Terence Stamp: from arthouse icon to blockbuster villain
An emblem of London's "Swinging Sixties", he showed off a magnetic screen presence from his earliest roles, immediately gaining awards and fans.
He made his breakthrough in 1962 playing an angelic sailor hanged for killing one of his crewmates in Peter Ustinov's "Billy Budd", earning an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe.
He would also win best male actor at Cannes in 1965 for "The Collector", a twisted love story based on a John Fowles novel.
Stamp was born in London on July 22, 1938. His father stoked ship boilers and his family of seven crammed into a tenement with no bathroom in east London.
In later interviews, he would recount experiencing hunger during his childhood, as well as facing problems at school because of his working-class accent.
Discovered by Fellini
Inspired by Gary Cooper and James Dean, he dreamed of being an actor from an early age and left home at 17 -- taking a scholarship to a drama school against his father's wishes.
In the early 1960s, British cinema began to take an interest in the working class and Ken Loach hired Stamp for his first film, "Poor Cow" in 1967.
His meeting with Italian director Federico Fellini that same year was decisive.
While searching for "the most decadent English actor" for his segment of "Spirits of the Dead", Fellini cast Stamp as a drunk actor seduced by the devil in the guise of a little girl.
Another Italian director, Pier Paolo Pasolini, cast him in 1969's "Theorem" as an enigmatic outsider who seduces the members of a bourgeois Milan family.
But Stamp's scandalous roles fell out of fashion and he struggled to find work for a decade.
He embarked on a mystical world tour and settled in India, where he was studying in an ashram in 1977 when his agent got in touch and offered him the role of General Zod in "Superman".
From 'Priscilla' back to hard men
His career took off again and he soon became a go-to face for Hollywood directors looking for British villains.
The role of Bernadette in "Priscilla" came in the mid-1990s, just as he was growing weary of those Hollywood hardmen roles.
A few years later though, he returned to familiar stomping ground for the "The Limey", playing a British ex-con who travels to California to find out who killed his daughter.
Director Steven Soderbergh used scenes from "Poor Cow" that capture Stamp in his dazzling years as a sixties English beauty.
One of his last films, Last Night in Soho (2021), was a supernatural thriller in which a teenager was haunted by characters from London's Swinging Sixties -- bringing Stamp full circle on a dazzling career.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
France 24
a day ago
- France 24
Terence Stamp: from arthouse icon to blockbuster villain
His bold, decades-long career swung between big productions Michael Cimino's "The Sicilian" to independent films such as Stephen Frears's "The Hit" or Steven Soderbergh's "The Limey". An emblem of London's "Swinging Sixties", he showed off a magnetic screen presence from his earliest roles, immediately gaining awards and fans. He made his breakthrough in 1962 playing an angelic sailor hanged for killing one of his crewmates in Peter Ustinov's "Billy Budd", earning an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe. He would also win best male actor at Cannes in 1965 for "The Collector", a twisted love story based on a John Fowles novel. Stamp was born in London on July 22, 1938. His father stoked ship boilers and his family of seven crammed into a tenement with no bathroom in east London. In later interviews, he would recount experiencing hunger during his childhood, as well as facing problems at school because of his working-class accent. Discovered by Fellini Inspired by Gary Cooper and James Dean, he dreamed of being an actor from an early age and left home at 17 -- taking a scholarship to a drama school against his father's wishes. In the early 1960s, British cinema began to take an interest in the working class and Ken Loach hired Stamp for his first film, "Poor Cow" in 1967. His meeting with Italian director Federico Fellini that same year was decisive. While searching for "the most decadent English actor" for his segment of "Spirits of the Dead", Fellini cast Stamp as a drunk actor seduced by the devil in the guise of a little girl. Another Italian director, Pier Paolo Pasolini, cast him in 1969's "Theorem" as an enigmatic outsider who seduces the members of a bourgeois Milan family. But Stamp's scandalous roles fell out of fashion and he struggled to find work for a decade. He embarked on a mystical world tour and settled in India, where he was studying in an ashram in 1977 when his agent got in touch and offered him the role of General Zod in "Superman". From 'Priscilla' back to hard men His career took off again and he soon became a go-to face for Hollywood directors looking for British villains. The role of Bernadette in "Priscilla" came in the mid-1990s, just as he was growing weary of those Hollywood hardmen roles. A few years later though, he returned to familiar stomping ground for the "The Limey", playing a British ex-con who travels to California to find out who killed his daughter. Director Steven Soderbergh used scenes from "Poor Cow" that capture Stamp in his dazzling years as a sixties English beauty. One of his last films, Last Night in Soho (2021), was a supernatural thriller in which a teenager was haunted by characters from London's Swinging Sixties -- bringing Stamp full circle on a dazzling career.
France 24
a day ago
- France 24
Terence Stamp, Superman villain and 'swinging sixties' icon, dies aged 87: UK media
"He leaves behind an extraordinary body of work, both as an actor and as a writer that will continue to touch and inspire people for years to come," media quoted the family saying. From Pier Paolo Pasolini's "Theorem" to George Lucas's "Star Wars", the "swinging sixties" icon captivated audiences in both arthouse films and Hollywood with his magnetic presence, making more than 60 films during his genre-spanning career. The London actor from a working-class background, born on July 22, 1938 had his first breakthrough in the role of a dashing young sailor hanged for killing one of his crewmates. Peter Ustinov's "Billy Budd" earning him an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe for Best New Actor. Carving out a niche for his alluring depictions of broody villains, he won Best Actor at Cannes in 1965 for his role as a psychopathic character in "The Collector", a twisted love story by William Wyler. His 1967 encounter with Federico Fellini, who was searching for the "most decadent English actor" for his adaptation of "Extraordinary Stories", was transformative. The Italian director found his "Toby Dammit", a drunken actor seduced by the devil in the guise of a little girl. And Pasolini, who cast him in the cult classic "Theorem", saw him as a "boy of divine nature". In 1969, Stamp played an enigmatic visitor who seduced an entire bourgeois Milanese family. He also had a relationship with Jean Shrimpton -- model and beauty of the sixties -- before she left him towards the end of the 1960s. "I was so closely identified with the 1960s that when that era ended, I was finished with it," he once told French daily Liberation. But a dry spell did not last long, with Stamp reviving his career for some of his most popular roles, including in 1980's "Superman II", as Superman's arch-nemesis General Zod. Other roles followed, including that of Bernadette, a transgender woman in "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert" (1994), in which Stamp continued his exploration of human ambiguity, this time in fishnet stockings. He continued to pursue a wide-ranging career, jumping between big-budget productions like "Star Wars" and independent films like Stephen Frears' "The Hit" and Ken Loach's British drama "Poor Cow".
France 24
a day ago
- France 24
Terence Stamp in five films
Here are five that gained classic or cult status: 'Billy Budd' (1962) Adapted from Herman Melville's short novel about a dashing sailor, Stamp won immediate acclaim for his first major screen performance playing the titular character. British legend Peter Ustinov directed the film and starred as the ship's captain, who has to intervene when drama breaks out between Budd and a comrade. An adaption of Melville's novel had enjoyed a popular run on Broadway in the 1950s before its movie adaptation, which picked up four BAFTAs, a Golden Globe win and an Oscar nod for Stamp. 'The Collector' (1965) Never more handsome or disturbing, Stamp played a kidnapper with a chip on his shoulder and a passion for collecting butterflies who captures a young woman and locks her up in his basement. The adaptation by William Wyler of John Fowles's classic novel brought out all the twisted power and class dynamics explored in the book, and was a triumph at Cannes, picking up best actor for Stamp. 'Theorem' (1968) This near-wordless cult classic by Italian master Pier Paolo Pasolini gets under the skin of bourgeois life through the arrival of a stranger, played by Stamp, into a rich family. Mysterious, attractive, he lures various family members into sex and in doing so unlocks forbidden passions, though what he unleashes is hardly happiness. Pasolini's film, which was initially banned, is "a blistering Marxist treatise on sex, religion, and art and a primal scream into the void," according to the Criterion Collection. It was Stamp's second collaboration with an Italian legend after shooting the short "Toby Dammit" earlier that year with Federico Fellini. "The great experience of my life was working with Fellini. It was a peak in the way I was performing at the time," Stamp said in a 2017 interview. But shooting "Theorem" was a rather different experience -- he had no lines and Pasolini barely spoke to him at all. "He had his own agenda. He was creating an ambience that I was part of." 'The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert' (1994) One of the most madcap and memorable comedies of the 1990s was a surprise popular hit worldwide and brought queer cinema into the mainstream. Stamp played a transgender woman accompanied by two drag queens driving a bus through the Australian outback in hope of meeting new friends. With its array of outlandish outfits and make-up, the film won best costume design at the Oscars and has inspired several stage musicals around the world. "It was only when I got there, and got through the fear, that it became one of the great experiences of my whole career," said Stamp. "It was probably the most fun thing I've ever done in my life." 'Last Night in Soho' (2022) Edgar Wright's British indie hit mixing horror and time travel featured Stamp as a shady but charming barfly with a mysterious connection to Swinging Sixties London. He spooks a fashion student who has flashbacks to the 1960s, when Soho was full of brothels rather than sandwich shops, and the film takes a devilish turn with Diana Rigg as a landlady hiding many skeletons in her cupboard.
