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Ian Charleson (11 August 1949 – 6 January 1990) was a Scottish stage and film actor. He is best known internationally for his starring role as Olympic athlete and missionary Eric Liddell, in the Oscar-winning 1981 film Chariots of Fire. He is also well known for his portrayal of Rev. Charlie Andrews in the 1982 Oscar-winning film Gandhi.
Charleson was a noted actor on the British stage as well, with critically acclaimed leads in Guys and Dolls, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Fool for Love, and Hamlet, among many others. Over the course of his life Charleson performed numerous major Shakespearean roles, and the annual Ian Charleson Awards were established in his honour in 1991, to reward the best classical stage performances in Britain by actors aged under 30.
The Houghton Mifflin Dictionary of Biography describes Charleson as "a leading player of charm and power" and "one of the finest British actors of his generation." Alan Bates wrote that Charleson was "definitely among the top ten actors of his age group." Ian McKellen said Charleson was "the most unmannered and unactorish of actors: always truthful, always honest."
Charleson was diagnosed with HIV in 1986, and died in 1990 at the age of 40. He requested that it be announced after his death that he had died of AIDS, in order to publicize the condition. This was the first show-business death in the United Kingdom openly attributed to AIDS, and helped to promote awareness of the disease.
Description above from the Wikipedia article Ian Charleson, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
1988
as Major Brendan Archer
1988
as Ivan Bucharensky - 'Kyril'
1987
as Marco
1986
as Gerald
1984
as Mike Campbell
1984
as Victor Geary
1984
as Jeffson Brown
1984
as Jamie MacGregor
1984
as Clarence Dandridge
1983
as Lockhart
1983
as Lt. Ryder
1982
as Reverend Charlie Andrews
1982
as Ian Arthur
1981
as Eric Liddell
1981
as Octavius Caesar
1981
as Hephaistion
1981
as Bertram
1980
as Neville Heath
1980
as Fortinbras
1978
1978
as Angel
1976
as Henry
1972