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Constantine Gregory (born Constantine Liebert, September 16, 1942) is an American actor, dialect coach, and voice actor. [1] Until 1983 he was usually credited as Constantin de Goguel.
He was born of a Dutch father and Russian–born mother. On their divorce, he was given his mother's surname of de Goguel. His mother was born in 1920 in Sebastopol with the White Army during the Russian Civil War, and in 1925 was smuggled out to England, where she was brought up. She studied acting briefly under Michael Chekhov at Dartington, but when his school broke up with the outbreak of war, she then later went to America and worked as a personal assistant to Edward James. She married Onno Liebert (Leebaert) in 1941. Liebert was a journalist and broadcaster who escaped the occupied Netherlands on a bicycle.
Gregory came to England with his mother in 1950 and then attended Dartington Hall School (1950–1961), followed by Trinity College, Dublin (1961–1965) where he read Economics and Political Science. He became President of Trinity College Players and in 1965 went with them to the Edinburgh Festival with a hugely successful late night revue directed by Max Stafford-Clark at the Traverse Theatre founded by Jim Haynes which had then only been going for two years.
His first professional job was as the back legs of Alfred the Horse in the annual Christmas production of Toad of Toad Hall in London's West End. He also understudied Mr Toad, and played Fat-Face the Policeman. Then he followed the usual path of actors in British theatre with stints in repertory at the Opera House, Harrogate, the Theatre Royal Windsor, amongst others, as well as playing a Blue Fairy in A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Open Air Theatre, Regent's Park, where he understudied Oberon. He performed at the Everyman Theatre Liverpool, toured in a musical directed by Michael Bogdanov, who had been a University contemporary. Constantine joined the Royal Shakespeare Company under Trevor Nunn for the "Roman season" of Coriolanus , Julius Caesar , Antony and Cleopatra and Titus Andronicus . (He later appeared as Aemelius in Julie Taymor's film, Titus ). In Jean-Louis Barrault's acclaimed production of Rabelais at the Round House Theatre London, Constantine played the leading part of the MC. He also appeared at the Royal Court Theatre in Keith Hack's production of The Good Woman of Szechuan with Janet Suzman, Ian McDiarmid and Jonathan Kent.
Meanwhile, his film and television career was taking off, thanks largely to his speaking fluent Russian at a time when Cold War spy stories were popular. Finding that he was being type cast as a "foreigner", he took on the professional surname of Gregory, and started getting more varied roles. His facility for accents and languages saw him portray not only Russians, but Americans, Germans, Spaniards and even a Moroccan. This vocal ability made him in demand as a "voice" in recording ADR, or "dubbing" feature films. He has now done this work, as a voice and group director, on over 350 films. This in turn led to being asked to dialogue coach the TV mini-series Mussolini: The Untold Story with George C. Scott and many other stars, including the young Robert Downey, Jr. and Lee Grant. A parallel career to acting stemmed from this when he was asked to dialogue coach on Bernardo Bertolucci's Oscar-winning film The Last Emperor (1987), in which he also played "The Oculist". He worked on two further movies with Bertolucci, Little Buddha (1994) and The Dreamers (2003). Gregory's skills as a dialogue coach have been mostly used with non-Anglo actors who need to act in English, and in establishing dialect conventions with multi-national casts. He has worked with many distinguished directors and international stars in this capacity, as well as the most distinguished actors in many countries, while continuing to act in feature films and TV movies. Constantine has also worked on radio for the BBC and made many audio story recordings, latterly several for Spoken Ink. Gregory has been married and divorced twice, has two daughters and a son, and lives in London and Hove. He has dual nationality UK/US and speaks fluent Russian and French with a knowledge of Italian, Spanish and German.
The Wind in the Willows is a classic children's novel by the British novelist Kenneth Grahame, first published in 1908. It details the story of Mole, Ratty, and Badger as they try to help Mr. Toad, after he becomes obsessed with motorcars and gets into trouble. It also details short stories about them that are disconnected from the main narrative. The novel was based on bedtime stories Grahame told his son Alastair. It has been adapted numerous times for both stage and screen.
Bernardo Bertolucci was an Italian film director and screenwriter with a career that spanned 50 years. Considered one of the greatest directors in Italian cinema, Bertolucci's work achieved international acclaim. With The Last Emperor (1987) he became the first Italian filmmaker to win the Academy Award for Best Director, and he received many other accolades including a BAFTA Award, a César Award, two Golden Globes, a Golden Lion in 2007, and an Honorary Palme d'Or at Cannes in 2011.
The Last Emperor is a 1987 epic biographical drama film about the life of Puyi, the last Emperor of China. It is directed by Bernardo Bertolucci from a screenplay he co-wrote with Mark Peploe, which was adapted from Puyi's 1964 autobiography, and independently produced by Jeremy Thomas.
Michael Leonard Williams was a British actor who played both classical and comedy roles. He was best known for co-starring in the sitcom A Fine Romance with his wife Dame Judi Dench, and for voicing Dr. Watson in the long-running Sherlock Holmes adaptations for BBC Radio.
Henry Ian Cusick is a Peruvian-Scottish actor of television, film, and theatre and a television director.
Mikhail Aleksandrovich Chekhov, known as Michael Chekhov, was a Russian-American actor, director, author, and theatre practitioner. He was a nephew of the playwright Anton Chekhov and a student of Konstantin Stanislavski. Stanislavski referred to him as his most brilliant student.
Sherman Howard is an American actor. He is best known for his performance as the zombie Bub in George A. Romero's Day of the Dead (1985) and Lex Luthor on Superboy (1990–92). He also voiced Derek Powers / Blight in Batman Beyond (1999–2001).
The Wind in the Willows is a 1996 British adventure comedy film based on Kenneth Grahame's 1908 novel The Wind in the Willows, adapted and directed by Terry Jones, and produced by Jake Eberts and John Goldstone. The film stars Terry Jones, Steve Coogan, Eric Idle and Nicol Williamson. While positively regarded, it was a box office bomb and had distribution problems in the United States.
Jeffery Kissoon is an actor with credits in British theatre, television, film and radio. He has performed with the Royal Shakespeare Company at venues such as the Royal National Theatre, under directors including Peter Brook, Peter Hall, Robert Lepage, Janet Suzman, Calixto Bieito and Nicholas Hytner. He has acted in genres from Shakespeare and modern theatre to television drama and science fiction, playing a range of both leading and supporting roles, from Mark Antony in Antony and Cleopatra and Prospero and Caliban in The Tempest, to Malcolm X in The Meeting and Mr Kennedy in the children's TV series Grange Hill.
Pierre André Clémenti was a French actor.
John Murray McEnery was an English actor.
David Tree was an English stage and screen actor from a distinguished theatrical family whose career in the 1930s included roles in numerous stage presentations as well as in thirteen films produced between 1937 and 1941, among which were 1939's Goodbye Mr. Chips and two of producer Gabriel Pascal's adaptations of Shaw classics, 1938's Pygmalion, in which he portrayed Freddy Eynsford-Hill, and 1941's Major Barbara, in which he was Charles Lomax.
Barbara Mary Jefford, OBE was a British actress, best known for her theatrical performances with the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Old Vic and the National Theatre and her role as Molly Bloom in the 1967 film of James Joyce's Ulysses.
Jeremy Mahony Sinden was an English actor who specialised in playing eccentric military men and overgrown schoolboys.
Cicely Frances Berry was a British theatre director and vocal coach.
Pierre André Clémenti was a French actor.
Leslie Richard French was a British actor of stage and screen.
Basil Cedric Langton was an English actor, director and photographer, who made a career on both sides of the Atlantic. He was an authority on the plays of George Bernard Shaw and compiled an archive of more than 400,000 words of interviews with people who had known and worked with Shaw. He was also a teacher, working at colleges in New York and California.
Adolph Lestina was an American stage and film actor who was a member of D. W. Griffith's stock company of film actors.
John Dearth was an English actor, known for playing numerous roles in nearly 30 episodes of ITV series The Adventures of Robin Hood.
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