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Alan Bates

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Sir Alan Arthur Bates, CBE (February 17, 1934 – December 27, 2003) was an English actor.

Biography

Early life

Bates, the eldest of three brothers, was born in Allestree, Derby, the son of Florence Mary (née Wheatcroft), a homemaker and a pianist, and Harold Arthur Bates, an insurance broker and a cellist. Both of his parents were amateur musicians, and encouraged him to pursue music, but by age 11, young Bates already had determined his life's course as an actor, and so they sent him for dramatic coaching instead. He earned a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, where he studied before leaving to join the Royal Air Force.

Career

In 1956, he debuted on stage in the West End, starring in Look Back in Anger, a role which made him a star. Four years later, he appeared in The Entertainer, his first film role. Bates worked for the Padded Wagon Moving Company in the early 1960s while acting at the Circle in the Square Theater in New York City. He soon starred in Whistle Down the Wind, Phillipe de Brocca's King of Hearts, and in the Bernard Malamud film The Fixer, which gave him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.

Bates was handpicked by director John Schlesinger to star in the film Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971) in the role of Dr. Daniel Hirsh. Even though he wanted the part very much, Bates was held up filming The Go-Between (1970) for director Joseph Losey and also became a father around that time, so he had to pass on the project, with regrets. The part then went first to Ian Bannen who balked at kissing and simulating sex with another man, and then to Peter Finch, who earned an Academy Award nomination.

Bates starred in such international films as Georgy Girl, Far From the Madding Crowd, Zorba the Greek, The Go-Between, Nijinsky, An Unmarried Woman and Women in Love (in which, along with Oliver Reed, he became the first actor to do frontal nudity in a major studio motion picture) but he consciously decided to concentrate on a few well-defined roles, rather than to take everything that came his way. On television, his parts ranged from classic roles such as The Mayor of Casterbridge (1978) to Guy Burgess in An Englishman Abroad (1983) to a Russian spy in Pack of Lies (1987) to the storyteller in the 2000 version of the Arabian Nights.

Bates played Antonius Agrippa in the 2004 TV film Spartacus, but died before it debuted. It was dedicated to his memory and that of writer Howard Fast, who wrote the original novel that inspired the film Spartacus by Stanley Kubrick. On stage, Bates had a particular association with the plays of Simon Gray, appearing in Butley, Otherwise Engaged, Stage Struck, Melon, Life Support and Simply Disconnected, as well as the film of Butley and Gray's TV series Unnatural Pursuits.

Bates was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1996, and was knighted in 2003. He was an Associate Member of RADA and was a patron of The Actors Centre, Covent Garden, London from 1994 until his death in 2003 (previous Patrons: Lord Olivier, Sir Alec Guinness).

Personal life

Bates was married to the actress Victoria Ward from 1970 until 1992, when she died of a wasting illness brought on by grief following the deaths of several family members, including her son. The Bates had twin sons born in 1971, the actors Benedick Bates and Tristan Bates; the latter died suddenly in 1990 of a drug overdose at the age of 19 while in Tokyo on a modelling assignment. The Bates are also survived by granddaughter, Chatto Bates, Benedick's daughter.

In the later years of his life, Alan Bates's companion and lover was his lifelong friend, actress Joanna Pettet, his co-star in 1964's Broadway play Poor Richard. They split their time between New York and London.

In May 2007 several articles were published with people from Bates' past asserting that he had engaged in numerous homosexual affairs. These included fellow actor Peter Wyngarde and Olympic skater John Curry.

A lifelong smoker, Bates died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 69.

Posthumous biography: Otherwise Engaged

Otherwise Engaged: The Life of Alan Bates, by Donald Spoto, "the only authorized biography," was published posthumously on June 7, 2007: "According to Mr Spoto's assistant, Laurence Elliott, 'This is and will remain the only authorized biography, which ...was written with the full and complete cooperation of Benedick Bates, Martin Bates, Michael Linnit and Rosalind Chatto and more than one hundred people who were interviewed in depth.'" According to an excerpt published in The Daily Mail, in additional to heterosexual relationships, Bates had homosexual relationships throughout his life, including with Peter Wyngarde and John Curry, to whom he was devoted for over a decade, through the figure skater's death from AIDS. According to Spoto, "Even after the [British anti-sodomy] law was changed, the need to preserve his public image left him terrified of exposure. Alan rigorously avoided interviews and questions about his personal life, and invariably denied – even, bizarrely, with his lovers – that there was a homosexual component in his nature." Another of his male lovers, the actor Nickolas Grace, with whom (according to Grace) he had " 'an intense affair,' " said: " 'I told him labels didn't matter, but that we must be who we are. ... But he just could not accept that ... Alan was at ease as long as he pretended – and he insisted on pretending – that our relationship was not what it was, and was not disclosed to or evident to others.' " Throughout his life, a consummate actor, Bates protected his public screen and stage image as more of a ladies' man, or at least as a man who, in plays and films, would still appear attractive to and attracted by women.

Tristan Bates Theatre

Sir Alan and his family set up the Tristan Bates Theatre at the Actors' Centre in Covent Garden, in memory of his son, Tristan, who died at the age of 19. Tristan's twin brother, Benedick, is a vice-director.

Awards

  • 2002 Best Actor Tony and Drama Desk, for "Fortune's Fool"
  • 2000 Drama Desk and Lucille Lortel Award for "Unexpected Man"
  • 1983 Variety Club Award for "A Patriot for Me"
  • 1975 Variety Club Award for "Otherwise Engaged"
  • 1971 Evening Standard Best Actor Award for "Butley"
  • 1972 Best Actor Tony for "Butley (a performance he recreated in the film version of the same name, Butley (1974))"
  • 1959 Clarence Derwent Award for "A Long Day's Journey Into Night"

Notes

References

External links

  • The Alan Bates Archive – The official memorial website. ("The Alan Bates Archive was launched on 17 February 1997, and was Sir Alan's official website. Site and domain name © copyright Karen Rappaport, 2006.") Accessed 15 September 2007.



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Last updated on Tuesday March 11, 2008 at 15:27:32 PDT (GMT -0700)
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