I was very sorry to hear of the death of the fine British actor Christopher Lee yesterday ....
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| Christopher Lee is 'Dracula' |
He was always the definitive vampire Count Dracula, and his performances
in that role formed part of the mosaic of music, and films that were
the backdrop of my teens and early manhood.
Of course he was more than just a set of false vampire teeth ..... He was also something of an idealist, going to Finland and volunteering at age 17 to fight for the Finnish army during the Winter War in 1939. He didn't actually fight, being kept away from the actual fighting along with the other British volunteers, and after a fortnight, they were all returned home, but that was hardly his fault. He later became a member of the Long Range Desert Patrol, (later the SAS) in North Africa. Oddly, he also met J.R.R. Tolkien once after the war, making him the only person involved in The Lord of the Rings film trilogy to have done so ....
His acting career was incredibly long and varied, spanning nearly seventy years. Its amazing to consider that his first film role was way back in 1947 in Corridor of Mirrors. However it wasn't until he took the role of the monster in Hammers The Curse of Frankenstein in 1957, that he became noted by a wider audience, an audience that much later included all at PC Towers.
In 1958, he was in the starring role in the film Dracula (known as Horror of Dracula in the United States) .... and the rest as they say is history. Oh sure he was 'Fu Manchu', Lord Summerisle in the classic 'Wicker Man', the Comte de Rochefort in the Musketeer movies, Francisco Scaramanga in a Bond movie, Saruman in the The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, and again in the prequel film The Hobbit, Count Dooku in the in the Star Wars series, and in many many other roles, as well as making a number of heavy metal records.
But for me, and many more men of a certain age, he will always be the Count Dracula (Gary Oldman is a close second).
His acting career was incredibly long and varied, spanning nearly seventy years. Its amazing to consider that his first film role was way back in 1947 in Corridor of Mirrors. However it wasn't until he took the role of the monster in Hammers The Curse of Frankenstein in 1957, that he became noted by a wider audience, an audience that much later included all at PC Towers.
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| Christopher Lee Became Dracula In 1958 |
In 1958, he was in the starring role in the film Dracula (known as Horror of Dracula in the United States) .... and the rest as they say is history. Oh sure he was 'Fu Manchu', Lord Summerisle in the classic 'Wicker Man', the Comte de Rochefort in the Musketeer movies, Francisco Scaramanga in a Bond movie, Saruman in the The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, and again in the prequel film The Hobbit, Count Dooku in the in the Star Wars series, and in many many other roles, as well as making a number of heavy metal records.
But for me, and many more men of a certain age, he will always be the Count Dracula (Gary Oldman is a close second).
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| Christopher Lee Is Dracula |
Excellent summary of a long and distinguished career.
ReplyDeleteI wonder, was he cremated and where are his ashes . . . ?
Just to be on the safe side, don't spill any blood on the ground LOL.
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