1. Bill Nighy gained acclaim for his roles in David Hare's Pravda in 1985, Harold Pinter's Betrayal in 1991, Tom Stoppard's Arcadia in 1993, and Anton Chekhov's The Seagull in 1994.
53 Facts About Bill Nighy
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Bill Nighy acted on Broadway in the David Hare plays The Vertical Hour and Skylight, earning a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play nomination for the latter.
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Bill Nighy rose to international stardom with his role in Love Actually, which earned him a BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actor.
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Bill Nighy went on to portray Viktor in the Underworld film series and Davy Jones in the Pirates of the Caribbean film series.
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Bill Nighy has gained acclaim for his roles in television, earning a BAFTA Award for his role in BBC One series State of Play, and a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor for the BBC film Gideon's Daughter.
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William Francis Bill Nighy was born on 12 December 1949 in Caterham, Surrey, the son of Alfred Martin Bill Nighy and Catherine Josephine,.
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Bill Nighy's father managed a car garage after working in the family chimney sweeping business; his mother was a psychiatric nurse of Irish descent born in Glasgow, Scotland.
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Bill Nighy was brought up as a Roman Catholic and served as an altar boy; however, he gave up "being a practising Catholic" as a teenager.
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Bill Nighy left school at the age of 15, without qualifications, and later with a friend travelled to Paris hoping and failing "to write a novel".
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Bill Nighy worked variously in a local employment office and as a messenger for The Croydon Advertiser and The Field.
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Bill Nighy then applied for a place at RADA, but was rejected and instead enrolled at the Guildford School of Dance and Drama to train for the stage.
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Bill Nighy was a member of the travelling theatre group Van Load, which included one of Nighy's most frequent collaborators, writer and director David Hare.
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When Bill Nighy told him that he was an actor, Campbell hired him on the spot.
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Bill Nighy was cast in two David Hare premieres, A Map of The World and Pravda, at the National.
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Bill Nighy starred in three episodes of the British anthology series Play For Today from 1978 to 1982.
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Bill Nighy played Samwise Gamgee in the 1981 BBC Radio dramatisation of The Lord of the Rings, and was heard in the 1980s BBC Radio version of Yes Minister.
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Bill Nighy's most acclaimed stage performances were in National Theatre productions.
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Bill Nighy played Jerry in Harold Pinter's Betrayal in 1991 at the Almeida Theatre.
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Bill Nighy played a libidinous young disc jockey, Vincent Fish, in the 1980 comedy series Agony, where he was the occasional lover of the lead character, played by Maureen Lipman.
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Bill Nighy starred in two episodes of the BBC series Performance in 1991 and 1993.
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Bill Nighy claimed that the serial, an Ann Oakley novel adapted by Laura Lamson, was the job that launched his career.
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Bill Nighy received some recognition by American audiences for his acclaimed character portrayal of fifty-year-old rock star Ray Simms in the 1998 film Still Crazy.
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Since 1999, Bill Nighy has played Simon Brett's fictional amateur sleuth Charles Paris at least 17 times on BBC Radio 4.
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In 2003, Bill Nighy played the role of the Vampire Elder Viktor in the American production Underworld.
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Bill Nighy appeared in the comedy Shaun of the Dead.
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In early 2004, The Sunday Times reported that Bill Nighy was on the shortlist for the role of the Ninth Doctor in the 2005 revival of the BBC television series Doctor Who.
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Bill Nighy played the lead character, Gideon, a successful events organiser who begins to lose touch with the world around him.
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Also in 2006, Bill Nighy made his Broadway debut alongside Julianne Moore in the David Hare play The Vertical Hour, directed by Sam Mendes at the Music Box Theatre.
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In 2006, Bill Nighy played the principal villain, Davy Jones, in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest with his face entirely obscured by computer-generated makeup.
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Bill Nighy reprised the role in the 2007 sequel, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, in which his real face was briefly revealed in one scene.
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Bill Nighy provided the narration for the Animal Planet series Meerkat Manor.
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Bill Nighy appeared as General Friedrich Olbricht, one of the principal conspirators, in the 2008 film Valkyrie.
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Bill Nighy had played an SS officer in the 1985 Hitler's SS: Portrait in Evil.
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Bill Nighy starred in the film Wild Target in 2010.
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Bill Nighy had already worked with director David Yates twice, and with the majority of the Harry Potter cast in previous films.
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Bill Nighy has said of his role as Rufus Scrimgeour that it meant he was no longer the only English actor not to be in Harry Potter.
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Bill Nighy voiced Grandsanta in the 2011 animated film Arthur Christmas.
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Bill Nighy acted in these films alongside Rachel Weisz, Ralph Fiennes, Helena Bonham Carter, and Michael Gambon.
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Bill Nighy returned to Broadway starring in the transfer in Skylight alongside Mulligan where they both received nominations for the Tony Awards for Best Actor in a Play and Best Actress in a Play respectively.
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Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian praised Bill Nighy, describing him as "a colossally proportioned scene-stealer".
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Variety film critic Andrew Barker praised the casting of Bill Nighy as Emma's father, writing that the decision was an "uncontested layup of casting".
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Bill Nighy is the narrator of the Channel 5 travel show The World's Most Scenic Railway Journeys, a programme that began its fifth series in autumn 2021 with episodes featuring train journeys across Australia and the Welsh borders.
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In 2022, Bill Nighy became a DJ on BBC 6 Music when he stood in for Guy Garvey on the regular Sunday afternoon programme Guy Garvey's Finest Hour, with Bill Nighy deputising for the Elbow frontman again at the beginning of 2023.
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Bill Nighy later deputised for Iggy Pop on his show Iggy Confidential from March to April 2023, and again in December 2023.
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Bill Nighy is a supporter of Crystal Palace FC He is a patron of the Crystal Palace Children's Charity and of the Ann Craft Trust.
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Bill Nighy is a patron of the Milton Rooms, a new arts centre in Malton, North Yorkshire, along with Imelda Staunton, Jools Holland and Kathy Burke.
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Bill Nighy is a supporter of the Robin Hood tax campaign, and starred in a video in support of it.
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Bill Nighy has spoken of his role in Pride, a film extolling the mutual support between the National Union of Miners and gay rights groups in the UK in the 1980s, as one of his most cherished.
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In 2004, Bill Nighy was a guest on Desert Island Discs, presented by Sue Lawley.
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Bill Nighy was listed as one of the 50 best-dressed over-50s by The Guardian in March 2013 and one of GQ 50 best-dressed British men in 2015.
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Bill Nighy became a fan of the Pokemon franchise during the production of Detective Pikachu, in which he played Howard Clifford.
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Bill Nighy has said that Mew is his favourite Pokemon.
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For many years, Bill Nighy struggled with substance issues, particularly alcoholism, a topic he rarely discusses, and has been a "sober alcoholic" since 17 May 1992.