Happy Birthday, Bernard Hill!

Best known among the Tolkien community for his portrayal of Théoden, King of Rohan in The Lord of the Rings, Bernhard Hill enjoyed a long and exciting career on screen and on stage. Today, Hill celebrates his 70th birthday.

Born in 1944 in Blackley, Manchaster in England, Hill attended the Manchester Polytechnic School of Drama at the same time as Richard Griffiths who played Vernon Dursley in the Harry Potter films. Hill’s long and successful career began in 1973 when he made his English television debut in the TV movie Hard Labour. In 1983 Hill won a BAFTA Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of Yosser Hughes, a Liverpool working class man ultimately driven to the edge by an uncaring system, in the miniseries Boys from the Blackstuff (1982). With his bemused brood of kids never let out of his sight, Bernard Hill’s powerful depiction of a man crumbling before the audience’s eyes brought him numerous awards but, as he later revealed, almost “drove him to the edge of insanity”.

In the following years, Hill appearanced on TV, movies, and stage in England. As Sergeant Putnam in Gandhi (1982), Hill received his first international recognition. Fifteen years after that, Hill portrayed Captain Edward Smith in Titanic. Hill is one of only three actors who appear in two out of only seven movies that grossed over $1 billion in the box office, namely Titanic and LOTR. The other actors are Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom. Bernard Hill, however, is the only actor to star in two billion dollar films that have both won 11 Oscars (LOTR: The Return of the King and Titanic).

For the younger generations, Hill is best known for his portrayal of Théoden in LOTR. In an interview with the BBC,  Hill admitted that while he first got a copy of LOTR in 1977, he haven’t read it all and that the book is “a bit of a heavy read”. However, as soon as he knew he’ll work on Peter Jackson’s adaptation, Hill read the second and third book of LOTR. Initially, Peter Jackson considered Hill for the role of the wizard Gandalf, which went to Sir Ian McKellen. Nowadays it is impossible to imagine anyone but Bernard Hill in the role of Théoden!

So let’s gather around and raise our glasses and celebrate the birthday of an amazing actor!