SIR DEREK JACOBI
Name: Sir Derek Jacobi
Born: 22 October 1938 Leytonstone, London, England
Sir Derek George Jacobi CBE (born 22 October 1938) is an
English actor and director, knighted in 1994 for his services to the theatre.
Like Laurence Olivier, he bears the distinction of holding two knighthoods,
Danish and British. He is regarded to have one of the most outstanding speaking
voices ever with studied tonality and an exceptional elocution in drama.
Jacobi, an only child, was born in Leytonstone, London, England, the son of
Daisy Gertrude (nee Masters), a secretary who worked in a drapery store in
Leyton High Street, and Alfred George Jacobi, who ran a sweet shop and was a
tobacconist in Chingford. His great-grandfather emigrated to England from
Germany during the 19th century. His family was working class. Although a
war baby, he claims a happy childhood. In his teens he went to the Leyton County
High School and became an integral part of the drama club, The Players of Leyton.
At 18, he won a scholarship to the University of Cambridge, where he studied
history and earned his degree. Other younger members of the university at the
time included Ian McKellen (who had an "undeclared and unrequited" crush on him)
and Trevor Nunn. During his stay at Cambridge, he played many parts including
Hamlet, which was taken on a tour to Switzerland where he met Richard Burton. As
a result of his performance of Edward II at Cambridge, he was invited to become
a member of the Birmingham Rep immediately upon his graduation in 1960.
Jacobi quickly came to the fore, and his talent was recognised by Laurence
Olivier, who invited him back home to London to become one of the eight founding
members of the new National Theatre, even though at the time he was relatively
unknown. He played Laertes in the National Theatre's inaugural production of
Hamlet opposite Peter O'Toole in 1963, and Olivier gave him the role of Cassio
in his 1965 film of Othello and of Andrei in Three Sisters in 1970.
After eight years at the National Theatre, Jacobi left in 1971 to pursue
different roles and mediums of expression. In 1972, he starred in the BBC serial
Man of Straw, directed by Herbert Wise. Most of his theatrical work in the 70's
was with the touring classical Prospect Theatre Company, with which he undertook
many roles, including Ivanov, Pericles, Prince of Tyre and A Month in the
Country.
Although Jacobi's name was becoming known and he was increasingly busy with
stage and screen acting, his big breakthrough did not come until 1976. It was
the title role of the BBC's blockbuster series I, Claudius that finally cemented
his increasing reputation with his performance as the stammering, twitching
Emperor Claudius winning him many plaudits. In 1979, thanks to his international
popularity he took Hamlet on an epic theatrical world tour through England,
Egypt, Greece, Sweden, Australia, Japan and China with himself in the
protagonist's role. He was then invited to essay the role once more at Kronborg
Castle, better known as Elsinore Castle, the setting of the play itself. In 1978
he played in the BBC's production of Shakespeare's Richard II, with Sir John
Gielgud and Dame Wendy Hiller.
In 1980, Jacobi took the leading role in the BBC's Hamlet, made his Broadway
debut in The Suicide, and then joined the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) from
1982 to 1985 where he played four demanding roles simultaneously: Benedick in
Shakespeare's Much Ado about Nothing, for which he won a Tony; Prospero in The
Tempest; Peer Gynt; and Cyrano de Bergerac. In 1986, he made his West End debut
in Breaking the Code with the role of Alan Turing. The play was taken to
Broadway. In 1988 Jacobi alternated in West End the title roles of Shakespeare's
Richard II and Richard III in repertoire.
His TV career saw him measure with Inside the Third Reich (1982), where he
played Hitler; Mr Pye (1985); Little Dorrit (1987), from Charles Dickens's book;
The Tenth Man (1988) with Anthony Hopkins and Kristin Scott Thomas.
Jacobi continued to play Shakespeare, notably in Kenneth Branagh's 1989 film of
Henry V (as the Chorus) and made his directing debut as Branagh's director for
the 1988 Renaissance Theatre Company's touring production of Hamlet, which also
played at Elsinore and as part of a Renaissance repertory season at the Phoenix
Theatre in London. The 1990s saw Jacobi keeping on with repertoire stage work in
Kean at the Old Vic, Becket in the West End (the Haymarket Theatre) and Macbeth
at the RSC in both London and Stratford.
He was appointed the joint artistic director of the Chichester Festival Theatre,
with the West End impresario Duncan Weldon in 1995 for a three year tenure. As
an actor at Chichester, he also starred in four plays, including his first Uncle
Vanya in 1996 (he took a second run in 2000). Jacobi's work during the 90's
included the 13 episodes series TV adaptation of the novels by Ellis Peters
Cadfael (1994-1998) and a televised version of Breaking the Code (1996). Film
appearances included performances in Kenneth Branagh's Dead Again (1991),
Branagh's Hamlet (1996) as King Claudius, in John Maybury's Love is the Devil (1998),
a portrait of painter Francis Bacon, and as "The Duke" opposite Christopher
Eccleston and Eddie Izzard in a post-apocalyptic version of Thomas Middleton's
The Revenger's Tragedy (2002).
In 2001, he won an Emmy by mocking his Shakespearean background in the
television sitcom Frasier episode "The Show Must Go Off", in which he played the
world's worst Shakespearean actor: the hammy, loud, untalented Jackson Hedley.
This was his first guest appearance on an American television programme.
Jacobi has done the narration for an audio book version of the Iliad and for The
Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C. S. Lewis. In 2002, Jacobi toured Australia in
The Hollow Crown with Sir Donald Sinden, Ian Richardson and Dame Diana Rigg.
Jacobi also played the role of Senator Gracchus in Gladiator and starred in the
2002 miniseries The Jury.
In 2003, he was involved with Scream of the Shalka, a webcast based on the
science fiction series Doctor Who. He played the voice of the Master alongside
Richard E. Grant as the Doctor. In the same year, he also appeared in Deadline,
an audio drama also based on Doctor Who. In that, he played Martin Bannister, an
ageing writer who makes up stories about "the Doctor", a character who travels
in time and space, the premise being that the series had never made it on to
television. Jacobi later followed this up with an appearance on the Doctor Who
BBC TV series itself, in the June 2007 episode "Utopia". Jacobi appears as the
kindly Professor Yana, who by the end of the episode is revealed to actually be
the Doctor's arch-nemesis, the Master.
In 2004, Jacobi starred in Friedrich Schiller's Don Carlos at the Crucible
Theatre in Sheffield, in an acclaimed production, which transferred to the
Gielgud Theatre in London in January 2005. The London production of Don Carlos
gathered rave reviews. Also in 2004, he starred as Lord Teddy Thursby in the
first of the four-part BBC series The Long Firm, based on Jake Arnott's novel of
the same name. In Nanny McPhee (2005), he played the role of the colourful Mr.
Wheen, an undertaker. He played the role of Alexander Corvinus in the 2006 movie
Underworld: Evolution.
In March 2006, BBC Two broadcast Pinochet in Suburbia, a docudrama about former
Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and the attempts to extradite him from Great
Britain; Jacobi played the leading role. In September 2007, it was released in
the U.S., entitled Pinochet's Last Stand. In 2006, he appeared in the children's
movie Mist, the tale of a sheepdog puppy, he also narrated this movie. In July-August
2006 he played the eponymous role in A Voyage Round My Father at the Donmar
Warehouse, a production which then transferred to the West End.
In February 2007, his feature film The Riddle, directed by Brendan Foley, in
which he stars alongside Vinnie Jones and Vanessa Redgrave, was screened at
Berlin EFM. Jacobi plays twin roles, first a present day London tramp and then
the ghost of Charles Dickens. In March 2007, the BBC's children's programme In
the Night Garden started its run of 200 episodes, with Jacobi as the narrator.
He played Nell's grandfather in ITV's Christmas 2007 adaptation of The Old
Curiosity Shop, and appears in two forthcoming films: Morris: A Life With Bells
On and Hippie Hippie Shake.
In 2008 he will play Malvolio in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night for the Donmar
Warehouse.
Name: Sir Derek Jacobi
Born: 22 October 1938 Leytonstone, London, England
Sir Derek George Jacobi CBE (born 22 October 1938) is an
English actor and director, knighted in 1994 for his services to the theatre.
Like Laurence Olivier, he bears the distinction of holding two knighthoods,
Danish and British. He is regarded to have one of the most outstanding speaking
voices ever with studied tonality and an exceptional elocution in drama.
Jacobi, an only child, was born in Leytonstone, London, England, the son of
Daisy Gertrude (nee Masters), a secretary who worked in a drapery store in
Leyton High Street, and Alfred George Jacobi, who ran a sweet shop and was a
tobacconist in Chingford. His great-grandfather emigrated to England from
Germany during the 19th century. His family was working class. Although a
war baby, he claims a happy childhood. In his teens he went to the Leyton County
High School and became an integral part of the drama club, The Players of Leyton.
At 18, he won a scholarship to the University of Cambridge, where he studied
history and earned his degree. Other younger members of the university at the
time included Ian McKellen (who had an "undeclared and unrequited" crush on him)
and Trevor Nunn. During his stay at Cambridge, he played many parts including
Hamlet, which was taken on a tour to Switzerland where he met Richard Burton. As
a result of his performance of Edward II at Cambridge, he was invited to become
a member of the Birmingham Rep immediately upon his graduation in 1960.
Jacobi quickly came to the fore, and his talent was recognised by Laurence
Olivier, who invited him back home to London to become one of the eight founding
members of the new National Theatre, even though at the time he was relatively
unknown. He played Laertes in the National Theatre's inaugural production of
Hamlet opposite Peter O'Toole in 1963, and Olivier gave him the role of Cassio
in his 1965 film of Othello and of Andrei in Three Sisters in 1970.
After eight years at the National Theatre, Jacobi left in 1971 to pursue
different roles and mediums of expression. In 1972, he starred in the BBC serial
Man of Straw, directed by Herbert Wise. Most of his theatrical work in the 70's
was with the touring classical Prospect Theatre Company, with which he undertook
many roles, including Ivanov, Pericles, Prince of Tyre and A Month in the
Country.
Although Jacobi's name was becoming known and he was increasingly busy with
stage and screen acting, his big breakthrough did not come until 1976. It was
the title role of the BBC's blockbuster series I, Claudius that finally cemented
his increasing reputation with his performance as the stammering, twitching
Emperor Claudius winning him many plaudits. In 1979, thanks to his international
popularity he took Hamlet on an epic theatrical world tour through England,
Egypt, Greece, Sweden, Australia, Japan and China with himself in the
protagonist's role. He was then invited to essay the role once more at Kronborg
Castle, better known as Elsinore Castle, the setting of the play itself. In 1978
he played in the BBC's production of Shakespeare's Richard II, with Sir John
Gielgud and Dame Wendy Hiller.
In 1980, Jacobi took the leading role in the BBC's Hamlet, made his Broadway
debut in The Suicide, and then joined the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) from
1982 to 1985 where he played four demanding roles simultaneously: Benedick in
Shakespeare's Much Ado about Nothing, for which he won a Tony; Prospero in The
Tempest; Peer Gynt; and Cyrano de Bergerac. In 1986, he made his West End debut
in Breaking the Code with the role of Alan Turing. The play was taken to
Broadway. In 1988 Jacobi alternated in West End the title roles of Shakespeare's
Richard II and Richard III in repertoire.
His TV career saw him measure with Inside the Third Reich (1982), where he
played Hitler; Mr Pye (1985); Little Dorrit (1987), from Charles Dickens's book;
The Tenth Man (1988) with Anthony Hopkins and Kristin Scott Thomas.
Jacobi continued to play Shakespeare, notably in Kenneth Branagh's 1989 film of
Henry V (as the Chorus) and made his directing debut as Branagh's director for
the 1988 Renaissance Theatre Company's touring production of Hamlet, which also
played at Elsinore and as part of a Renaissance repertory season at the Phoenix
Theatre in London. The 1990s saw Jacobi keeping on with repertoire stage work in
Kean at the Old Vic, Becket in the West End (the Haymarket Theatre) and Macbeth
at the RSC in both London and Stratford.
He was appointed the joint artistic director of the Chichester Festival Theatre,
with the West End impresario Duncan Weldon in 1995 for a three year tenure. As
an actor at Chichester, he also starred in four plays, including his first Uncle
Vanya in 1996 (he took a second run in 2000). Jacobi's work during the 90's
included the 13 episodes series TV adaptation of the novels by Ellis Peters
Cadfael (1994-1998) and a televised version of Breaking the Code (1996). Film
appearances included performances in Kenneth Branagh's Dead Again (1991),
Branagh's Hamlet (1996) as King Claudius, in John Maybury's Love is the Devil (1998),
a portrait of painter Francis Bacon, and as "The Duke" opposite Christopher
Eccleston and Eddie Izzard in a post-apocalyptic version of Thomas Middleton's
The Revenger's Tragedy (2002).
In 2001, he won an Emmy by mocking his Shakespearean background in the
television sitcom Frasier episode "The Show Must Go Off", in which he played the
world's worst Shakespearean actor: the hammy, loud, untalented Jackson Hedley.
This was his first guest appearance on an American television programme.
Jacobi has done the narration for an audio book version of the Iliad and for The
Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C. S. Lewis. In 2002, Jacobi toured Australia in
The Hollow Crown with Sir Donald Sinden, Ian Richardson and Dame Diana Rigg.
Jacobi also played the role of Senator Gracchus in Gladiator and starred in the
2002 miniseries The Jury.
In 2003, he was involved with Scream of the Shalka, a webcast based on the
science fiction series Doctor Who. He played the voice of the Master alongside
Richard E. Grant as the Doctor. In the same year, he also appeared in Deadline,
an audio drama also based on Doctor Who. In that, he played Martin Bannister, an
ageing writer who makes up stories about "the Doctor", a character who travels
in time and space, the premise being that the series had never made it on to
television. Jacobi later followed this up with an appearance on the Doctor Who
BBC TV series itself, in the June 2007 episode "Utopia". Jacobi appears as the
kindly Professor Yana, who by the end of the episode is revealed to actually be
the Doctor's arch-nemesis, the Master.
In 2004, Jacobi starred in Friedrich Schiller's Don Carlos at the Crucible
Theatre in Sheffield, in an acclaimed production, which transferred to the
Gielgud Theatre in London in January 2005. The London production of Don Carlos
gathered rave reviews. Also in 2004, he starred as Lord Teddy Thursby in the
first of the four-part BBC series The Long Firm, based on Jake Arnott's novel of
the same name. In Nanny McPhee (2005), he played the role of the colourful Mr.
Wheen, an undertaker. He played the role of Alexander Corvinus in the 2006 movie
Underworld: Evolution.
In March 2006, BBC Two broadcast Pinochet in Suburbia, a docudrama about former
Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and the attempts to extradite him from Great
Britain; Jacobi played the leading role. In September 2007, it was released in
the U.S., entitled Pinochet's Last Stand. In 2006, he appeared in the children's
movie Mist, the tale of a sheepdog puppy, he also narrated this movie. In July-August
2006 he played the eponymous role in A Voyage Round My Father at the Donmar
Warehouse, a production which then transferred to the West End.
In February 2007, his feature film The Riddle, directed by Brendan Foley, in
which he stars alongside Vinnie Jones and Vanessa Redgrave, was screened at
Berlin EFM. Jacobi plays twin roles, first a present day London tramp and then
the ghost of Charles Dickens. In March 2007, the BBC's children's programme In
the Night Garden started its run of 200 episodes, with Jacobi as the narrator.
He played Nell's grandfather in ITV's Christmas 2007 adaptation of The Old
Curiosity Shop, and appears in two forthcoming films: Morris: A Life With Bells
On and Hippie Hippie Shake.
In 2008 he will play Malvolio in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night for the Donmar
Warehouse.