Saturday, July 1, 2017

Heathcote Williams obit

Heathcote Williams, radical poet, playwright and actor, dies aged 75

This article is more than 8 years old

His poems blasted the arms trade, consumerism and the tabloids, and he was also an accomplished painter and sculptor

 He was not on the list.


Heathcote Williams, the radical poet, playwright, actor and polymathic English genius, has died at the age of 75. He had been ill for some time and died on Saturday in Oxford.

He was the author of many polemical poems, written over four decades in a unique documentary style. They included works about the devastation being wrought on the natural environment – Sacred Elephant, Whale Nation and Falling For a Dolphin – and Autogeddon, a grim and majestic attack on the car.

Williams also wrote several successful stage plays including AC/DC, which premiered at the Royal Court in 1969, and The Local Stigmatic, commissioned by Harold Pinter and revived in 2014 at the Old Red Lion Theatre in London on its 50th anniversary. His most recent play, Killing Kit, was about the life and death of Christopher Marlowe.

Scruffy on screen and off, Williams appeared in several films, often in cameo roles. He was a notable Prospero in Derek Jarman’s 1979 production of The Tempest. Other credits were Sally Potter’s arthouse Orlando, based on Virginia Woolf’s novel, and Hollywood’s Basic Instinct 2.

Williams was a very talented figure. He was an accomplished painter – his vivid works hung at the Oxford home he shared with his partner, Diana Senior – and sculptor. He was an impressive conjuror and a member of the Magic Circle. One of his TV plays, What the Dickens!, featured Dickens performing magic shows for children.

His literary output was prolific. It included a book on Speakers’ Corner in Hyde Park, published when he was 23, and in later life he wrote several poems a month, driven by news and current affairs. As mainstream publishers dried up, these appeared online as YouTube video montages, often narrated by the actors Alan Cox and Roy Hutchins.

At heart, Williams was a revolutionary. The historian Peter Whitfield placed his work in a “great tradition of visionary dissent” stretching from William Blake and John Ruskin to DH Lawrence and David Jones. His poems – blasting the arms trade, consumerism and the tabloids – were “wonderfully innocent” and at the same time “wonderfully streetwise”.

There were comparisons with Percy Bysshe Shelley, the subject of one of Williams’s later long poems, Shelley in Oxford, published in 2012. Both were rebels who wrote with passionate social anger. Like Shelley, Eton-educated Williams didn’t finish his Oxford degree.

In his 60s and 70s, Williams found it difficult to walk any great distance. This confinement did nothing to diminish his creative energies nor his anger at the direction in which society was going in the hucksterish era of Brexit, Boris Johnson and Donald Trump.

Williams retained his principled fury to the end. In 2016 he published Boris Johnson: The Blond Beast of Brexit – A Study in Depravity, an excoriating attack reprising the foreign secretary’s lies, evasion and adultery, sold as a pamphlet from the London Review of Books bookshop. Another work, Royal Babylon, lambasted the Queen.

His last volume of poetry about Trump, American Porn, was published in January. Williams wrote that Trump’s real name – Drumpf – “suggests dumbness, even the passing of wind/ As well as the merciful transience of fame.”

Actor

 

    Saoirse Ronan and Harry Treadaway in City of Ember (2008)

    City of Ember

    6.4

        Sadge Merrall

        2008

    Nostradamus (2006)

    Nostradamus

    6.3

    TV Movie

        Pepe

        2006

    Sharon Stone and David Morrissey in Basic Instinct 2 (2006)

    Basic Instinct 2

    4.4

        Jakob Gerst

        2006

    Martin Shaw in Judge John Deed (2001)

    Judge John Deed

    7.7

    TV Series

        Professor Winkworth

        2006

    Cargo (2004)

    Cargo

    5.6

        Damia

        2004

    Willem Dafoe and Paul Bettany in The Reckoning (2003)

    The Reckoning

    6.4

        Undertaker

        2003

    Dinotopia (2002)

    Dinotopia

    6.4

    TV Series

        Razouli

        2002–2003

    Signal to Noise (2002)

    Signal to Noise

    5.0

    Short

        The Director

        2002

    Ashley Walters in The Hidden City (2002)

    The Hidden City

    8.5

    TV Series

        Harvey

        2002

    The Love Doctor

    Short

        Bekai Basu

        2001

    Lover's Prayer (2001)

    Lover's Prayer

    4.8

        Dr. Looshin

        2001

    Revelation (2001)

    Revelation

    4.6

        New Age Man

        2001

    Hotel (2001)

    Hotel

    4.1

        Bosala

        2001

    Dream (2001)

    Dream

    5.6

        Roger Stark

        2001

    The Sandman (2000)

    The Sandman

    7.0

    TV Movie

        2000

    Honest (2000)

    Honest

    4.2

        Professor

        2000

    Toy Boys

    6.2

    Short

        Mr. Chambers

        1999

    Daniel Auteuil and Liza Walker in The Escort (1999)

    The Escort

    6.2

        Ann's Father

        1999

    Saffron Burrows in Miss Julie (1999)

    Miss Julie

    6.1

        Servant

        1999

    Whoopi Goldberg, Christopher Lloyd, Gene Wilder, Robbie Coltrane, Ben Kingsley, Tina Majorino, Miranda Richardson, Martin Short, Peter Ustinov, and George Wendt in Alice in Wonderland (1999)

    Alice in Wonderland

    6.3

    TV Movie

        Mr. Eaglet

        1999

    Alegría (1999)

    Alegría

    6.6

        Marcello

        1999

    The Legend of 1900 (1998)

    The Legend of 1900

    8.0

        Doctor Klauserman

        1998

    Elisabeth Shue and Jessica Lange in Cousin Bette (1998)

    Cousin Bette

    6.2

        Nucingen

        1998

    Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Matthew Perry, and David Schwimmer in Friends (1994)

    Friends

    8.9

    TV Series

        The Older Guest

        1998

    The IMAX Nutcracker (1997)

    The IMAX Nutcracker

    4.9

    Short

        'Uncle' Drosselmeier

        1997

    Sally Potter and Pablo Verón in The Tango Lesson (1997)

    The Tango Lesson

    6.7

        Builder

        1997

    Bring Me the Head of Mavis Davis (1997)

    Bring Me the Head of Mavis Davis

    5.2

        Jeff

        1997

    Isabella Rossellini, Greta Scacchi, Armand Assante, and Vanessa Williams in The Odyssey (1997)

    The Odyssey

    7.0

    TV Mini Series

        Laocoon

        1997

    Richard E. Grant, Lynsey Baxter, and Perdita Weeks in The Cold Light of Day (1996)

    The Cold Light of Day

    6.2

        Stephen Nuslauer

        1996

    Ewan McGregor and Catherine Zeta-Jones in Blue Juice (1995)

    Blue Juice

    5.1

        Shaper

        1995

    Alfred Molina and Helen Slater in The Steal (1995)

    The Steal

    4.8

        Jeremiah

        1995

    W.S.H.

    6.6

    TV Movie

        Dexter

        1994

    The Browning Version (1994)

    The Browning Version

    7.2

        Dr. Lake

        1994

    Tilda Swinton in Orlando (1992)

    Orlando

    7.1

        Nick GreenePublisher

        1992

    Screen Two (1984)

    Screen Two

    6.6

    TV Series

        Dr. Boyle

        1989

    Slipstream (1989)

    Slipstream

    4.7

        Man on Stairs

        1989

    Tommy Lee Jones, Melanie Griffith, and Sting in Stormy Monday (1988)

    Stormy Monday

    6.2

        Peter Reed

        1988

    Alec Guinness, Derek Jacobi, Joan Greenwood, Robert Morley, and Sarah Pickering in Little Dorrit (1987)

    Little Dorrit

    7.1

        Dr. Haggage

        1987

    Emily Lloyd in Wish You Were Here (1987)

    Wish You Were Here

    6.8

        Dr Holroyd

        1987

    Jordan in Nightshift (1981)

    Nightshift

    6.6

        1981

    The Tempest (1979)

    The Tempest

    6.3

        Prospero - The Right Duke of Milan

        1979

    Wet Dreams (1974)

    Wet Dreams

    4.8

        (segment "Flames")

        1974

    Malatesta (1970)

    Malatesta

    6.8

    TV Movie

        Josef Solokow

        1970

    Love Love Love

    6.4

    Short

        1968

 

Writer

 

    Les gardiennes de la planète (2023)

    Les gardiennes de la planète

    6.6

        inspired by the book "Whale Nation"

        2023

    Inheritance (2014)

    Inheritance

    Short

        writer

        2014

    Game of Drones: The President and the White House Fly (2013)

    Game of Drones: The President and the White House Fly

    Short

        writer

        2013

    Royal Babylon: The Criminal Record of the British Monarchy (2012)

    Royal Babylon: The Criminal Record of the British Monarchy

    7.4

        written by

        2012

    Hotel (2001)

    Hotel

    4.1

        adaptation

        2001

    Forty Minutes (1981)

    Forty Minutes

    6.5

    TV Series

        poem

        1991

    Al Pacino and Paul Guilfoyle in The Local Stigmatic (1990)

    The Local Stigmatic

    5.6

        play (screenplay)

        1990

    The Secret Cabaret (1990)

    The Secret Cabaret

    8.2

    TV Series

        Writer

        1990

    What the Dickens!

    TV Movie

        Writer

        1983

    Malatesta (1970)

    Malatesta

    6.8

    TV Movie

        Writer

        1970

 

Director

 

    Wet Dreams (1974)

    Wet Dreams

    4.8

        Director (segment "Flames")

        1974

 

Soundtrack

 

    A Violent Desire for Joy (2018)

    A Violent Desire for Joy

    6.5

        writer: "Why'd Ya Do It"

        2018

    Marianne Faithfull in Marianne Faithfull: Dreaming My Dreams (2000)

    Marianne Faithfull: Dreaming My Dreams

    8.4

    Video

        writer: "Why'd Ya Do It?"

        2000

 

Producer

 

    Game of Drones: The President and the White House Fly (2013)

    Game of Drones: The President and the White House Fly

    Short

        associate producer

        2013

 

Self

 

    Checking Out: Mike Figgis & Hotel

        Self

        2005

    A History of Britain (2000)

    A History of Britain

    8.3

    TV Series

        Self (voice)

        2002

    Al Pacino in Looking for Richard (1996)

    Looking for Richard

    7.3

        Self

        1996

    Heathcote Williams in Everytime I Cross the Tamar I Get Into Trouble (1993)

    Everytime I Cross the Tamar I Get Into Trouble

    TV Special

        Self

        1993

    Arena (1975)

    Arena

    7.7

    TV Series

        Self

        1990

    After Dark (1987)

    After Dark

    7.4

    TV Series

        Self

        1988

    Fletcher Markle in Telescope (1963)

    Telescope

    7.6

    TV Series

        Self

        1966

 

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