovich: A Man of Many Faces
2015

Six Characters in Search of An Author
1992

Lecture 21
2008

Bait
2002

Whistle and I'll Come to You
2010

Wimbledon The Official Film 2014
2014

The Snipist
2012

Sinful Davey
1969

My Name Is Lenny
2017

Boxes
2007

Success Is the Best Revenge
1984

Before Winter Comes
1969

Ballybrando
2009

The Sailor from Gibraltar
1967

Red Fox
1991

Meeting Che Guevara & the Man from Maybury Hill
2003

The Journey – Stories from the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa
2011

Three Dangerous Ladies
1977

Resident Alien
1990

In Love with Alma Cogan
2011

Night Train
1998
Hiroshima: The First Weapon of Mass Destruction
2005

Henry Fonda for President
2025

Love at First Sight
2010

Deadline
1988

Benjamin Britten: Peace and Conflict
2013

I Dreamt I Woke Up
1991

Stream Line
1976

David Macaulay: Pyramid
1989

Windprints
1990

Whaledreamers
2006

The Plot Against Harold Wilson
2006

The Day of the Doctor: Cinema Intro
2013

Check the Gate: Putting Beckett on Film
2003

In Search of Gregory
1969

Great Moments in Aviation
1994
The Pity of War: The Loves and Lives of the War Poets
2016
Remembrance
2009

Tender Loving Care
1996

A.K.A Nadia
2015

I, Claudius: A Television Epic
2002

Dark at Noon
1992
Journey to Knock
1991

After Darkness
1985

Edge of the Universe
2002
The Hunting of the Snark
1987

This Is My Street
1964

The Alchemist's Letter
2015

You're Dead...
1999

The Confession
2011

Paul McCartney: From Rio to Liverpool
1990

The Storyteller: Fearnot
1988

Lou
2010

On Borrowed Time
2011
On Jupiter
1995

Thames Film
1986

Vincent
1987

Short Order
2005

The Final Reel
2016

Shaolin: Wheel of Life
2001

Shadowing the Third Man
2004
Behind Jim Jarmusch
2010

Lapse of Memory
1991

The Hidden Wars of Desert Storm
2001

'V for Vendetta' Unmasked
2006

Interview with John Hurt
2007

The Storyteller: The Heartless Giant
1988

23 Degrees, 5 Minutes
2011
The Playboy of the Western World
1974

The Storyteller: Hans My Hedgehog
1988

Picture Windows: Two Nudes Bathing
1995

The Peddler
1976

The Storyteller: The True Bride
1988

Sunset People
1984

Sailcloth
2011

The Storyteller: The Luck Child
1988

Break
2015

The Storyteller: A Story Short
1988
The Twilight Hour: Visions of Ireland's Haunted Past
2002

The Terrible Elephant Man Revealed
2001
Paul McCartney - Take It Away
1982

Iceberg
1987
An Evening with Quentin Crisp
1980

Back to Utopia
2016

Monolith
1987
Saigon Baby
1995
Rocinante
1986

Rabbit Ears - Aladdin and the Magic Lamp
1994

Centenary: The BP Story
2009

Krapp's Last Tape
2000
Green Julia
1971
Frightmares
1987

Ayamé
2018

The Storyteller: Sapsorrow
—

The Storyteller: The Soldier and Death
1988