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Colin Firth
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Colin Firth | |
| Born | September 10, 1960 (age 46) Grayshott, Hampshire, England |
| Spouse(s) | Livia Giuggioli (1997 — present) |
| Notable roles | Fitzwilliam Darcy in Pride and Prejudice Mark Darcy in Bridget Jones's Diary Jack Worthing/Ernest in The Importance of Being Earnest |
Colin Andrew Firth (born 10 September 1960) is an English actor.
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Firth was born in Grayshott, Hampshire, England to David (a history lecturer and the son of an Anglican priest) and Shirley (a comparative religion lecturer, whose own parents were Congregationalist ministers); he has a sister, Kate, and a younger brother, Jonathan, who is now also an actor. Both of Firth's parents were born and raised in India, as their English-born parents were involved in missionary work.
Firth spent part of his childhood in Nigeria, where his father was teaching. He lived in St. Louis, Missouri when he was 11. He later attended the Montgomery of Alamein Secondary School, a state comprehensive school in Winchester, Hampshire, and then Barton Peveril College in Eastleigh, Hampshire.
Firth starred in the award-winning 1981 London stage production of Another Country. He reprised this role for his first film appearance in 1984. In 1987, he appeared alongside Kenneth Branagh in the film version of J. L. Carr's novel, A Month in the Country. In 1989, he took the lead in the film Valmont.
Despite widespread admiration for his performances,[citation needed] it was only with the 1995 BBC television adaptation of Pride and Prejudice that Firth gained wider renown. The serial was a big success and Firth became known as a heart-throb because of his role as Fitzwilliam Darcy. This performance also made him the object of affection for fictional journalist Bridget Jones (created by Helen Fielding), an interest which carried on into the two novels featuring the Jones character. In the second novel, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, the character even meets Firth in Rome. As something of an in-joke, when the novels were adapted for the cinema, Firth was cast as Jones's love interest, Mark Darcy.
Firth had a supporting role in The English Patient (1996) and since then has starred in films such as Fever Pitch (1997), Shakespeare in Love (1998), Bridget Jones's Diary (2001), The Importance of Being Earnest (2002), Love Actually (2003), What a Girl Wants (2003) and Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason (2004). He has also appeared in recent television productions, including Donovan Quick (an updated version of Don Quixote) (1999) and Conspiracy (2001).
In 1989, Firth entered into a romantic relationship with actress Meg Tilly, his co-star in Valmont. In 1990, she gave birth to a son, Will Firth.
In 1994, Firth was involved with actress Jennifer Ehle, his co-star in Pride and Prejudice. Currently, Firth lives both in London and Italy. He is married to Italian documentary filmmaker Livia Giuggioli (since 21 June 1997). The couple have two sons, Luca (born 2001) and Matteo (born 2003).
Recently, Firth has been involved in a campaign to stop the deportation of a group of Congolese immigrants from Britain, because of the belief that they will likely be murdered on their return to the Democratic Republic of Congo.[1] Firth has argued that "To me it's just basic civilisation to help people. I find this incredibly painful to see how we dismiss the most desperate people in our society. It's easily done. It plays to the tabloids, to the middle-England xenophobes. It just makes me furious. And all from a government we once had such high hopes for".[2] As a result of the campaign, a Congolese nurse was given a last-minute reprieve from deportation.[3]
- ^ Colin Firth, We must stop a deportation that is likely to end in murder, The Independent, 26 February 2007, accessed 27 February 2007
- ^ Andrew Johnson, Colin Firth makes plea for nurse 'facing murder' in Congo, The Independent, 26 February 2007, accessed 27 February 2007
- ^ Firth's intervention saves nurse from deportation, The Independent, 27 February 2007, accessed 27 February 2007
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