Anthony Stewart Head (born 20 February 1954)[1] is an English actor and singer. Primarily a performer in musical theatre, he rose to fame in the UK in the 1980s following his role in the Gold Blend couple television advertisements for Nescafé, which led to major roles in several television series. He is best known for his roles as Rupert Giles in Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997–2003), the Prime Minister in Little Britain (2003–2006), Uther Pendragon in Merlin (2008–2012), and Rupert Mannion in Ted Lasso (2020–2023), as well as voicing Herc Shipwright in BBC Radio 4's Cabin Pressure.
Early life
Head was born in Camden Town, London. His father was Seafield Laurence Stewart Murray Head (20 August 1919 – 22 March 2009), a documentary filmmaker and a founder of Verity Films, and his mother was actress Helen Shingler (29 August 1919 – 8 October 2019); they married in 1944 in Watford. His older brother is actor/singer Murray Head. Both brothers have played the part of Freddie Trumper in the musical Chess at the Prince Edward Theatre, London, with Murray a part of the original cast in 1986, while Anthony was in the final cast in 1989.[2]
Head was educated at Sunbury Grammar School in Surrey,[1] and furthered his education studying acting at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA).[3] In discussing why he chose acting as a career, in an interview in 2013 he said that "When it's in your family, it's a choice, it's there. It's not a jump to say: 'I want to act.' When I was six I was in a little show my mother's friends organised, playing the Emperor in The Emperor's New Clothes. I remember thinking: 'This is the business, this is what I want to do.'"[4]
In the early 1980s he provided backing vocals for the band Red Box.[7] He was featured as well on the album Face in the Window (1983) by Two Way.[8]
In the late 1980s, he gained wider recognition as the man in the Gold Blend couple series of coffee commercials, alongside Sharon Maughan, for Nescafé Gold Blend between 1987 and 1993.[9] (A version made for North America featured the American brand name Taster's Choice from 1990 to 1997).[9]
In 1997, he took on the role of Rupert Giles in Buffy the Vampire Slayer.[12] While playing this role he lived in the United States during the late 1990s and early 2000s, although his family continued to live in the UK. Head left the regular cast of Buffy during the show's sixth season and subsequently appeared several times as a guest star until the conclusion of the series.[13]
2000s
In 2002, he co-starred in the BBC Two television series Manchild, a show revolving around four friends approaching their fifties who try to recapture their fading youth and vitality while dealing with life as 'mature' men.[14] He also appeared in guest roles in various other dramas, such as Silent Witness, Murder Investigation Team and Spooks.[15] He appeared in the fourth series of the British hit sitcom My Family in 2003, playing one of the main characters' (Abi's) father in the episode "May the Best Man Win".[15] He was featured as the prime minister in the popular BBC comedy sketch show Little Britain from 2003 to 2005,[15] and guest starred in several episodes of the 2004 series of popular drama Monarch of the Glen.[15]
In early 2006, he appeared in an episode of Hotel Babylon,[15] a BBC One drama set in a hotel, in which he played a suicidal man who recovers and lands a music deal. The same year he filmed a pilot for a new show entitled Him and Us, loosely based on the life of openly gay rock star Elton John, for American TV channel ABC, co-starring Kim Cattrall. In July he appeared as Captain Hook at the Children's Party at the Palace, a live pantomime staged in the grounds of Buckingham Palace as part of Queen Elizabeth II's 80th birthday celebrations. In October 2006, he voiced Ponsonby, leader of MI6, in Destroy All Humans! 2.[15]
At Comic-Con International in 2007, Joss Whedon said talks were almost completed for a 90-minute Buffy the Vampire Slayer spin-off, Ripper, as a BBC special,[16] with both Head and the BBC on board, though this has not come to fruition. In 2007, he portrayed Stockard Channing's gay brother in the English film Sparkle,[12] and appeared as Mr. Colubrine in the ITV1 comedy drama Sold.[15] Head also appeared as Sir Walter Elliot in Persuasion.[17] Head also narrated a BBC behind-the-scenes programme for the American television series Heroes,[12]Heroes Unmasked.[15] He has also been seen as Maurice Riley in the BBC drama The Invisibles alongside Warren Clarke.[15]
After seeing Anthony Head in the Buffy musical episode, "Once More With Feeling", Saw director Darren Lynn Bousman cast him in his 21st century rock opera, Repo! The Genetic Opera.[18] Head portrays an organ repossessor, employed by a fictional dystopian medical firm; "Anthony Head was my number one choice for Repo Man from the very beginning", said Bousman in an interview[18] shortly before the film's release on 7 November 2008. The film also stars Sarah Brightman and Paris Hilton.
Head has also performed for radio, taking two of the lead roles—arch-villain Mr. Gently Benevolent, and his descendant, journalist Jeremy Sourquill—in the BBC Radio 4 comedy series, Bleak Expectations (five series, 2007–12). He also had a significant recurring role in the last two series (2011–13) of the Radio 4 sitcom Cabin Pressure as Hercules Shipwright, a romantic interest for the airline CEO played by Stephanie Cole, and returned for show's two-part finale in 2014.
Head also provided voice-over work for the Nintendo Wii video game Flip's Twisted World, developed by Frozen North Productions.[20] For his acting in the film Despite the Falling Snow he won the Best Supporting Actor award at the 2016 Prague Independent Film Festival.[21] In July 2018 Head was added to the cast of long-running BBC radio soap-opera The Archers, playing Robin Fairbrother, member of a family with several past and current connections to the Archers themselves.
^ abcd"Anthony Head (visual voices guide)". Behind The Voice Actors. Retrieved 14 October 2023. A green check mark indicates that a role has been confirmed using a screenshot (or collage of screenshots) of a title's list of voice actors and their respective characters found in its credits or other reliable sources of information.
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