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Warren Mitchell

 
Quotes By: Warren Mitchell
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"In case of doubt, do a little more than you have to."

"I knew that I did not have to buy into society's notion that I had to be handsome and healthy to be happy. I was in charge of my spaceship and it was my up, my down. I could choose to see this situation as a setback or as a starting point. I chose to begin life again."

"Comedy comes from conflict, from hatred."

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Actor: Warren Mitchell
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Home > Library > Entertainment & Arts > Actors
  • Born: 1926 in London, England
  • Occupation: Actor
  • Active: '50s-'80s
  • Major Genres: Comedy, Drama
  • Career Highlights: The Chain, The Plague Dogs, The Merchant of Venice
  • First Major Screen Credit: Stowaway Girl (1957)

Biography

Warren Mitchell might be the finest actor in England of his generation, which overlaps with Laurence Olivier, Ralph Richardson, John Gielgud, Albert Finney, Michael Caine, Ben Kingsley, and Alan Bates. Mitchell is certainly among the best of his profession from that era and the rival to any of those actors; the difference is that Mitchell has made his career almost exclusively in England. Born Warren Misell to an Orthodox Jewish family in London in 1926, he grew up over his grandmother's fish-and-chips shop in the East End. Misell's mother died when he was 13 and his father did his best holding the family together on his own. At around the same time, young Misell was partly alienated from his family when he chose to fulfill his obligation to the football team for which he was playing by participating in a game on Yom Kippur, the most sacred day in the Jewish calendar.

Misell made it on his own as an actor through some lean years; after training at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, he married, had a family, and watched as his wife got steadier work than he did for many years while he raised the family. Misell's earliest professional credits on stage and screen date from 1954, when the 29-year-old actor, having changed his name to Warren Mitchell, appeared in a production of Can-Can at the Coliseum in London and made an appearance in the feature film Passing Stranger. He did The Threepenny Opera at the Royal Court Theatre, found some television work, and played ever larger roles in movies through the 1950s. Science fiction fans will remember him as Professor Crevett in The Crawling Eye; it was one of many avuncular and older-man roles that Mitchell played successfully in his thirties, following a pattern slightly similar to that of his colleague Lionel Jeffries. His screen work fairly exploded in the late '50s and kept Mitchell busy in character roles for the next decade. American audiences of a certain age may remember him as Abdul in the Beatles's feature film Help! (1965), and he also did some delightful work in episodes of The Avengers.

In 1966, Mitchell got the role that turned him into a star when he won the lead in the television series Till Death Us Do Part. In the series, created by Johnny Speight, Mitchell played belligerent, bigoted, working-class, right-wing zealot Alf Garnett, head of a family that included his long-suffering wife, slightly bubble-headed daughter, and dedicated socialist son-in-law. Mitchell became an instant star on the series, which was an immediate hit in England and was popular enough to attract attention from America, where it was translated by producers Norman Lear and Bud Yorkin into All in the Family and became a star vehicle for Carroll O'Connor, in Alf's transatlantic equivalent, Archie Bunker. Mitchell ended up playing the role of Alf Garnett in numerous follow-up seasons and revivals, as well as a feature film, and the part became a defining point in his career. It also proved to be very controversial, as Mitchell brought so much humanity, and just enough gentleness, to the role of Alf Garnett that one could not be entirely repulsed by the character. Many pundits and columnists felt that he made the bigoted, racist figure too appealing, but others found him to be a compelling presence in the highly repulsive, deeply flawed character, which is the goal of any real actor.

Luckily for his career, Mitchell was able to quickly move into other, better, and different roles, on stage and television, and now he had the recognition to get the offers. This culminated with a wave of recognition, highlighted by the Society of West End Theatre Award (the British equivalent of the Tony Award) for his portrayal of Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman in 1979. Amid essaying roles in a vast range of modern and classical works, Mitchell also portrayed Shylock in the public television production of Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. In more recent years, Mitchell has been acclaimed for his King Lear as well, and entered the 21st century as one of the most highly regarded and popular actors in England. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
Wikipedia: Warren Mitchell
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Home > Library > Miscellaneous > Wikipedia
This is about the English actor. For the U.S. college basketball coach, go to Warren Mitchell (basketball).
Warren Mitchell
Born Warren Misel
14 January 1926 (1926-01-14) (age 83)
Stoke Newington, London
Years active 1951 – present
Spouse(s) Connie (1950 – present)

Warren Mitchell (born 14 January 1926) is an English actor.

Contents

Early life

Mitchell was born Warren Misel in Stoke Newington, London. He is of Russian Jewish descent[1], but describes himself in interviews as an atheist who sometimes believes in God.[2] His father was a glass and china merchant. He was interested in acting from an early age, and attended the Gladys Gordon's Academy of Dramatic Arts in Walthamstow from the age of seven. He did well at school and read physical chemistry at University College, Oxford, for six months. There he met his contemporary Richard Burton, and together they joined the RAF in 1944. He completed his navigator training in Canada just as the war ended[3].

Career

Richard Burton's description of the acting profession had convinced him that it would be better than completing his chemistry degree and so Mitchell attended RADA for two years, performing in the evening with the Unity Theatre. After a short stint as a DJ on Radio Luxembourg, in 1951, Mitchell became a versatile professional actor with straight and comedy roles on stage, radio, film and television. His first broadcast was as a regular on the radio show Educating Archie, and this led to appearances on Hancock's Half Hour. By the late fifties, he regularly appeared on television: as Sean Connery's trainer in boxing drama Requiem for a Heavyweight (1957), with Charlie Drake in the sitcom Drake's Progress (BBC, 1957) and a title role in Three 'Tough' Guys (ITV, 1957), in which he played a bungling criminal. He also appeared in The Avengers and many ITC drama series, for ITV: William Tell, The Four Just Men, Sir Francis Drake, Danger Man and as a recurrent guest in The Saint[3].

His cinema début came in 1957 in Guy Hamilton's Manuela, and he began a career of minor roles as sinister foreign agents, assisted by his premature baldness and facility with eastern European accents. He appeared in The Roman Spring of Mrs Stone (José Quintero, 1961), and Help! (Richard Lester, 1965) and played leads in All The Way Up (James MacTaggart, 1970), The Chain (Jack Gold, 1984), The Dunera Boys (Ben Lewin, 1985) and Foreign Body (Ronald Neame, 1986)[3].

In 1965, he was cast as Alf Garnett in a play for the BBC Comedy Playhouse series, broadcast on 22 July 1965. This was the pilot edition of the long-running series Till Death Us Do Part with Gretchen Franklin, Una Stubbs and Anthony Booth (later Tony Blair's father-in-law). The part of Mum played by Gretchen Franklin was taken by Dandy Nichols when the programme was commissioned as a series. Mitchell may be best known for his role as the bigoted cockney West Ham United F.C. supporter, Alf Garnett, but ironically, his real life persona is quite the opposite, being a left-winger, Jewish, and a staunch supporter of Tottenham Hotspur F.C.. The show ran from 1966 to 1975, in seven series, making a total of 53 30-minute episodes[4].

He has a long and distinguished career on stage and television. Other small screen roles include performances in The Sweeney (Thames Television for ITV, 1978), Lovejoy (BBC), Waking the Dead (BBC), Kavanagh QC (Carlton Television for ITV), The Merchant of Venice (BBC, 1980) and Gormenghast.

On stage he received extensive critical acclaim for his performances in Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman and Harold Pinter's The Caretaker at the National Theatre; and Pinter's The Homecoming and Miller's The Price in the West End, also appearing in Visiting Mr. Green in 2007 and 2008.

Even after the cancellation of the Alf Garnett sequel series In Sickness And In Health, Mitchell still played him on a number of occasions. ITV aired a series of mini episodes called A Word With Alf featuring Alf and his friends. When Johnny Speight died in 1998, the series was cancelled at the request of Mitchell saying he no longer wanted to play Alf now that Speight was dead.

Awards

Warren was voted TV Actor of the Year in 1965, for his portrayal of Alf Garnett, in Till Death Do Us Part'. For his 2003 performance in The Price, he was awarded the 2004 Laurence Olivier Theatre Award for Best Performance in a Supporting Role, and was also nominated for a London Evening Standard Award for Best Actor. In 1982, he received an Australian Film Institute Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role, for the film, Norman Loves Rose.

Personal life

Mitchell is a Distinguished Supporter of the British Humanist Association.

He has been married since 1950 to Connie (Constance Wake), an actress who appeared in early 1960s television dramas such as Maigret. They have three children; Rebecca, Daniel and Anna (also known as Georgia Mitchell). He is a naturalised citizen of Australia.[5]

For over twenty years, Mitchell has suffered pain from nerve damage, caused by a virus, and is a supporter of the Neuropathy Trust.[6] He suffered a mild stroke in August 2004.

Footnotes

  1. ^ "Variety Club - Jewish Chronicle colour supplement "350 years"". The Jewish Chronicle. 2006-12-15. pp. 28-29. 
  2. ^ Deveney, Catherine (2007-10-10). "The pride of prejudice". Scotland on Sunday. http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/features/The-pride-of-prejudice.2570786.jp. Retrieved 2007-07-20. 
  3. ^ a b c BFI screen online biography accessed 27 Jun 2007
  4. ^ Till Death Us Do Part (1966-75) accessed 27 Jun 2007
  5. ^ "Warren Mitchell is a winner". The 7.30 Report (Australian Broadcasting Corporation). 24 February 2004. http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2004/s1052464.htm. Retrieved 2008-05-10. 
  6. ^ Neuropathy Trust accessed 27 Jun 2007

External links


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