Stephen Dillane

Actor

• Born: November 30, 1956
• Place of Birth: London, England

Contribution: Stephen Dillane is an English actor best known for his roles in the film The Hours (2002) and in the HBO miniseries John Adams (2008) and series Game of Thrones (2012–15).

Background

Stephen Dillane was born Stephen Delaney on November 30, 1956, in London, England. Soon after his birth, his family moved to Kent, where he was raised by his mother and surgeon father.

He later attended the University of Exeter, where he studied history and politics. Upon graduating, Dillane worked for a time as a journalist for the Croydon Advertiser newspaper. He soon found that he was intensely unhappy with his career choice, however, and settled almost randomly on acting as an alternative. Dillane then attended Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, where he took on the stage name Stephen Dillon before settling on his surname’s current spelling, Dillane.

Career

After completing the school’s two-year drama program, Dillane began working in London theaters, performing in such plays as Dancing at Lughnasa and The Beaux Strategem.

Dillane found critical success on the stage, and by the late 1980s, he had ventured into screen acting. He started out in bit parts in television films such as The Secret Garden (1987), series such as Remington Steele (1985) and Bulman (1987), and features such as Business as Usual (1988). He found more prominent film success when he was cast in the role of Horatio in Franco Zeffirelli's film adaptation of Hamlet (1990), which starred Mel Gibson in the title role. The next year, Dillane appeared in a supporting role in the World War II romance Heading Home (1991), part of the Screen Two anthology series.

In 1993, Dillane appeared in a stage production of the Tony Kushner play Angels in America at the National Theatre. Soon after, he made a significant breakthrough when the celebrated director Peter Hall cast him in the lead role in his production of Hamlet, which opened at the Gielgud Theatre in 1994. Dillane’s performance was widely praised, with theater critic Michael Billington listing Dillane’s Hamlet among the top ten performances of the role. Dillane interspersed his work in theater with more roles in television, including the 1992 television film Frankie’s House and the 1994 series The Rector’s Wife.

After appearing in the 1996 flop Two If by Sea with Sandra Bullock and Denis Leary, Dillane costarred with Sophie Marceau in the romance Firelight (1997). He garnered critical attention for his performance in the 1997 film Welcome to Sarajevo, in which he acted alongside Woody Harrelson. Next, he starred in another romance, Déjà Vu (1998), playing a married painter who falls in love with an American woman.

In 1999, Dillane made his Broadway debut, starring in a production of Tom Stoppard's The Real Thing at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre. For his performance, Dillane won a Tony Award and a Drama Desk Award for best actor in a play. Also in 1999, he appeared in the lead role in the film The Darkest Light as the father of a child stricken with cancer. The next year, he appeared in the miniseries Anna Karenina (2000), which was positively reviewed. Dillane’s work thus far in film and television was beginning to earn him notice, and he soon began appearing in more prominent productions, including the Brad Pitt and Robert Redford film Spy Game (2001) and the Jonathan Demme–directed The Truth about Charlie (2002).

Dillane then landed the role of Virginia Woolf’s husband, Leonard, in the 2002 film The Hours, based on the modernist novel of the same name by Michael Cunningham. The film was widely acclaimed by critics, who praised Dillane’s understated yet complex performance. The actor continued his rise into mainstream features with a turn as Merlin in King Arthur (2004), an action-adventure take on the Arthurian legends directed by Antoine Fuqua.

After acting in a number of supporting roles over the next several years, Dillane landed second billing to Julianne Moore in the 2007 drama Savage Grace. The independent film was highly praised for the talents of its actors. In 2008, Dillane played Thomas Jefferson in the HBO historical miniseries John Adams, starring Paul Giamatti. The show received predominantly positive reviews and put Dillane in the spotlight more than ever before, especially after he was nominated for an Emmy Award for outstanding supporting actor in a miniseries or movie for his performance. Several more supporting film roles followed until 2012, when he found major success as Stannis Baratheon in the HBO epic fantasy series Game of Thrones (2011–2019), based on the popular book series A Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin.

Dillane continued with intermittent film and television work between shooting episodes of Game of Thrones. He acted in supporting roles in Perfect Sense (2011), Twenty8k (2012), and Zero Dark Thirty (2012), appeared in the television series Hunted (2012) and the miniseries Secret State (2012), and was cast in the lead role of the 2012 independent film Papadopoulos & Sons.

Though his time on Game of Thrones came to an end in 2015, Dillane continued to find work on both the big and small screens. After appearing in an episode of the popular Netflix series The Crown as the painter Graham Sutherland and returning to the stage for a London revival of the play Faith Healer in 2016, he portrayed Viscount Halifax in the historical film Darkest Hour (2017), which focuses on a particular point in Winston Churchill's time as prime minister of the United Kingdom, and was part of the cast of the biographical drama Mary Shelley (2017). Additionally, between 2013 and 2018, he costarred in the French-British crime series The Tunnel. His performance as Karl Roebuck earned him an International Emmy Award for Best Performance by an Actor in 2014. In 2019, he followed a role in the 2018 film Outlaw King with a part in The Professor and the Madman and took to the London stage again for When We Have Sufficiently Tortured Each Other.

In 2020, Dillane starred in the road-trip comedy film The Man in the Hat and followed that up with a role in the romantic comedy Boxing Day in 2021. He also starred in the British-made TV series Alex Rider, which ran for three seasons. Dillane appeared in two TV series in 2024, the crime series Sherwood and the Netflix comedy Kaos, in which he played the Greek god Prometheus.

Impact

Having chosen acting as an alternative to journalism on a whim, Stephen Dillane garnered critical success early in his career on the stage before gradually moving up the ranks of mainstream film and television. From his Emmy-nominated role as Thomas Jefferson in the miniseries John Adams to his recurring role as Stannis Baratheon on Game of Thrones, Dillane has proven that the acting profession is where he truly belongs.

Personal Life

Dillane is married to Naomi Wirthner, with whom he has two sons, Frank and Seamus.

Bibliography

McNulty, Bernadette. “Stephen Dillane.” Telegraph, 26 Sept. 2008, www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/3561243/Stephen-Dillane.html. Accessed 24 Sept. 2024.

"Stephen Dillane." IMDb, 2024, www.imdb.com/name/nm0226820/. Accessed 24 Sept. 2024.

Van Der Zee, Bibi. “The Unknown Heart-Throb.” Guardian, 12 Jan. 2000, www.theguardian.com/culture/2000/jan/13/artsfeatures1. Accessed 24 Sept. 2024.

Wolf, Matt. “Getting out of the Way of The Real Thing.” New York Times, 16 Apr. 2000, www.nytimes.com/2000/04/16/theater/theater-getting-out-of-the-way-of-the-real-thing.html. Accessed 24 Sept. 2024.