Ian Holm

As of 2014, he appeared in five films that were nominated for the Best Picture Oscar: Nicholas and Alexandra (1971), Chariots of Fire (1981), The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) and The Aviator (2004). Of those, Chariots of Fire (1981) and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) were winners in the category.

His last non-Hobbit film role was a voice part as Skinner in Ratatouille (2007). Ian Holm had five children, three daughters and two sons from the first two of his four wives and from an additional relationship.

He played a meteorologist in The Day After Tomorrow (2004) (as Professor Terry Rapson) and The Aviator (2004) (as Professor Fitz).

He supplied voice for radio announcements by New York-Presbyterian Medical Center (New York City, USA), where he had been treated for prostate cancer (2002).

He was awarded the 1998 Laurence Olivier Theatre Award for Best Actor of the 1997 season for his performance in "King Lear" at the Royal National Theatre: Cottesloe stage.

He was awarded the 1997 London Critics Circle Theatre Award (Drama) for Best Actor for his performance in "King Lear" at the Royal National Theatre.

He was awarded the 1993 London Evening Standard Theatre Award for Best Actor for his performance in "Moonlight".

In the late 1990s, he gave a highly-acclaimed turn as the lawyer, Mitchell, in Atom Egoyan's The Sweet Hereafter (1997), and was subsequently cast in a number of high-profile Hollywood films of the next decade, playing Father Vito Cornelius in The Fifth Element (1997), Bilbo in The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003), and Professor Fitz in The Aviator (2004), as well as Zach Braff's character's father Gideon in Garden State (2004).

In 1989 Holm was created a Commander of the British Empire (CBE), and in 1998 he was knighted for his services to drama.

Along with Ronald Lacey, he was one of the early choices to play the villain Morgus in Peter Davison's final serial as the Doctor, Doctor Who: The Caves of Androzani: Part One (1984), which instead went to John Normington.

In 1981, he played one of his best known roles, Sam Mussabini in Chariots of Fire (1981), for which he was nominated for Oscar for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.

He clearly had no objections to being buried up to his neck in the pursuit of his craft, as this happened to him in no less than three films: Alien (1979), Brazil (1985) and Simon Magus (1999).

He worked with two Frodos - Christopher Guard in Les Miserables (1978) and Elijah Wood in Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy. Holm also played Frodo in the BBC Radio production. He also worked with three other Bilbos: Norman Bird (from Ralph Bakshi's film) in Oh! What a Lovely War (1969) and Young Winston (1972); Martin Freeman in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012) and The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (2013); and John Le Mesurier in the BBC Radio production.

He had two roles in common with Orson Bean. Bean was the voice of Bilbo Baggins in The Hobbit (1977), while Holm played in the Peter Jackson trilogy. Bean also played Frodo in The Return of the King (1980); Holm played Frodo on BBC radio.

He developed a severe case of stage fright in 1976 while performing "The Iceman Cometh" and left the theatre. He has only returned three times since then.

He played Napoleon Bonaparte three times in Napoleon and Love (1974), Time Bandits (1981) and The Emperor's New Clothes (2001) - and was a front-runner for the role in Stanley Kubrick's unproduced biography.

In 1969 Holm won his first BAFTA Film Award Best Supporting Actor for The Bofors Gun (1968), then followed a flow of awards and nominations for his numerous works in film and on television.

He appeared with David Warner in six films: The Bofors Gun (1968), The Fixer (1968), A Midsummer Night's Dream (1968), Holocaust (1978), S.O.S. Titanic (1979) and Time Bandits (1981).

He won Broadway's 1967 Tony Award as Best Supporting or Featured Actor (Dramatic) for Harold Pinter's "The Homecoming", a role he recreated in the film version with the same title, The Homecoming (1973).

In 1965 Holm made his debut on television as Richard III on the BBC's The Wars of the Roses (1965), which was a filmed theatrical production of four of Shakespeare's plays condensed down into a trilogy.

In a return to the Royal Shakespeare Company, where he first received acclaim in the mid-1960s for his contemporary stylings of "Richard III" and "Henry V", he developed a confidence-shattering case of "stage fright" during a 1976 performance of "The Iceman Cometh" and quickly withdrew from the production. His only stage appearance for almost two decades was as Astrov in "Uncle Vanya" in 1979. He finally returned to the theatre to create the role of Andy in Harold Pinter's short play "Moonlight" in 1993 for which he received the Evening Standard Award. His "King Lear" several years later earned him the Olivier Award as well as the Evening Standard and London Critic's Circle Theatre awards.

In 1959 his stage partner Laurence Olivier scored a hit on Ian Holm in a sword fight in a production of 'Coriolanus'. Holm still had a scar on his finger.

Holm studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, graduating in 1950 to the Royal Shakespeare Company. There he emerged as an actor whose range and effortless style allowed him to play almost entire Shakespeare's repertoire.

Sir Ian Holm was one of the world's greatest actors, a Laurence Olivier Award-winning, Tony Award-winning, BAFTA-winning and Academy Award-nominated British star of films and the stage. He was a member of the prestigious Royal Shakespeare Company and has played more than 100 roles in films and on television. He was born Ian Holm Cuthbert on September 12, 1931, in Goodmayes, Essex, to Scottish parents who worked at the Essex mental asylum. His mother, Jean Wilson (née Holm), was a nurse, and his father, Doctor James Harvey Cuthbert, was a psychiatrist. Young Holm was brought up in London. At the age of seven he was inspired by the seeing 'Les Miserables' and became fond of acting.

He appeared in two adaptations of the 1819 novel "Frankenstein" by Mary Shelley: he played both Victor Frankenstein and his Monster in Mystery and Imagination: Frankenstein (1968) and Frankenstein's father Baron Frankenstein in Frankenstein (1994).