Sir Nigel Barnard Hawthorne
(April 5, 1929 - December 26, 2001) U.K.
Actor and director
 Born in Coventry, Warwickshire, his mother was Agnes Rosemary Hawthorne. His father was Dr Charles Bernard Hawthorne who was a doctor in Coventry. The family emigrated to Cape Town, South Africa in 1931. Nigel Hawthorne went to St. George's Grammar School and the Christian Brothers' College in Cape Town. The Brothers were stern and adopted the approach of beating wickedness out of boys and beating knowledge into them. Nigel Hawthorne realised that he was gay during this time.
Hawtorne then enrolled onto a broadcasting degree course at the University of Cape Town but dropped out after a year. He made his stage debut in April 1950 at the Hofmeyr Theatre, Cape Town, South Africa in The Shop at Sly Corner as Archie Fellowes.
He worked briefly as an insurance salesman. He then returned to Britain in 1951 on the advice of another member of the university drama group, Shaun Sutton, who got him a job as assistant stage manager at Buxton, Derbyshire. In 1951 he first appeared on stage in You Can't Take It With You. He recognised that his career was not taking off and he returned to South Africa in 1957 where he played in Long Day's Journey Into Night. He re-gained his confidence and he made his way back to Britain in 1963. He first appeared in London's West End in 1966 in Talking to You.
 In 1968 he met his partner Trevor Bentham (born 1943) who was stage-managing at the Royal Court theatre. Trevor Bentham became a writer. They set up home together in 1979. They were living in a home where they were happy in Hertfordshire until a motorway service station was planned outside their drive. They then moved a few miles away into a 15th. century manor house at Radwell near Ware that had belonged to Chris Lowe of the Pet Shop Boys. The two of them became fund raisers for the North Hertfordshire Hospice and other local charities.
Nigel Hawthorne became well known in the BBC telvision comedy series Yes Minister, followed by Yes, Prime Minister. He received a Commander of the British Empire (CBE) in the 1987 Queen's Honours list. He was given a Best Actor Academy Award nomination for his part in The Madeness of King George in 1994.
Hawthorne was outed in March 1995. During the period leading upto the Oscar Awards ceremony he gave an interview to The Advocate. Perhaps he thought of it as an obscure American magazine but uncharacteristically he talked openly about his sexuality. However the magazine made a big issue of it and proclaimed that he was "the first openly gay actor to be nominated for a Best Actor Award". The British tabloids then took up the story. The Daily Express had the headline 'The madness of Queen Nigel', and the Mail had "Yes, Minister, I'm gay".
In 1997 Nigel Hawthorne and Trevor Bentham learnt that Trevor had muscular dystrophy which he had inherited from his mother. In the New Year's Honours List on 31st. December 1998 Nigel Hawthorne was awarded a knighthood for services to the theatre, film, and television. In 2000 he began to receive treatment for pancreatic cancer which continued until he died of a heart attack at his home at Radwell in Hertfordshire.
Film:
- Sweeney II (1978)
- The Sailor's Return (1978)
- Watership Down (1978)
- Memoirs of a Survivor (1981)
- The Knowledge (1981)
- History of the World: Part I (1981)
- The World Cup: A Captain's Tale (1982)
- The Plague Dogs (1982)
- Ghandi (1982)
- Firefox (1982)
- Turtle Diary (1985)
- The Chain (1985)
- The Black Cauldron (1985)
- King of the Wind (1989)
- En Håndfull tid (1989)
- Relatively Speaking (1990)
- Demolition Man (1993)
- The Madness of King George (1994)
- Richard III (1995)
- Twelfth Night: Or What You Will (1996)
- Inside (1996)
- Murder in Mind (1997)
- Amistad (1997)
- At Sachem Farm (1998)
- The Object of My Affection (1998)
- Madeline (1998)
- A Reasonable Man (1999)
- The Clandestine Marriage (1999)
- The Big Brass Ring (1999)
- The Winslow Boy (1999)
- Tarzan (1999)
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Theatre:
- The Shop at Sly Corner (1950)
- You Can't Take It With You (1951)
- Long Day's Journey Into Night
- Talking to Tou (1962)
- Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (1971)
- Julius Caesar (1972)
- As You Like It (1974)
- Privates on Parade (1977)
- The Magistrate (1986)
- Hapgood (1988)
- Shadowlands (1989, 1990-92)
- The Madness of King George (1992)
TV:
- Holocaust (1978)
- Edward & Mrs Simpson (1980)
- Yes, Minister (1980-92)
- A Woman Called Golda (1982)
- The Barchester Chronicles (1984)
- Jenny's War (1985)
- Mapp & Lucia (1985)
- Yes, Prime Minister (1986-88)
- The Fragile Heart (1996)
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