British actor Frank Finlay, who was Academy Award-nominated for his work alongside Laurence Olivier in Othello, has died aged 89.
Finlay’s family said he died of heart failure Saturday at his home in Weybridge, southern England. In a statement, they called him “a wonderful father, loving grandfather and a damn fine actor.”
Handsome, deep-voiced and capable of both charm and menace, Finlay was a founding member of Britain’s National Theatre company, played the lothario Casanova in a 1971 television series of the same name and starred in the TV miniseries Bouquet of Barbed Wire, a portrait of a damaged family that was a scandalous hit in 1976.
He played Iago, nemesis to Olivier’s Othello, onstage and in a 1965 film adaptation of the Shakespearean tragedy, for which he was Oscar-nominated as best supporting actor.
Other film roles included Porthos in Richard Lester’s big-budget 1973 take on The Three Musketeers — and two sequels — and the main character’s father in Roman Polanski’s The Pianist.
He is survived by a son, a daughter and several grandchildren.
