James Villiers

James Michael Hyde Villiers (29 September 1933 – 18 January 1998) was an English actor. He was described by The Independent as "one of the country's most distinctive character actors, with ripe articulation and a flair for displaying supercilious arrogance that put him in the Vincent Price class of screen villains". Career Villiers made his film début in 1958 and appeared in many British productions, including Joseph Losey's The Damned (also known as These Are the Damned), shot in 1961 but not released until 1963; Nothing but the Best (1964), Seth Holt's The Nanny (1965), Joseph Andrews (1977), For Your Eyes Only (1981), The Scarlet Pimpernel (1982), Mountains of the Moon (1990) and The Tichborne Claimant (1998), along with numerous other projects. He often specialised in portraying cold, somewhat effete villains.

Villiers portrayed the role of Colonel Hensman in the television adaptation of Brendon Chase and was heard on BBC Radio 4 as the voice of Roderick Spode in The Code of the Woosters and several other adaptations of the Jeeves stories of P. G. Wodehouse, which starred Michael Hordern and Richard Briers. In a 1965 episode of the TV series The Human Jungle, "Solo Performance", as theatre director Paul Stockhill. In the 1978 television adaptation of The Famous Five, Villiers featured strongly in the two-part pilot in which he played the antagonist, a rogue bureaucrat known only as Johnson.

Personal life In 1966, at Maidstone, Kent, Villiers married Patricia Donovan. They adopted a son, Alan Michael Hyde Villiers (born Alan Donovan), and the marriage lasted until 1984, when it was dissolved. Elsewhere, Villiers is described as a "big drinker" who entered into drinking competitions with his friend Peter O'Toole.

Death Villiers died on 18 January 1998 in Arundel, Sussex, of cancer.

Selected filmography

Scotland Yard ('Late Night Final' episode) (1954) (uncredited) - as Mortuary Assistant (possibly earliest TV appearance) Carry On Sergeant (1958) as Seventh Recruit Edgar Wallace Mysteries (The Clue of the New Pin) (1961) as Tab Holland Bomb in the High Street (1961) as Stevens Petticoat Pirates (1961) as English Lieutenant Operation Snatch (1962) as Lt. Keen Eva (1962) as Alan McCormick – a screenwriter The Damned (1963) as Captain Gregory Murder at the Gallop (1963) as Michael Shane Girl in the Headlines (1963) as David Dane Father Came Too! (1963) as Benzil Bulstrode* Hancock (1963 TV series) (1963) ('The Man on the Corner ', episode) as Captain Mainwaring Nothing But the Best (1964) as Hugh King & Country (1964) as Captain Midgely Repulsion (1965) as John Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines (1965) as Yamamoto (voice, uncredited) The Alphabet Murders (1965) as Franklin You Must Be Joking! (1965) as Bill Simpson The Nanny (1965) as Bill Fane The Wrong Box (1965) as Sydney Whitcombe Sykes Sword of Honour BBC TV (1967) as Ian Kibannock Half a Sixpence (1967) as Hubert The Touchables (1968) as Twyning Some Girls Do (1969) as Carl Petersen Otley (1969) as Hendrickson A Nice Girl Like Me (1969) as Freddie Blood from the Mummy's Tomb (1971) as Corbeck The Ruling Class (1972) as Dinsdale Gurney Asylum (1972) as George (segment: "Lucy Comes to Stay") Follow Me! (1972) as Dinner Guest (uncredited) The Amazing Mr. Blunden (1972) as Uncle Bertie Ghost in the Noonday Sun (1973) as Parsley-Freck Seven Nights in Japan (1976) as Fin Spectre (1977) as Sir Geoffrey Cyon Joseph Andrews (1977) as Mr. Boody Saint Jack (1979) as Frogget The Music Machine (1979) as Hector Woodville (uncredited) For Your Eyes Only (1981) as Bill Tanner The Scarlet Pimpernel (1982) as Baron de Batz Under the Volcano (1984) as Brit Running Out of Luck (1987) Fortunes of War (1987) as Inchcape Scandal (1989) as Conservative M.P. Mountains of the Moon (1990) as Lord Oliphant King Ralph (1991) as Prime Minister Geoffrey Hale Let Him Have It (1991) as Cassels Uncovered (1994) as Montegrifo The Tichborne Claimant (1998) as Uncle Henry