ALBERT FINNEY

Rest in peace Albert Finney who died 7 Februaryaged 82. A Mancunian with strong working class roots, he is seen above in Tom Jones  (Tony Richardson, 1963), an international success and his first Oscar nomination. 

With Shirley Anne Field in Saturday Night and Sunday Morning

An early favourite

Early on he was cast as a lead in films such as Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (Karel Reisz, 1960) and Two For The Road  (Stanley Donen, 1967), but he easily transitioned to character roles in the Seventies, being perhaps best remembered as Hercule Poirot in Murder on The Orient Express  (Sidney Lumet, 1974) and later as Julia Roberts’ boss in Erin Brockovich (Stephen Soderbergh, 2000). He was also David Lean’s first choice for the lead in Lawrence of Arabia (1963), but Finney didn’t want to sign an exclusive multi-year contract with producer Sam Spiegel, so the part went famously to Peter O’Toole instead.. Highly attractive to the opposite sex he married Anouk Aimee amongst 3 others and had a long term relationship with fellow actor Diana Quick. 

with Audrey Hepburn

Big Fish

Big Fish with Tim Burton and Jessica Lange

Bourne Ultimatum

In Skyfall

"I don't think that we necessarily lie. I mean, we make our living by pretending that we're someone else. I don't tell tall tales. I always tell the truth."

Finney (18) and O'Toole (21) while at RADA

"Tall, broad-shouldered, strong limbs moving in athletic grace, copper-nobbed with the merriest pair of twinklers set in square-cut attractive features, his manner easy, intelligent, larky and strong, he fair buzzed with a confident energy, Finney was his name. Albert Finney, a bold young puppy of a bloke, straight out of school, not yet eighteen, he was years younger than I, a mere lad. A gulf of three or four years between young men of twenty or so is massive and yet talent, which as I believe the French say, is a gift given to us by God and which we reveal without perceiving it, came tumbling untroubled from his frame across that wide gap of years and within minutes we had set ourselves to enjoying ourselves hugely  

." Peter O'Toole  with thanks to the redoubtable International Times  

Advertising Joe Orton's 'Loot!'

Finney was nominated five times for the Oscar but never won. However he was a recipient of the BAFTA, Golden Globes, Emmy and Screen Actors Guild awards. He was offered a knighthood by Her Majesty’s government in 2000 but turned it down. Latterly he appeared as a sinister force in the first two Jason Bourne films and one of my personal favourites Tim Burton's 'Big Fish'  He was married three times and his last wife of over twelve years, Pene and son Simon by his first marriage were at his bedside when he passed away.

[compiled Andy Swapp]