Born on Dec. 31, 1937 in the steel mining town of Port Talbot, South Wales, Hopkins grew up convinced he would amount to nothing. But at 17, he discovered acting at the YMCA and quickly found himself with a scholarship to the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, a stint that was briefly interrupted by service with the Royal Artillery. After studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and making his London debut as Metellus Cimber in “Julius Caesar,” he joined the National Theatre in 1965 when Laurence Olivier served as artistic director. When Olivier fell prey to appendicitis, Hopkins took over in “Dance of Death” (1966), then went on to play Lear, Antony and others at the famed Old Vic. While his stage career was on the rise, however, his personal life was in rapid decline. Hopkins was a an alcoholic, walked out on his first wife, Petronella Barker, in 1969 and later abandoned a production of Macbeth. Moving to Los Angeles, CA in 1974, Hopkins quit drinking two days before his 38th birthday and became a lifelong member of Alcoholics Anonymous.

Though he eschewed the stage later in his career, it was his theatrical training that enabled him to change shape and transform himself to a dazzling array of characters. As Lloyd George in “Young Winston” (1972), Hopkins initiated a five picture association with director Richard Attenborough which would see him segue from Lieutenant Colonel John Frost in “A Bridge Too Far” (1977) to the volatile, obsessed ventriloquist in “Magic” (1978) to the quiet, scholarly C S Lewis in “Shadowlands” (1993). He exhibited similar range in his work with the Merchant-Ivory team, beginning with his chillingly understated upper crust nasty in “Howards End” (1992) and proceeding through the mild-mannered all-too-perfect butler in “The Remains of the Day” (1993) to the ferocious energy and relentless sexuality of Pablo Picasso in “Surviving Picasso” (1996).

Hopkins’ indelible portrayal of Hannibal Lecter, the brilliant, cultivated serial killer at the center of Jonathan Demme’s “The Silence of the Lambs,” paved the way for a succession of meaty and challenging roles, including an enjoyable turn as Dr. Van Helsing in Francis Ford Coppola’s adaptation of “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” (1992) and a barnstorming performance as the stricken father in the Western epic, “Legends of the Fall” (1994). Immersing himself in countless hours of film and videotape for his title role in Oliver Stone’s “Nixon” (1995), Hopkins fashioned a riveting performance that was as much an internal product of his own remembered inadequacies as a Welsh schoolboy as it was external mimicry of the 37th President of the USA. He directed and starred in “August” (1996), an adaptation of Chekhov’s “Uncle Vanya” (for which he also composed its melancholy, lyrical score), and then played bookish billionaire Charles Morse who devises many of the best survival strategies after a plane crash in the Alaskan wilderness pits Alec Baldwin and him against nature in Lee Tamahori’s “The Edge (1997). Hopkins followed quickly with another portrayal of an American president, this time as John Quincy Adams in Steven Spielberg’s “Amistad” (1997).

In 1998, Hopkins starred in a pair of remakes, playing William Parrish in “Meet J Black” (filmed twice before as “Death Takes a Holiday,” a 1934 feature and a 1971 ABC-TV movie) and the aged, original swashbuckler Don Diego, who trains a thief (Antonio Banderas) as his successor in “The Mask of Zorro.” Later in the year, he was cast as Dr Ethan Powell in “Instinct,” a film loosely based on a novel by Daniel Quinn. As an anthropologist who lived for three years in the wilds with a family of gorillas, Powell discovered a secret which can not be revealed until a psychiatrist uncovers the truth behind a homicidal attack for which the doctor stands accused. In 1999, Hopkins took on the mighty title role in Julie Taymor’s adaptation of “Titus.” He briefly considered retiring after this role but found himself unable to give up his desire to perform. In both 2001 and 2002, he again played his most well-known role of Hannibal Lecter in “Hannibal” and “Red Dragon.” Hopkins made the rather unfortunate choice, however, of starring with Chris Rock in the abominable “Bad Company.” Directed by J l Schumacher, the action comedy boasted two talented stars and a well-respected director, but came off as a by-the-numbers action flick that came and went with little notice in the theaters.

Although Hopkins seemed to take a slightly lazy delight in revisiting the famous Lecter character (and fattening his bank account), he also accepted the challenging, racially charged role of Coleman Silk in director Robert Benton’s film adaptation of author Philip Roth’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel “The Human Stain” (2003). Hopkins went t -to-t with acting heavyweights Nicole Kidman, Gary Sinise and Ed Harris in playing Coleman Silk, a man of mixed race passing as white who embarks on an affair with an uneducated woman. Despite his well-established ability to stretch and excel in unlikely roles, Hopkins faced some criticism for seeming so physically disparate from the character depicted in the novel, although his performance was considered a bright spot in an otherwise hum-drum film. He reunited with Oliver Stone to play famed ancient geographer Ptolemy in the writer-director’s epic historical drama “Alexander” (2004), then delivered an effective, heart-wrenching and occasionally ferocious performance as a brilliant but schizophrenic mathematician whose death leaves his troubled daughter and caretaker (Gwyneth Paltrow) wondering if she’s inherited his genius or his madness in director John Madden’s deft adaptation of the acclaimed stage play, “Proof” (2005).

In “The World’s Fastest Indian” (2005), Hopkins gave a charming and light-hearted performance as the real-life Burt Munro, an Australian motorcycle enthusiast whose dream to break the under-1000cc land speed record at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah came true when he was 67-years-old. Meanwhile, Hopkins was honored by the Hollywood Foreign Press at the 2006 Golden Globe Awards with the Cecile B. DeMille Award for lifetime achievement. Always riveting, Hopkins has had the uncanny ability to enthrall despite an otherwise poorly made film, as was the case with “All the King’s Men” (2006) where he played a powerful Louisiana judge-albeit with a British accent-who represents the corrupted political system that ensnares an idealistic man-of-the-people (Sean Penn) running for governor.

Hopkins joined the large, all-star ensemble cast in “Bobby” (2006), Emilio Estevez’s long developed drama about the assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy, playing a retired doorman at the famous Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles who-along with several other hotel staff-witness the shocking murder. The acclaimed actor then gave a pleasingly sadistic performance in “Fracture” (2007), playing the confessed murderer of his much younger wife (Embeth Davidtz) who was having an affair with a police hostage negotiator (Billy Burke). Hopkins matched wits with the Deputy D.A. for Los Angeles (Ryan Gosling), gleefully watching the prosecutor’s case unravel as pieces of evidence from a seemingly open-and-shut case systematically fall to pieces.

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He was first seen on the London stage in a 1939 production of Wuthering Heights. When war came he decided to enlist in the Royal Air Force, however tragedy struck when his plane was shot down over France, and he found himself imprisoned in a POW camp. He was eventually freed and discharged with the rank of Flight Lieutenant.

Resuming his career after the war, Pleasence eventually came to New York in the company of Laurence Olivier in 1950, appearing in Caesar and Cleopatra. And although he began appearing in films in 1954, Pleasence’s British fame during the ’50s was the result of his television work, notably a recurring role as Prince John in The Adventures of Robin Hood from 1955-1958. He also co-starred in TV productions of The Millionairess, Man in a Moon, and Call Me Daddy. Voted British television actor of the year in 1958, Pleasence produced and hosted the 1960 series Armchair Mystery Theatre, before creating the stage role for which he was best remembered: Davies, the menacing tramp in Harold Pinter’s The Caretaker. The actor revived the character throughout his career, appearing as Davies for the last time in 1991.

He was fortunate enough to be associated with the massive success of The Great Escape in 1963. He played a role as a RAF officer who ends up in a Luftwaffe POW camp. Ironically this is exactly what had happened to him twenty years earlier! Clearly a role which he would have had experience in and would have enjoyed. The spin off success led to a wealth of American film offers. Four years later, the actor portrayed arch criminal Ernst Blofeld in the James Bond film ‘You Only Live Twice’ – the first time that the scarred face of the secretive character was seen onscreen in the Bond series.

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Black Brigade begins when Captain Carter (Stephen Boyd) is asked to go on a dangerous mission to blow up a Nazi held dam 50 miles behind enemy lines and the unit chosen to accomplish the task is “B” Company which is all black and which is a sanitation unit. The men in this unit do hard physical work including digging latrines, digging graves, dealing with garbage, etc. Despite the fact that soldiers of this type did not receive much combat training and certainly none of the training needed for daring commando type missions, Carter asks their lieutenant in charge for “volunteers”, and he picks 6 men.

These black soldiers are nothing like what real black soldiers from the WWII era were like. These soldiers have attitude and are not afraid to yell and scream at their white commanding officer about the unfairness of life. Also, all the black actors have big afros and a few have mustaches/goatees in keeping with 1970 fashions. Richard Pryor sports a natty red beret throughout the whole movie. In real life, anyone wearing such a beret and sporting afros and the mustaches/goatees would have been in serious trouble.

Now, you’d expect that the soldiers would receive some sort of special training and special advanced planning for their mission. No such thing. You would also expect that the soldiers would be airlifted to somewhere near their target. Once again, no such thing. Instead, the troopers just simply walk down a road in broad daylight. And they manage to penetrate the enemy lines without encountering any Germans, military or civilian and on top of that, they manage to come near the dam 50 miles behind the enemy lines strictly by walking in not more than a day. Unreal.

They stop at a house occupied by a native woman (Susan Oliver) who has zero German accent and there Capt. Carter listens to the radio for his orders. Now, in real life, these orders would have been broadcasted in either code or in such a way that only someone in the know would really know what was going on. Instead, Carter’s commanding officer engages in total disregard for even basic communications security telling him everything in plainspoken English even telling him that on the next day the Third Regiment was going to launch an offensive to gain that dam going the full 50 miles in less than a day and that Capt. Carter and his ludicrously small command had to secure the dam for the offensive to succeed. This is interesting since any real life WWII offensive that could have gained 50 miles in a single day would have been considered the Eighth Miracle of the World. And for good reason too: In real life, no single offensive ever gained anywhere near that kind of territory in one day.

Despite the fact that the Germans monitored Allied radio communications and surely picked the unguarded orders, once Capt. Carter’s unit arrives at the dam, they find it guarded only by a couple incompetents who are quickly dispatched. Then, the unit moved on to find four Germans who are fixing on blowing the dam despite the fact that they did not have anywhere near enough dynamite to make a serious dent in the dam, let alone blow it up. These enemy troops are also eliminated with ease. As if on cue, the Third Regiment shows up without showing any signs of ever being in combat and the operation is judged a success and one of the soldiers is notified that he will receive the Congressional Medal of Honor. End of movie.

Black Brigade is a war action movie without any real suspense nor did it even try to replicate anything even halfway authentic. If anything, it falls into the genre of movies like Where Eagles Dare in which the killing of enemy troops is as easy as pie, prompting viewers to wonder if its so easy for the good guys to kill off the bad guys, then why did WWII last so long?

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The Black Brigade

Collins showed herself to great effect on TV during 1967, guest-starring on two episodes of “Batman” (ABC) and delivering a memorably radiant portrayal of 1930s suffragette Edith Keeler in “The City on the Edge of Forever”, a two-part “Star Trek” (NBC) episode, then disappeared from the small screen to resume making run-of-the-mill features. Though she continued to work, her career was without any real momentum until deliciously naughty performances in “The Stud” (1978) and “The Bitch” (1979), movies made from the novels of her sister Jackie, thrust her back in the public eye. Collins returned to the London stage in “The Last of Mrs Cheney” (1980-81) before the success of “Dynasty” opened a whole new world of opportunity. Playboy beckoned, featuring her as “50 Is Beautiful”, and she debuted her Joan Collins Fashion Eyewear Line in 1985. She also branched out as executive producer (as well as star) of two CBS miniseries, “Sin” and “Monte Carlo” (both 1986).

Collins had already written three books when she followed in sister Jackie’s footsteps and published her first novel, “Prime Time” (1988), setting the stage for her grand drama with Random House. The publisher signed her to a two-book deal that guaranteed her $4 million but reneged on receipt, suing her for return of a $1.3 million advance. The high profile case revealed her purple prose as laughable, but the jury vindicated her, though giving credit for just one book, calling the second one in question a rehash of the first. The 90s saw Collins embrace the work of the late Noel Coward, playing Amanda Prynne in “Private Lives” on the London stage and in her 1992 Broadway debut. The raven-haired beauty also associate produced and starred in “Collins and Coward” (A&E, 1992), performing three of his one-act plays. She gave her signature diva role a new spin as a frosty agent in Kenneth Branagh’s “A Midwinter’s Tale” (1996) but could not save “Pacific Palisades” (Fox, 1997) for old pal and “Dynasty” executive producer Aaron Spelling.

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