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Sir Christopher Lee
CBE CStJ
Lee at the Berlin International Film Festival, February 2013
Born
Christopher Frank Carandini Lee

(1922-05-27) 27 May 1922 (age 102)
Belgravia, London, England, United Kingdom
Alma materWellington College
Occupation(s)Actor, singer, author
Years active1946–present
SpouseBirgit Krøncke (1961–present)
Children1
Military career
Allegiance Finland
 United Kingdom
Service / branchFinnish Army (December 1939)
British Home Guard (1940)
 Royal Air Force (1941–1946)
Years of service1939–1946
RankFlight Lieutenant
Battles / warsWinter War
World War II (North African Campaign, Allied invasion of Italy, Battle of Monte Cassino)
Websitechristopherleeweb.com

Sir Christopher Frank Carandini Lee, CBE, CStJ, (born 27 May 1922) is an English actor, singer and author. He is best known for playing villains, including Frankenstein's monster, Count Dracula, Kharis and Fu Manchu in a string of popular Hammer Horror films (1957–1973); Francisco Scaramanga in the James Bond film The Man with the Golden Gun (1974); Count Dooku in the Star Wars prequel trilogy (2002–2005); and Saruman in The Lord of the Rings film trilogy (2001–2003) and The Hobbit film trilogy (2012–2014).

Born in London in 1922, Lee was educated at Summer Fields School and Wellington College, leaving the latter in 1939 when his step-father went bankrupt. After travelling, working as a clerk and volunteering to fight for Finland during the Winter War against the Soviet Union, he joined the Royal Air Force in 1941. An optic nerve problem prevented him from completing his training so he joined RAF Intelligence and served in North Africa and Italy and then in Germany and Austria after the War ended. He was also attached to the Special Operations Executive and the Long Range Desert Group, the precursor of the SAS.

After the War, he decided to become an actor. After a long "apprenticeship", his breakthrough came in 1957 with a role as Frankenstein's monster in Hammer's The Curse of Frankenstein. Roles as Count Dracula in Dracula (1958) and Sir Henry Baskerville in The Hound of the Baskervilles (1959) quickly followed as he made his name in horror and fantasy films. During the 1960s and 70s he appeared for Hammer as Dracula seven times (1958–1973), as Fu Manchu five times (1965–1969), as Grigori Rasputin in Rasputin, the Mad Monk (1966) and as Duc de Richleau in The Devil Rides Out (1968). His non-Hammer roles included Sherlock Holmes in Sherlock Holmes and the Deadly Necklace (1962), Artemidorus in Julius Caesar (1970), Comte de Rochefort in The Three Musketeers (1973) and The Four Musketeers (1974), Lord Summerisle in The Wicker Man (1973) and Francisco Scaramanga in the James Bond film The Man with the Golden Gun (1974).

In 1976, he made his final film for Hammer, To the Devil a Daughter, and moved to America the following year. He appeared in films including Airport '77 (1977), Jaguar Lives! (1979), 1941 (1979), The Return of Captain Invincible (1983) and Howling II: Your Sister Is a Werewolf (1985). Returning to Britain in 1985, his films included Mio in the Land of Faraway (1987), The Return of the Musketeers (1989), Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990) and Police Academy: Mission to Moscow (1994). In 1999 he had what he considers his "second breakthrough" in Tim Burton's Sleepy Hollow, which led to five more collaborations with Burton and roles as Saruman in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit film series (1999–2014) and as Count Dooku in two Star Wars films (2002–2005). His other recent films include Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005), Corpse Bride (2005), The Golden Compass (2007), Alice in Wonderland (2010), Hugo (2011), Dark Shadows (2012) and, in 2011, his first Hammer film for three decades, The Resident.

Lee was knighted for services to drama and charity in 2009, received the BAFTA Fellowship in 2011 and received the BFI Fellowship in 2013.[1][2][3] Lee considers his best performance to be that of Pakistan's founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah in the biopic Jinnah (1998), and his best film to be the British horror film The Wicker Man (1973).[4] Lee is also one of the highest grossing actors of all time, his films having grossed $8,321,486,066 worldwide.

Always noted as an actor for his deep, strong voice and love of opera music, he has also worked as a singer, recording various opera and musical pieces between 1986 and 1998. After working with several heavy metal bands since 2005, he has also released two symphonic metal albums: Charlemagne: By the Sword and the Cross (2010) and Charlemagne: The Omens of Death (2013).[5][6] He was honoured with the "Spirit of Metal" award in the 2010 Metal Hammer Golden God awards ceremony.

Early life

[edit]

Christopher Lee was born in Belgravia, Westminster, London on 27 May 1922,[7] the son of Lieutenant Colonel Geoffrey Trollope Lee (1879–1941), of the 60th King's Royal Rifle Corps, and his wife, Contessa Estelle Marie (née Carandini di Sarzano) (1889–1981).[8][9] Lee's father fought in the Boer War and in the First World War[10] and his mother was a famous Edwardian beauty who was painted by Sir John Lavery as well as by Oswald Birley and Olive Snell, and sculpted by Clare Frewen Sheridan.[11][12] Lee's maternal great-grandfather was an Italian political refugee, whose wife, Lee's great-grandmother, was English-born opera singer Marie Carandini (née Burgess). His had one sister, Xandra Carandini Lee (1917–2002).[13]

It was a good part, and I claim to have done it justice. I learned at the outset that the best lines are given to the baddies and that these make the most impact on the audience - especially if there is some pathos in their situation.

 — Lee, on playing Rumpelstiltskin.[14]

Lee's parents separated when he was four and divorced two years later.[15] During this time, his mother took him and his sister to Wengen in Switzerland.[16] After enrolling in Miss Fisher's Academy in Territet, he played his first role, as Rumpelstiltskin.[14] They then returned to London, where Lee attended Wagner's private school in Queen's Gate and his mother married Harcourt George St-Croix Rose, a banker and uncle of Ian Fleming.[17] Fleming, author of the James Bond novels, thus became Lee's step-cousin. The family moved to Fulham, living next door to the actor Eric Maturin.[18] One night, he was introduced to Prince Yusupov and Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich, the assassins of Grigori Rasputin, whom Lee was to play many years later.[19]

When Lee was nine, he was sent to Summer Fields School, a preparatory school in Oxford notable for sending many alumni to Eton.[20] He continued acting in school plays, though "the laurels deservedly went to Patrick Macnee."[21] Lee applied for a scholarship to Eton, where his interview was to prove portentous because of the presence of the noted ghost story author M. R. James.[22] Sixty years later, Lee played the part of James for the BBC.[23] His poor maths skills meant that he placed eleventh and thus missed out on being a King's Scholar by one place. His step-father was not prepared to pay the higher fees that being an Oppidan Scholar meant and so he did not attend.[22] Instead, Lee attended Wellington College, where he won scholarships in the classics, studying Ancient Greek and Latin.[24] Aside from a "tiny part" in a school play, he didn't act while at Wellington.[25] He was a "passable" racquets player and fencer and a competent cricketer but did not do well at the other sports played: hockey, football, rugby and boxing.[26] He disliked the parades and weapons training and would always "play dead" as soon as possible during mock battles.[27] Lee was frequently beaten at school, including once at Wellington for "being beaten too often", though he accepted them as "logical and therefore acceptable" punishments for knowingly breaking the rules.[28] At age 17 and with one year left at Wellington, the summer term of 1939 was his last. His step-father had gone bankrupt, owing £25,000.[29]

His mother separated from Rose and Lee had to get a job, his sister already working as a secretary for the Church of England Pensions Board.[30] With most employers on or preparing to go on summer holidays, there were no immediate opportunities for Lee and so he was sent to the French Riviera, where his sister was on holiday with friends.[30] On his way there he stopped briefly in Paris, where he stayed with the journalist Webb Miller, a friend of Rose, and witnessed the execution of Eugen Weidmann, the last person to be executed in public in France.[31] Arriving in Menton, he stayed with the Russian Mazirov family, living amongst exiled princely families.[32] It was arranged that he should stay on in Menton after his sister had returned home, but with Europe on the brink of war, he returned to London instead.[33] He worked as an office clerk for United States Lines, taking care of the mail and running errands.[34][35]

The assumptions behind my education were that when it was complete I would be ready to lick the world. Now that it was, it seemed I was not fit for anything but to lick stamps. A strange blank interval began in my life, rather like a dream, in which one moves to and fro perfectly aware but unable to direct one’s own actions.[36]

Volunteering in the Winter War

[edit]

When World War II broke out, Lee was only 17 and thus not eligible to be conscripted, according to the National Service (Armed Forces) Act 1939. So, Lee and several friends volunteered to fight for the Finnish forces during the Winter War against the Soviet Union in 1939.[36] He and other British volunteers were kept away from actual fighting, but they were issued winter gear and were posted on guard duty a safe distance from the front lines. After a fortnight, they returned home.[37]

The Army was even less bothered about enlisting my services than the City had been. Along with a few other recent schoolboys who felt neglected by the War Office, I took a journey to Finland. Our idea was that we would rescue the Finns from the Russian invaders. Our surprised hosts affected to be delighted by this callow set of volunteers, and touched that we had paid our own third-class fares. They gave us some white uniforms as camouflage in the snow, and took us up front to a perfectly safe area. We never saw any Russians, and went home after a fortnight. It was clear the tiny Finnish army was doing rather well against the Russian colossus, without our help.[37]

In the last fifteen years I had hardly spent as many days in his company. I really knew very little about him except that sixty-two was a nonsensically early age for a man of his vitality to go. But blood is thicker than water. I felt overwhelmed… and ran into the lavatory to burst into tears.

 — Lee on the death of his father.[38]

Lee returned to work at United States Lines and found his work more satisfying, feeling that he was contributing. In early 1940, he joined Beecham's, at first as an office clerk, then as a switchboard operator.[39] When Beecham's moved out of London, he joined the Home Guard.[40] In the winter, his father fell ill with double pneumonia and died on 12 March 1941. Realising that he had no inclination to follow his father into the Army, Lee decided to join up while he still had some choice of service, and volunteered for the Royal Air Force.[38]

Service in World War II

[edit]

Training in Southern Rhodesia

[edit]

Lee reported to RAF Uxbridge for training and was then posted to the Initial Training Wing at Paignton.[41] After passing his exams in Liverpool, the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan meant that he travelled on the Reina del Pacifico to South Africa, then to his posting at Hillside, at Bulawayo in Southern Rhodesia.[42] Training with de Havilland Tiger Moths, Lee was having his penultimate training session before his first solo flight when he suffered from headaches and blurred vision. The medical officer hesitantly diagnosed a failure of his optic nerve and he was told he would never be allowed to fly again.[43] Lee was devastated and the death of a fellow trainee from Summer Fields only made him more despondent. His appeals were fruitless and he was left with nothing to do.[44] He was moved around to different flying stations, before going to Salisbury in December 1941.[45] He then visited the Mazowe Dam, Marandellas, the Wankie Game Reserve and the ruins of Great Zimbabwe. Thinking he should "do something constructive for my keep", he applied to join RAF Intelligence. His superiors praised his initiative and he was seconded into the Rhodesian Police Force and was posted as a warder at Salisbury Prison.[46] He was then promoted to leading aircraftman and moved to Durban in South Africa, before travelling to Suez on the Nieuw Amsterdam.[47]

North Africa

[edit]

After "killing time" at RAF Kasfareet near the Great Bitter Lake in the Suez Canal Zone, he resumed intelligence work in the city of Ismaïlia.[48] He was then attached to No. 205 Group RAF before being promoted to pilot officer and attached to No. 260 Squadron RAF as an intelligence officer.[49] As the North African Campaign progressed, the squadron "leapfrogged" between Egyptian airstrips, from RAF El Daba to Maaten Bagush and on to Mersa Matruh. They lent air support to the ground forces and bombed strategic targets. Lee, "broadly speaking, was expected to know everything."[50] The Allied advance continued into Libya, through Tobruk and Benghazi to the Marble Arch and then through El Agheila, Khoms and Tripoli, with the squadron averaging five missions a day.[51] As the advance continued into Tunisia, with the Axis forces digging themselves in at the Mareth Line, Lee was almost killed when the squadron's airfield was bombed.[52] After breaking through the Mareth Line, the squadron made their final base in Kairouan.[53] After the Axis surrender in May 1943, the squadron moved to Zuwarah in Libya in preparation for the Allied invasion of Sicily.[54]

Italy

[edit]
Pilot officer Lee in Vatican City, 1944, soon after The Liberation of Rome

They then moved to Malta, and, after its capture by the British Eighth Army, the Sicilian town of Pachino, before making a permanent base in Agnone Bagni.[55] After the Sicilian campaign was over, Lee came down with malaria for the sixth time in under a year. He was flown to a hospital in Carthage for treatment and when he returned, the squadron was restless. Frustrated with a lack of news about the Eastern Front and the Soviet Union in general, and with no mail from home or alcohol, unrest spread and threatened to turn into mutiny. Lee, by now an expert on Russia, talked them into resuming their duties, which much impressed his commanding officer.[56]

After the Allied invasion of Italy, the squadron was based in Foggia and Termoli during the winter of 1943. Lee was then seconded to the Army during an officer's swap scheme.[57] He spent most of this time with the Gurkhas of the 8th Indian Infantry Division during the Battle of Monte Cassino.[58] While spending some time on leave in Naples in March 1944, Lee climbed Mount Vesuvius, which erupted three days later.[59] During the final assault on Monte Cassino, the squadron was based in San Angelo and Lee was nearly killed when one of the planes crashed on takeoff and he tripped over one of its live bombs.[60] After the battle, the squadron moved to airfields just outside Rome and Lee visited the city, where he met his mother's cousin, Nicolò Carandini, who had fought in the Italian resistance movement.[61] In November 1944, Lee was promoted to flight lieutenant and left the squadron in Iesi to take up a posting at Air Force HQ.[62] Lee took part in forward planning and liaison, in preparation for a potential assault into the rumoured German Alpine Fortress.[63]

Germny and Austria

[edit]

After the war ended, Lee was invited to go hunting near Vienna and was then billeted in Pörtschach am Wörthersee in southern Austria.[64] For the final few months of his service, Lee, who can speak fluent French and German, among other languages, was seconded to the Central Registry of War Criminals and Security Suspects.[65] Here, he was tasked with helping to track down Nazi war criminals.[66] Of his time with the organisation, Lee has said: "We were given dossiers of what they'd done and told to find them, interrogate them as much as we could and hand them over to the appropriate authority ... We saw these concentration camps. Some had been cleaned up. Some had not."[66] Lee then retired from the RAF in 1946 with the rank of flight lieutenant.[65]

Special services

[edit]

Coincidentally, Lee's step-father served as a Captain in the Intelligence Corps, but it is unlikely Rose had any influence over Lee's military career. Lee saw him for the last time on a bus in London in 1940, by now divorced from Lee's mother, though Lee did not speak to him.[67]

Lee has mentioned on several occasions that during the war he was attached to the Special Operations Executive and the Long Range Desert Group, the precursor of the SAS,[68][69] but has always declined to go into details.

I was attached to the SAS from time to time but we are forbidden – former, present, or future – to discuss any specific operations. Let's just say I was in Special Forces and leave it at that. People can read in to that what they like.[70]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ "Hammer Horror star Lee knighted". BBC. Retrieved 7 May 2012
  2. ^ "Christopher Lee to receive Bafta Fellowship". BBC. Retrieved 7 May 2012
  3. ^ "Depp surprises Sir Christopher Lee with film award". BBC. Retrieved 14 December 2013
  4. ^ "The Total Film Interview – Christopher Lee". Total Film. 1 May 2005. Archived from the original on 12 June 2007. Retrieved 25 August 2013.
  5. ^ Sir Christopher Lee releases second heavy metal album
  6. ^ Farrell, John (28 May 2012). "Christopher Lee Celebrates 90th Birthday By Recording Heavy Metal". Forbes. Retrieved 29 May 2012.
  7. ^ "Biography – Christopher Lee – Official Website". Christopherleeweb.com. Retrieved 16 March 2014.
  8. ^ "Christopher Lee Biography (1922–)". Filmreference.com. Retrieved 4 October 2010.
  9. ^ "Merchant of menace". The Daily Telegraph. London. 19 May 2002. Retrieved 30 April 2010.
  10. ^ Lee 2003, p. 6-7.
  11. ^ Lee 2003, p. 13.
  12. ^ "Christopher Lee – Biography". Talk Talk. Retrieved 26 August 2013.
  13. ^ Lee 2003, p. 3.
  14. ^ a b Lee 2003, p. 22.
  15. ^ Lee 2003, p. 7.
  16. ^ Lee 2003, p. 21.
  17. ^ Lee 2003, p. 22-23.
  18. ^ Lee 2003, p. 23.
  19. ^ Lee 2003, p. 24.
  20. ^ Lee 2003, p. 25.
  21. ^ Lee 2003, p. 32.
  22. ^ a b Lee 2003, p. 38.
  23. ^ Christopher Lee playing M.R. James for the BBC in 2000 on YouTube
  24. ^ "Christopher Lee biography". Retrieved 18 April 2013.
  25. ^ Lee 2003, p. 44.
  26. ^ Lee 2003, p. 45.
  27. ^ Lee 2003, p. 46-47.
  28. ^ Lee 2003, p. 47.
  29. ^ Lee 2003, p. 48.
  30. ^ a b Lee 2003, p. 50.
  31. ^ Lee 2003, p. 52.
  32. ^ Lee 2003, p. 54.
  33. ^ Lee 2003, p. 56.
  34. ^ Lee 2003, p. 58-59.
  35. ^ Louis Paul (6 September 2007). Tales from the Cult Film Trenches: Interviews with 36 Actors from Horror, Science Fiction and Exploitation Cinema. McFarland. pp. 146–. ISBN 978-0-7864-8402-7.
  36. ^ a b Lee 2003, p. 59.
  37. ^ a b Lee 2003, p. 60.
  38. ^ a b Lee 2003, p. 65.
  39. ^ Lee 2003, p. 62-63.
  40. ^ Lee 2003, p. 64.
  41. ^ Lee 2003, p. 67-68.
  42. ^ Lee 2003, p. 70-71.
  43. ^ Lee 2003, p. 72-73.
  44. ^ Lee 2003, p. 73.
  45. ^ Lee 2003, p. 74.
  46. ^ Lee 2003, p. 75.
  47. ^ Lee 2003, p. 77.
  48. ^ Lee 2003, p. 77-79.
  49. ^ Lee 2003, p. 81.
  50. ^ Lee 2003, p. 84.
  51. ^ Lee 2003, p. 85-86.
  52. ^ Lee 2003, p. 86.
  53. ^ Lee 2003, p. 88.
  54. ^ Lee 2003, p. 91.
  55. ^ Lee 2003, p. 93-94.
  56. ^ Lee 2003, p. 96-97.
  57. ^ Lee 2003, p. 98.
  58. ^ Lee 2003, p. 99-100.
  59. ^ Lee 2003, p. 100-101.
  60. ^ Lee 2003, p. 101.
  61. ^ Lee 2003, p. 102.
  62. ^ Lee 2003, p. 104-105.
  63. ^ Lee 2003, p. 106.
  64. ^ Lee 2003, p. 106-107.
  65. ^ a b Lee 2003, p. 107.
  66. ^ a b "Christopher Lee: a giant among actors". The Times. 20 November 2009. Retrieved 20 December 2012.
  67. ^ Lee 2003, p. 61.
  68. ^ Lee 2003, p. 99.
  69. ^ Lord of the Rings DVD, audio commentary
  70. ^ Cite error: The named reference telegraphinterview was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

Bibliography

[edit]
  • Christopher Lee's Treasury of Terror, edited by Russ Jones, illustrated by Mort Drucker & others, Pyramid Books, 1966
  • Christopher Lee's New Chamber of Horrors, Souvenir Press, 1974
  • Christopher Lee's Archives of Terror, Warner Books, Volume I, 1975; Volume 2, 1976
  • Tall, Dark and Gruesome (autobiography), W.H. Allen, 1977 and 1999
  • The Hammer Story: The Authorised History of Hammer Films, by Marcus Hearn and Alan Barnes, Titan Books, 1997 and 2007 – Foreword by Christopher Lee
  • Christopher Lee: The Authorised Screen History by Jonathan Rigby, Reynolds & Hearn, 2001 and 2003
  • The Lord of the Rings: Weapons and Warfare by Chris Smith, HarperCollins, 2003 – Foreword by Christopher Lee
  • Lee, Christopher (2003) [1977]. Lord of Misrule: The Autobiography of Christopher Lee. London: Orion Publishing Group. ISBN 0-75285-770-3.
  • Dans les griffes de la Hammer by Nicolas Stanzick, Le Bord de l'eau Editions, Paris, 2010.
  • Sir Christopher Lee by Laurent Aknin, Nouveau Monde Éditions, Paris, 2011.
  • Monsters in the Movies: 100 Years of Cinematic Nightmares, by John Landis, DK Publishing, 2011 – Interview with Christopher Lee
  • Le Seigneur du désordre (autobiography, a French version of Lord of Misrule), Christopher Lee, Camion Blanc (Coll. "Camion Noir"), 2013.
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DEFAULTSORT:Lee, Christopher Category:1922 births Category:English people of Italian descent Category:Male actors of Italian descent Category:20th-century English male actors Category:21st-century English male actors Category:Actors awarded British knighthoods Category:Carandini family Category:Christopher Lee Category:Commanders of the Order of St John Category:Commanders of the Order of the British Empire Category:Officiers of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres Lee Category:English male film actors Category:English heavy metal singers Category:English male singers Category:English rock singers Category:English male stage actors Category:English male television actors Category:English male voice actors Category:Knights Bachelor Category:People educated at Summer Fields School Category:People educated at Wellington College, Berkshire Category:People from Belgravia Category:Royal Air Force officers Category:Royal Air Force personnel of World War II Category:Special Operations Executive personnel Category:Volunteers in the Winter War Category:Living people Category:Conservative Party (UK) people Category:Male actors from London

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