Actor ALBERT FINNEY Has Passed Away at Age 82
Today we lost an acting legend of the screen and stage, Albert Finney. Finney was born in Salford, England, and graduated from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and was also a member of the Royal Shakespeare Academy in Stratford-Upon-Avon, England. He was nominated for Best Actor in the Academy Awards five times, although he never took the award home. His nominations were for Tom Jones (1963), Murder on the Orient Express (1974), The Dresser (1983), Under the Volcano (1984), and Erin Brockovich (2000).
Finney also starred in fan-favorites like the musicals Scrooge (1970) and Annie (1982), and one of my favorite films, Big Fish (2003), for which he was nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor. Finney’s final roles were in 2012’s Bond film, Skyfall, and The Bourne Legacy. This was just one year after he reportedly beat a cancer diagnosis.
In reading about his life, I saw that he was nominated for knighthood twice, but turned them both down, and when asked about it in an interview, he responded:
Call me Sir if you like! Maybe people in America think being a Sir is a big deal. But I think we should all be misters together. I think the Sir thing slightly perpetuates one of our diseases in England, which is snobbery. And it also helps keep us 'quaint,' which I'm not a great fan of. You don't get much with the title anymore. That was all carved up by the robber barons in the Middle Ages.
What a down to earth guy! Finney was a fantastic actor, and his films will live on for generations. What was your favorite Albert Finney role?