Richard E. Grant

Richard E. Grant (born Richard Grant Esterhuysen; 5 May 1957) is a Swazi-English actor and presenter. Henrik Esterhuysen was head of education for the British government administration in the British protectorate of Swaziland. Grant is of English, Afrikaner, and German descent. He has a younger brother, Stuart, an accountant in Johannesburg. They are estranged; Grant has stated that they "never had any relationship" and that he has no interest in trying to establish one in their late adult lives.

As a boy, he attended St Mark's School, a local government school in Mbabane. Grant attended secondary school at Waterford Kamhlaba United World College of Southern Africa, an independent school near Mbabane. In May 1976, he started at the University of Cape Town to study English and drama.

In 1982, a year after his father's death, he moved to Britain. At that time, he adopted his stage name (truncating his Afrikaans surname to a single letter) and registered with Equity.

Career Grant was a member of the Space Theatre Company in Cape Town before moving to London in 1982. He later stated, "I grew up in Swaziland when it was mired in a 1960s sensibility. The kind of English spoken where I grew up was a period English sound and when I came to England people said, 'how strange'. Charles Sturridge, who directed Brideshead Revisited for TV, said, 'you speak English like someone from the 1950s.'"

Grant's first film role was the perpetually inebriated title character in the cult classic Withnail and I (1987). Following this, he started appearing in Hollywood films, taking on a range of projects from blockbuster studio movies to small independent projects. Since then, Grant has had supporting roles in the films Henry & June, L.A. Story, The Player, Bram Stoker's Dracula, The Age of Innocence, The Portrait of a Lady, Spice World, Gosford Park, Bright Young Things, and Penelope.

While filming L.A. Story with Steve Martin, the pair communicated by fax. Martin wrote: "I kept these faxes, which grew to a stack more than 2 inches thick, because they entertained me, and because I thought they were valuable aesthetic chunks from a screeching mind, a stream-of-consciousness faucet spewing sentences – sometimes a mile long – none of it rewritten, and bearing just the right amount of acid and alkaline."

In 1995, Grant starred as the titular character in Peter Capaldi's short film Franz Kafka's It's a Wonderful Life. The film won the 1995 Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film. In 1996, he portrayed Sir Andrew Aguecheek in Trevor Nunn's Twelfth Night. He released a single and accompanying video of "To Be Or Not To Be" with Orpheus in 1997.

Grant has twice portrayed the Doctor from Doctor Who, both outside the main continuity. In the comedy sketch Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death, he portrayed a version of the Tenth Doctor, referred to as the "Quite Handsome Doctor". He also voiced a version of the Ninth Doctor for the BBC original animated webcast Scream of the Shalka. The latter had intended to be the official Ninth Doctor prior to the revival of the TV series. His version of the Doctor also appeared as a projection in "Rogue" (2024), during a sequence in which the faces of the Fifteenth Doctor's previous incarnations were shown floating around his head. He made his first official Doctor Who appearance in the 2012 Christmas special, titled "The Snowmen", in which he plays the villain, Walter Simeon. During the episode, Simeon is erased from his body and it is taken over by the Great Intelligence, voiced by Ian McKellen in the episode until the takeover. Grant reprised the role in "The Bells of Saint John" and in the Series 7 finale, "The Name of the Doctor". Grant as The Voice for 2+2+2 at Heavy Entertainment, London.

Grant appeared as "The Voice" in 2+2+2 at American Nights at the King's Head Theatre, from 3 to 29 July 2007, and in 2008 co-starred in the London-based comedy Filth and Wisdom. Grant presented the 2008 Laurence Olivier Awards. In 2008, he made his musical theatre debut with Opera Australia, playing the role of Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady at the Theatre Royal, Sydney, a role he reprised in 2017 at the Lyric Opera of Chicago. In 2009, Grant played Alain Reille in Yasmina Reza's one-act play God of Carnage at the Theatre Royal, Bath, and subsequently at Cheltenham, Canterbury, Richmond, Brighton, and Milton Keynes.

In 2010 he starred in short film The Man Who Married Himself, which won Best Comedy at LA International Shorts Festival and Rhode Island Film Festival. Later that year, he made an appearance in a music video, when short-lived Bristol band The Chemists hired him to appear in their video for "This City"; the band split the same year. This appearance followed Grant's involvement with the band the previous year, in which he spoke the lyrics to "This City" to background music as part of the intro and outro tracks on their only album, Theories of Dr Lovelock.

In March 2013, Grant starred as intelligence analyst Brian Jones in David Morley's radio drama The Iraq Dossier with Peter Firth, Anton Lesser, David Caves, and Lindsay Duncan. It recounted the story of how British Ministry of Defence Intelligence expert Jones had tried to warn that his government's September Dossier on Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction was inaccurate. In 2014, Grant was cast on the HBO series Girls after series creator Lena Dunham saw him in Spice World.

In 2015, Grant gave a reading at VE Day 70: A Party to Remember in Horse Guards Parade, London. In 2016 he joined the HBO series Game of Thrones in Season 6 as Izembaro. In 2017, he appeared as the villainous corporate scientist Zander Rice in Logan.

Grant's critically lauded performance as Jack Hock in Can You Ever Forgive Me? (2018) earned him Academy Award, BAFTA, Golden Globe, and Screen Actors Guild Award nominations. The part also won Grant a New York Film Critics Circle Award and several other critics awards.

In 2019, Grant appeared in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. Grant played Classic Loki, an older variant of Loki, in the 2021 Disney+ / Marvel Cinematic Universe series Loki. Grant portrayed Sir Walter Elliot in Carrie Cracknell's 2022 adaptation of Jane Austen's Persuasion, which premiered on Netflix. In 2023 he appeared in Emerald Fennell's psychological thriller Saltburn opposite Barry Keoghan, Jacob Elordi, and Rosamund Pike.

Grant is set to appear on the second series of The Celebrity Traitors in autumn 2026.

Wah-Wah Grant wrote and directed the 2005 film Wah-Wah, loosely based on his childhood. A screenwriter recommended he write a screenplay after reading Grant's memoirs of the filming of Withnail and I. The film took him over seven years to complete and starred Nicholas Hoult in the lead role, with Gabriel Byrne, Miranda Richardson, Julie Walters, and Emily Watson. Grant kept a diary, later published as a book (The Wah-Wah Diaries). The book received positive reviews from critics, many of whom were impressed by the honesty of the tale, especially in regard to his difficult relationship with the "inexperienced" producer Marie-Castille Mention-Schaar.

Grant stated in subsequent interviews that she was a "control freak out of control", and he would "never see her again as long as [he] live". In a BBC interview, he again mentioned his "disastrous" relationship with Mention-Schaar. He related that he had received only five emails from her in the last two months of pre-production, and that she rarely turned up on the set at all. She failed to obtain clearance firstly for song rights and secondly to film in Swaziland. For the last infraction, Grant was eventually forced to meet with the King of Eswatini to seek clemency. During an interview with an Australian chat show, he mentioned that Wah-Wah was not released in France, and as a result, his producer did not make money out of it.

Personal life

Grant married voice coach Joan Washington in 1986; they had one daughter. After being diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer, Washington died on 2 September 2021.

Grant abstains from drinking alcohol since he has an alcohol intolerance. After casting him as the alcoholic Withnail, director Bruce Robinson made Grant drink a bottle of champagne and half a bottle of vodka during the course of a night so he could experience drunkenness.

Grant is a dual citizen of Eswatini and the United Kingdom. He used to wear a watch on each wrist, one of which was given to him by his dying father and set to Swaziland time.

In 2008, Grant told The Times that he is an atheist. In April 2014, Grant launched his new unisex perfume, JACK, exclusively at Liberty of Regent Street, London. Grant runs the perfume business in collaboration with his daughter.

In 2022, Grant released a memoir, A Pocketful of Happiness, mostly written in the last year of his wife's life.

Filmography

Film

+ Year Title Role Notes 1987 Withnail and I Withnail Hidden City Brewster 1989 How to Get Ahead in Advertising Denis Dimbleby Bagley Warlock Giles Redferne 1990 Mountains of the Moon Larry Oliphant Killing Dad Ali Berg Henry & June Hugo Guiler 1991 L.A. Story Roland Mackey Hudson Hawk Darwin Mayflower 1992 The Player Tom Oakley Bram Stoker's Dracula Dr. Jack Seward 1993 The Age of Innocence Larry Lefferts Franz Kafka's It's a Wonderful Life Franz Kafka Short subject 1994 Prêt-à-Porter Cort Romney 1995 Jack and Sarah Jack 1996 The Cold Light of Day Victor Marek The Portrait of a Lady Lord Warburton Twelfth Night Sir Andrew Aguecheek 1997 The Serpent's Kiss James Fitzmaurice Keep the Aspidistra Flying Gordon Comstock Food of Love Alex Salmon Spice World Clifford 1999 The Match Gorgeous Gus The Miracle Maker John the Baptist Voice 2000 The Little Vampire Frederick Sackville-Bagg 2001 Hildegarde Wolf Gosford Park George 2003 Monsieur N. Hudson Lowe Bright Young Things Father Rothschild 2004 Tooth Jarvis Jarvis The Story of an African Farm Bonaparte Blenkins 2005 Wah-Wah Writer and director Corpse Bride Lord Barkis Bittern Voice Colour Me Kubrick Jasper 2006 Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties Preston Voice Penelope Franklin Wilhern 2007 Always Crashing in the Same Car James Booth 2008 Filth and Wisdom Professor Flynn The Garden of Eden Colonel Philip Boyle 2009 Cuckoo Professor Julius Greengrass Love Hurts Ben Bingham 2010 Jackboots on Whitehall Campbell Babbitt Voice 1st Night Adam Drummond The Nutcracker in 3D Father The Man Who Married Himself Oliver 2011 The Last Fashion Show Federico Marinoni Foster Mr Potts Horrid Henry: The Movie Vic Van Wrinkle How to Stop Being a Loser Ian The Iron Lady Michael Heseltine 2012 Adventures in Zambezia Cecil Voice Kath & Kimderella Alain 2013 About Time Lawyer in Play Uncredited cameo Khumba Bradley Voice Dom Hemingway Dickie Black 2014 Queen and Country Major Cross 2016 Jackie William Walton Their Finest Roger Swain 2017 Logan Zander Rice The Hitman's Bodyguard Mr. Seifert 2018 Can You Ever Forgive Me? Jack Hock The Nutcracker and the Four Realms Shiver 2019 Palm Beach Billy Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Allegiant General Pryde 2020 Robin Robin Magpie Voice; Short subject 2021 Earwig and the Witch The Mandrake Voice; English dub The Spine of Night The Guardian Voice Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard Mr. Seifert Everybody's Talking About Jamie Hugo Battersby/Loco Chanelle 2022 Persuasion Sir Walter Elliot 2023 The Lesson J.M. Sinclair Saltburn Sir James Catton 2024 Argylle Fowler Cameo 2025 Death of a Unicorn Odell Leopold The Thursday Murder Club Bobby Tanner 100 Nights of Hero Birdman Nuremberg David Maxwell Fyfe 2026 Wicker Ladies First Pigeon Man Savage House Sir Chauncey Savage Confessions II Himself Short film Post-production Owl Rex Voice; in production Post-production Evelyn Delves Broughton Post-production

Television

+ Year Title Role Notes 1983 Sweet Sixteen Anton Episode: "Episode Six" 1985–1989 Screen Two Moonee Livingstone/David Dunhill 2 episodes 1988 Codename: Kyril Sculby 4 episodesDiebe in der Nacht Joseph Television film 1993 Great Performances: Suddenly Last Summer George Holly Television special The Legends of Treasure Island Long John Silver Voice; 8 episodes 1994 Absolutely Fabulous Justin Episode: "Hospital" Hard Times James Harthouse 3 episodes 1996 Karaoke Nick Balmer 4 episodes Cold Lazarus 2 episodes 1997 A Royal Scandal George IV Television film 1997–1998 Captain Star Captain Jim Star Voice; 14 episodes 1998 St. Ives Major Farquhar Chevening Television film 1999 The Curse of Fatal Death The Conceited Doctor Television special Let Them Eat Cake Monsieur Vigée-Lebrun Episode: "The Portrait" Trial & Retribution III Stephen Warrington 2 episodes A Christmas Carol Bob Cratchit Television film 1999–2000 The Scarlet Pimpernel Sir Percy Blakeney / The Scarlet Pimpernel 2002 Sherlock: Case of Evil Mycroft Holmes The Hound of the Baskervilles Jack Stapleton 2003 Posh Nosh Simon Marchmont 8 episodes Doctor Who: Scream of the Shalka Shalka Doctor Voice; 6 episodes 2004 Frasier Stephen Moon Episode: "Goodnight, Seattle" 90 Days in Hollywood Narrator Voice; Documentary The Story of Bohemian Rhapsody Narrator 2005 Home Farm Twins Paul Baker Unknown episodes 2006 That'll Teach 'Em: Boys Versus Girls Narrator Voice; 5 episodes Above and Beyond Don Bennett 2 episodes 2007 Agatha Christie's Marple Raymond West Episode: "Nemesis" Dalziel and Pascoe Lee Knight Episode: "Demons on Our Shoulders" Roald Dahl's Revolting Rule Book Himself Television special 2008 Mumbai Calling Benedict T. Harlow Episode: "Good Sellers" 2009 Freezing Richard Episode #1.1 2011 The Crimson Petal and the White Dr Curlew 4 episodes Rab C. Nesbitt Chingford Steel Episode: "Broke" Rev. Marcus Episode #2.5 2012 Playhouse Presents Stephen / Tony Episode: "The Other Woman" The Fear Seb Whiting 3 episodes The History of Safari with Richard E. Grant Himself (host) Television documentary 2012–2013 Doctor Who Dr Walter Simeon / The Great Intelligence 3 episodes (series 7) 2012–2014 Richard E. Grant's Hotel Secrets Himself (host) 14 episodes 2013 The Riviera: A History in Pictures Himself (host) 2 episodes 2014 Girls Jasper 4 episodes Downton Abbey Simon Bricker Psychobitches Matthew Hopkins Episode #2.6 2015 Dig Ian Margrove 9 episodes Wellington: The Iron Duke Unmasked Wellington Television documentary Jekyll and Hyde Sir Roger Bulstrode 9 episodes 2016 Game of Thrones Izembaro 3 episodes The Last Dragonslayer Dragon Voice; Television film 2018 Hang Ups Leonard Conrad 5 episodes 2019 A Series of Unfortunate Events The Man with a Beard but No Hair 3 episodes 2019–2022 Tuca & Bertie Holland Voice; 9 episodes 2020 Dispatches from Elsewhere Octavio Coleman 10 episodes 2021 Agatha and Poirot: Partners in Crime Himself (host) Television documentary Loki Classic Loki 2 episodes Write Around the World Himself (host) 3 episodes Blankety Blank Himself/panellist Episode: "Christmas Special" 2021–2022 Moley The Gardener Voice; 8 episodes 2021–2024 The Outlaws The Earl 4 episodes 2022 Suspect Harry 8 episodes 2024 RuPaul's Drag Race: UK vs. the World Himself (guest judge) 1 episode (series 2)Doctor Who The Doctor Episode: "Rogue" (series 14); uncredited cameo The Franchise Peter Fairchild 8 episodes The Simpsons Julian Voice; Episode: "Desperately Seeking Lisa" Nautilus White Rajah 2 episodes 2025 Too Much Jonno Ratigan 6 episodes 2026 Mr. Bennet Main role Richard E. Grant's Very Modern Odyssey Himself (presenter) Four-part series The Celebrity Traitors Himself (contestant)Series 2

Video games

+ Year Title Role Notes 2020 Sackboy: A Big Adventure Vex Voice Other

+ Year Title Role Notes 2007 George's Marvellous Medicine Narrator Audiobook The Pillars of the Earth World Without End 2008 My Fair Lady Henry Higgins Theatre Royal, Sydney 2010 "This City" Human cyborg The Chemists music video 2011 Conqueror Narrator Audiobook 2013 Fuck: An Irreverent History of the F-Word The Murder at the Vicarage: A Miss Marple Mystery 2017 My Fair Lady Henry Higgins Lyric Opera of Chicago 2019 Tigeropolis Narrator Audiobook 2023 The Wombles Audiobook (abridged version) 2026 Hay Fever David Bliss Wyndham's Theatre

Tours An Evening with Richard E Grant (2022) Australia An Evening with Richard E Grant (2023) UK

Awards and nominations