Ian Francis Kelly (born 16 January 1966) [1] is a British writer and actor. His works include historical biographies, stage and screenplays.
Born in Cambridge, England, in 1966, Kelly is the second son of Professor Donald Kelly and Patricia Ann Kelly. He was brought up in Philadelphia, Bristol, and the Wirral. Kelly studied at Cambridge University and UCLA Film School.
Kelly’s play Mr Foote's Other Leg, directed by Sir Richard Eyre and starring Simon Russell Beale, opened at Hampstead Theatre in 2015 before transferring directly into the West End, Theatre Royal Haymarket, playing 2015–2016. [2]
On film, Kelly played Hermione Granger's father in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1 . [3] On stage, he appeared in The Pitmen Painters at the National Theatre, on Broadway [4] and in the West End, and in A Busy Day, also in the West End. He acted on London's West End and in New York in his own one-man plays and also in the title role in the US premiere of Ron Hutchinson's Beau Brummell. He was nominated for Best Actor for his work in Tom Stoppard's Arcadia (Manchester Drama Awards). For his work in Alexei Balabanov's Voyna (War) he was nominated for Best Actor at the Montreal World Film Festival. [5] In 2015 he played George III in the premiere production of his own play Mr Foote’s Other Leg .
Kelly has published biographies of Antonin Careme (2004), [6] Beau Brummell (2005), [7] Casanova (2008), [8] [9] [10] and Samuel Foote (Mr. Foote's Other Leg, 2012). [11] [12] His biography of Vivienne Westwood, written with Dame Vivienne, was published in October 2014. [13]
The BBC Television drama Beau Brummell: This Charming Man with Hugh Bonneville and Phil Davis was based on Ian Kelly’s biography. His biography of Giacomo Casanova was read by Benedict Cumberbatch on BBC Radio 4 in 2008 as a Book of the Week abridged by Amber Barnfather, [14] repeated on BBC Radio 4 Extra, [15] then published by BBC Worldwide as an audio book in May 2015. He wrote the scenario of Casanova for a 2017 ballet choreographed by Kenneth Tindall for Northern Ballet which was also performed at Sadler's Wells Theatre. [16] [17]
The Society for Theatre Research awarded Mr. Foote's Other Leg the STR Theatre Book Prize in 2013. [18] His biography of Beau Brummell was shortlisted for the Marsh Biography Award. His biography of Casanova was the Sunday Times biography of the year in 2008. [19]
Kelly has written for most of the British broadsheets and the New York Times . He is a contributing editor of Food Arts Magazine.
As an actor his TV work includes Dennis Potter's Cold Lazarus [20] Drop the Dead Donkey , Silent Witness , Just William , Catherine Cookson's The Moth, Sensitive Skin , and Time Trumpet .
Kelly has acted in many films including The Children Act , Closed, Creation, Merchant-Ivory's Howards End , Richard Attenborough's In Love and War , The Mission , The King's Man and the Russian films Admiral and Aleksei Balabanov's War . [21]
A dandy is a man who places particular importance upon physical appearance and personal grooming, refined language and leisurely hobbies. A dandy could be a self-made man both in person and persona, who emulated the aristocratic style of life regardless of his middle-class origin, birth, and background, especially during the late 18th and early 19th centuries in Britain.
George Bryan "Beau" Brummell was an important figure in Regency England, and for many years he was the arbiter of British men's fashion. At one time, he was a close friend of the Prince Regent, the future King George IV, but after the two quarrelled and Brummell got into debt, he had to take refuge in France. Eventually, he died from complications of neurosyphilis in Caen.
Ian William Richardson was a British actor from Edinburgh, Scotland. He was best known for his portrayal of machiavellian Tory politician Francis Urquhart in the BBC's House of Cards (1990–1995) television trilogy, as well as the pivotal spy Bill Haydon in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (1979). Other notable screen work included a portrayal of Sherlock Holmes in two films, as well as significant roles in Brazil, M. Butterfly, and Dark City.
James Brian Mark Purefoy is an English actor. He played Mark Antony in the HBO series Rome, Nick Jenkins in A Dance to the Music of Time, college professor turned serial killer Joe Carroll in the series The Following, Solomon Kane in the film of the same name, and Hap Collins in the Sundance series Hap and Leonard. In 2018, he starred as Laurens Bancroft in the first season of Altered Carbon, a Netflix original series. Following an uncredited role as V in the 2006 film V for Vendetta, he was cast in a main role as Captain Gulliver "Gully" Troy / Captain Blighty in the 2020–2021 second and 2022 third season of the television series Pennyworth, the prequel to both Gotham and V for Vendetta.
Rupert William Penry-Jones is a British actor. He is known for his performances as Adam Carter in Spooks, Clive Reader in Silk, DI Joseph Chandler in Whitechapel, and Mr. Quinlan in the American horror series The Strain.
In British English slang, a toff is a stereotype for someone with an aristocratic background or belonging to the landed gentry, particularly someone who exudes an air of superiority. For instance, the Toff, a character from the series of adventure novels by John Creasey, is an upper class crime sleuth who uses a common caricature of a toff – a line drawing with a top hat, monocle, bow-tie and cigarette with a holder – as his calling card.
Beau Brummell is a 1954 British historical film released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed by Curtis Bernhardt and produced by Sam Zimbalist from a screenplay by Karl Tunberg, based on the 1890 play Beau Brummell by Clyde Fitch. The play was previously adapted as a silent film made in 1924 and starring John Barrymore as Beau Brummell, Mary Astor, and Willard Louis as the Prince of Wales.
Aleksei Oktyabrinovich Balabanov was a Russian film director, screenwriter, and producer, a member of European Film Academy. He started from creating mostly arthouse pictures and music videos but gained significant mainstream popularity in action crime drama movies Brother (1997) and Brother 2 (2000), both of which starred Sergei Bodrov, Jr. Later, Balabanov directed the films Cargo 200 (2007), Morphine (2008) and A Stoker (2010) which also received critical recognition.
War is a 2002 Russian war film by Aleksei Balabanov about the Second Chechen War, starring Aleksei Chadov and Ian Kelly.
William Arden, 2nd Baron Alvanley was a British Army officer, peer and socialite, who was a friend of Beau Brummell and one of a close circle of young men surrounding the Prince Regent.
Beau Brummell: This Charming Man is a 2006 BBC Television drama based on the biography of Beau Brummell by Ian Kelly. The title references a 1983 song by The Smiths.
George III has featured in many examples of popular culture.
George IV of the United Kingdom has been depicted many times in popular culture.
The Theatre Book Prize is a prize given by the Society for Theatre Research annually.
Tim Hatley is a British set and costume designer for theatre and film. He has won the Tony Award for Best Set Design and Best Costume Design, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Set Design, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Costume Design, and the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Set Design.
Mrs Gardner or Sarah Cheney was a British comedic actress and playwright.
On Dandyism and George Brummell, by Jules Barbey d'Aurevilly, is a biographic essay about the British dandy Beau Brummell (1778–1840) and about the way of life that is dandyism. In English, the essay "Du dandysme et de George Brummell" has been published under the titles "Of Dandyism and of George Brummell" and "The Anatomy of Dandyism".
Mr Foote's Other Leg is a 2015 stage adaptation of Mr Foote's Other Leg: Comedy, tragedy and murder in Georgian London, a 2012 biography of the 18th-century actor Samuel Foote. Both the biography and the play were written by Ian Kelly. The play's prelude is an attempt to steal Foote's amputated leg from the Hunterian Collection, but the drama mainly covers the period from Foote's tutelage under Charles Macklin in the 1740s until his involvement in the controversy surrounding Elizabeth Chudleigh in 1774–76.
Josiah Cottin (1771–1843) was an English army officer. He is now remembered for his association with a notorious courtesan, who assumed the name Julia Johnstone.
Scrope Berdmore Davies (1782–1852), often given incorrectly as Scrope Beardmore Davies, was an English dandy of the Regency period. He is known as a friend of Lord Byron, the dedicatee of Byron's poem Parisina. He is the subject of a 1981 biography.