Paul Scofield

David Paul Scofield, CH, CBE (born 21 January 1922 in Hurstpierpoint, Sussex) is an English actor of stage and screen.

Scofield was the son of the headmaster of the local school and was educated at the Varndean School for Boys, Brighton, the Croydon Repertory Theatre School and the London Mask Theatre School.

He began his stage career in 1940, and was soon being compared with Laurence Olivier. He has won several awards for his stage appearances, including a Tony Award for the original stage version of A Man for All Seasons, and was Salieri in the original stage production of Amadeus in 1979.

Scofield then won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his reprising role as Sir Thomas More in the movie version of A Man for All Seasons (1966). He played the title role in Ben Jonson's Volpone in Peter Hall's 1977 production for the Royal National Theatre.

In 1994 he starred in Quiz Show, a film directed by Robert Redford about the quiz show scandal in the United States in the 1950s. Scofield played Mark Van Doren, father of Charles Van Doren, the man at the center of the scandal, and received a nomination for Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

He has rejected the offer of a knighthood on three occasions, but was appointed CBE in 1956 and became a Companion of Honour in 2001.

Scofield is also a voice actor and narrated a radio version of C.S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia which was put out by Focus on the Family.

Films

• That Lady (1955) .... King Philip II of Spain
• Carve Her Name with Pride (1958) .... Tony Fraser
• The Train (1964) .... Col. von Waldheim
• A Man for All Seasons (1966) .... Sir Thomas More
• Tell Me Lies (1968)
• Bartleby (1970/I) .... The Accountant
• Nijinsky: Unfinished Project (1970) .... Sergei Diaghilev
• King Lear (1971) .... King Lear
• Scorpio (1973) .... Sergei Zharkov
• A Delicate Balance (1973) .... Tobias
• Ill Fares the Land (1983) (voice)
• Summer Lightning (1984) .... Old Robert Clarke
• 1919 (1985) .... Alexander Scherbatov
• When the Whales Came (1989) .... The Birdman
• Henry V (1989) .... French King Charles VI
• Hamlet (1990/I) .... The Ghost
• Utz (1992) .... Doctor Vaclav Orlik
• Quiz Show (1994) .... Mark Van Doren
• The Crucible (1996) .... Judge Thomas Danforth

Trivia

• Mel Gibson once compared working with Scofield on Franco Zeffirelli's Hamlet to being "thrown into the ring with Mike Tyson."

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