Charles Dance


Walter Charles Dance, is an English actor, screenwriter, and film director.
Some of his highest-profile roles are Tywin Lannister in HBO's Game of Thrones, Guy Perron in The Jewel in the Crown, Sardo Numspa in The Golden Child, Dr. Jonathan Clemens in Alien 3, Benedict in Last Action Hero, the Master Vampire in Dracula Untold, Lord Havelock Vetinari in Terry Pratchett's Going Postal, Alastair Denniston in The Imitation Game, and Emperor Emhyr var Emreis in . Most recently, he portrayed Lord Mountbatten in the third season of The Crown.

Early life

Charles Dance was born in Redditch, Worcestershire, the son of Eleanor Marion, a cook, and Walter Dance, an electrical engineer who had served as a sergeant in the 2nd Regular Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers during the Second Boer War in South Africa. Dance has an older half-brother, David, from his father's previous marriage.
When Dance was about three years old, his father died. He had always thought that his father had been in his early fifties when this happened, but later discovered that he was actually some 26 years older than he had believed. During filming of an episode for the genealogical series Who Do You Think You Are? in 2016, Dance also discovered that through his maternal line, he is of partial Belgian ancestry, descended from a family whose roots lay in Spa. His immigrant ancestor Charles François Futvoye had been a pioneer in the art of Japanning during the early half of the 19th century, and a resident of Marylebone in London.
Growing up in Plymouth, Devon, Dance attended Widey Technical School for Boys in Crownhill. He later attended Plymouth College of Art and the Leicester College of Arts, where he studied graphic design and photography.

Career

Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC)

Dance was a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company during the mid-to-late 1970s and was in many of their productions in London and Stratford-upon-Avon. Later he returned to the RSC to take the title role in Coriolanus at Stratford-upon-Avon and Newcastle in 1989, and at the Barbican Theatre in 1990. He received rave reviews and a Critics' Circle Best Actor award for his performance as C. S. Lewis in William Nicholson's Shadowlands, in the 2007 stage revival.

Television and film

Dance made his screen debut in 1974, in the ITV series Father Brown as Commandant Neil O'Brien in "The Secret Garden". Other small parts followed, including a 1983 cameo as a South African assassin in The Professionals, but his big break came the following year when he played the major role of Guy Perron in The Jewel in the Crown, an adaptation of Paul Scott's novels that also made stars of Geraldine James and Art Malik. Dance made one of his earliest big-screen appearances in the 1981 James Bond film For Your Eyes Only as evil henchman Claus. Though he turned down the opportunity to screen test for the James Bond role, in 1989 he played Bond creator Ian Fleming in Anglia Television's dramatised biography directed by Don Boyd, Goldeneye.
He has also starred in many other British television dramas such as Edward the Seventh, ', Randall and Hopkirk, Rebecca, The Phantom of the Opera, Fingersmith and Bleak House. He was name-checked in the British comedy series Absolutely Fabulous, as being slated to play the title character in The Life of Jesus Christ 2, which was filming in Morocco at the same time as the main characters of the series were there for a photo shoot. He also played Guy Spencer, the pro-Hitler propagandist, in the second instalment of Foyle's War, and had an ongoing role as Dr. Maltravers in the ITV drama Trinity.
Dance made a guest appearance on the BBC drama series Merlin as the Witchfinder Aredian, and as a vainglorious version of himself in the third series of Jam & Jerusalem. He played Lord Vetinari in the 2010 Sky adaptation of Terry Pratchett's Going Postal, and as the Russian oligarch Aleksandr Borinski in Paris Connections. He played the role of Tywin Lannister in HBO's Game of Thrones, based on the A Song of Ice and Fire novels by George R. R. Martin. Dance was wooed for the role by the producers while filming Your Highness in Belfast. Dance also played Conrad Knox on the British television series ' as the primary villain in the series.
On 30 June 2013, Dance appeared with other celebrities in an episode of the BBC's Top Gear as a "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car" for the debut of the Vauxhall Astra. In summer 2018, Dance narrated a documentary entitled "Spitfire", which featured the legendary Supermarine Spitfire and recounted the efforts of the RAF pilots who flew them during the Second World War.
In 2019, he played an antagonist in and appeared as Lord Mountbatten in series 3 of The Crown later in the same year.
Dance is represented by Tavistock Wood Management.

Screenwriting and directing

Dance's debut film as a writer and director was Ladies in Lavender, which starred Judi Dench and Maggie Smith. In 2009, he directed his own adaptation of Alice Thomas Ellis's The Inn at the Edge of the World.

Personal life

Dance married Joanna Haythorn in 1970. They have two children, Oliver Matthew and Rebecca. Haythorn and Dance divorced in 2004. In 2012, Dance and his partner Eleanor Boorman had a daughter, Rose Boorman. The pair have since separated.

Honours

Dance was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire on 17 June 2006.

Filmography

Film

Television

Video games

Audiobooks

Theatre credits

Stage