Leigh Lawson

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Leigh Lawson
Born (1945-07-21) 21 July 1945 (age 80)
Atherstone, Warwickshire, England
Occupation(s)Actor, director, writer
Years active1969–present
Spouse
​
(m. 1988)​
Partner Hayley Mills (1975–1984)
Children2

Allan Leigh Lawson (born 21 July 1945) is an English actor, director and writer.

Contents

Early life

Lawson was born in Atherstone, Warwickshire. He initially studied at Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts [1] before training further at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.

Career

Lawson has acted in film and television since the early 1970s, and has directed plays in the West End and on Broadway. He has worked with the National Theatre, Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) and with film directors such as Roman Polanski and Franco Zeffirelli. Lawson has been quoted as saying that the only time in his career when he did not feel he should be somewhere else doing something else was when he was with the RSC. [2] His portrayals in films include Bernardo in Brother Sun, Sister Moon (1972) and Alec d'Urberville in Tess (1979). He played the leading role as Alan Lomax in the television drama series Travelling Man (1984–85), and guest starred in television series such as The Duchess of Duke Street (1976), Disraeli (1978), Feuer und Schwert - Die Legende von Tristan und Isolde (1982), The Ray Bradbury Theatre (1988) and Silent Witness (2005–2007). Lawson also guested, with his wife Twiggy, playing themselves in an episode of the comedy series Absolutely Fabulous (2001).

In 1999 Lawson co-wrote and directed the musical If Love Were All, which tells of the friendship between Gertrude Lawrence and Noël Coward. The Dream: An Actor's Story, a theatrical memoir about the day-to-day life of a working actor, was published in September 2009. [3]

Personal life

In 1976, Lawson and his first wife, Mondy, were divorced. He met the actress Hayley Mills in 1975, when they performed in London's West End in A Touch of Spring; the following year, they had a son. [4] Lawson was stepfather to Crispian Mills, Mills's son with director Roy Boulting. During that time, he appeared with Mills's father, John Mills, in the film The Devil's Advocate (1977). Lawson and Mills ended their relationship in the mid-1980s.

Lawson met the model Twiggy in 1984. In 1988, they both worked in the film Madame Sousatzka and were married on 23 September that year, in Tony Walton's back yard in Sag Harbor, Long Island. [5] The couple reside in west London and also own a home in Southwold, Suffolk. [6]

He adopted Twiggy's daughter, Carly, who took his surname. [7]

Partial filmography

Stage appearances

Directed

References

  1. ↑ "Obituary: Peter Coxhead". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 30 November 2015.
  2. ↑ "Profile of Hamlet actor Sam West". The Guardian . 28 March 2001. Archived from the original on 19 September 2021.
  3. ↑ Lawson, Leigh (2008). The dream : an actor's story. Internet Archive. London : Oberon Books. ISBN   978-1-84002-867-6.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)
  4. ↑ Seedship http://www.seedship.com/hayley/
  5. ↑ Twiggy [ dead link ]
  6. ↑ "Famous People from Suffolk". May 2018.
  7. ↑ Twiggy and Daughter Carly Lawson http://www.theinsider.com/news/1030653_Twiggy_and_daughter_Carly_Lawson [ permanent dead link ]
  8. ↑ The Noël Coward Society http://www.noelcoward.net/html/chronology.html Archived 13 April 2017 at the Wayback Machine
  9. ↑ Leigh Lawson Biography http://www.twiggylawson.co.uk/leighlawson.html
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