Pete Postlethwaite
Actor
Biography
Pete Postlethwaite (February 7, 1946 – January 2, 2011) was an English stage, film and television actor. After minor television appearances including in The Professionals, Postlethwaite's first success came with the film Distant Voices, Still Lives in 1988. He played a mysterious lawyer, Mr. Kobayashi, in The Usual Suspects, and he appeared in Alien 3, In the Name of the Father, Amistad, Brassed Off, The Shipping News, The Constant Gardener, The Age of Stupid, Inception, The Town, Romeo + Juliet, and Æon Flux. In television, Postlethwaite's most notable performance was as the villain Sergeant Obadiah Hakeswill in the Sharpe television series and television movies opposite actor Sean Bean's character of Richard Sharpe. Postlethwaite was born in Warrington, England in 1946. He trained as a teacher and taught drama before training as an actor. Steven Spielberg called Postlethwaite "the best actor in the world" after working with him on The Lost World: Jurassic Park. He received an Academy Award nomination for his role in In the Name of the Father in 1993, and was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in the 2004 New Year's Honours List. He died of pancreatic cancer.
Filmography
The Usual Suspects
as Kobayashi 1995
The Lost World: Jurassic Park
as Roland Tembo 1997
Clash of the Titans
as Spyros 2010
Alien³
as David 1992
The Town
as Fergus "Fergie" Colm 2010
Romeo + Juliet
as Father Laurence 1996
The Last of the Mohicans
as Captain Beams 1992
Æon Flux
as Keeper 2005
DragonHeart
as Gilbert 1996
In the Name of the Father
as Giuseppe Conlon 1993
The Constant Gardener
as Lorbeer 2005
Solomon Kane
as William Crowthorn 2009
James and the Giant Peach
as The Magic Man 1996
Amistad
as Holabird 1997
The Omen
as Father Brennan 2006
Dark Water
as Veeck 2005