David Suchet

Sir David Courtney Suchet''England & Wales, Civil Registration Birth Index, 1916–2007'' ( ; born 2 May 1946) is an English actor known for his work on British stage and television. He portrayed Edward Teller in the television serial '' Oppenheimer'' (1980) and received the RTS and BPG awards for his performance as Augustus Melmotte in the British serial ''The Way We Live Now'' (2001). International acclaim and recognition followed his performance as Agatha Christie's detective Hercule Poirot in ''Agatha Christie's Poirot'' (1989–2013), for which he received a 1991 British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) nomination."The Actor Behind Popular 'Poirot"
''The Christian Science Monitor'', 25 March 1992.''"Inside the mind of a media monster"''
''Yorkshire Post''. 27 April 2007.

Early life and family

Suchet was born in the Paddington area of London, the son of Joan Patricia (''née'' Jarché; 1916–1992), an actress, and Jack Suchet. Jack emigrated from South Africa to England in 1932, trained to be a physician at St Mary's Hospital Medical School, London, in 1933, and became an obstetrician and gynaecologist.

Suchet's father was of Lithuanian-Jewish descent, the son of Izidor Suchedowitz, originally from Kretinga in the Pale of Settlement of the Russian Empire. At some point, the family name was recorded as "Schohet", a Yiddish word (from Hebrew '' shochet'') defining the profession of kosher butcher. Suchet's father changed his surname to Suchet while living in South Africa. David's mother was born in England and was Anglican (she was of Russian-Jewish descent on her father's side, and English Anglican on her mother's side). He was raised without religion, but became a practising Anglican in 1986, and was confirmed in 2006.

Suchet and his brothers, John and Peter, attended Grenham House boarding school in Birchington-on-Sea, Kent; then, after attending another independent school, Wellington School in Somerset, he took an interest in acting and joined the National Youth Theatre at the age of 16. He trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, where he now serves as a council member.

His elder brother, John, is a British television presenter and former ITN newscaster. Suchet's nephew is the RT broadcaster Rory Suchet.

Career

Theatre

Suchet began his acting career at the Gateway Theatre, Chester (1969) and then appeared in many reps, including Worthing, Birmingham, Belgrade Theatre, Coventry, Liverpool Playhouse, and the Watermill Theatre. In 1973, he joined the Royal Shakespeare Company. In 1981–82, he played Bolingbroke in '' Richard II'' opposite Alan Howard. Suchet played "John" in the drama '' Oleanna'' at the Royal Court Theatre in 1993. It was directed by Harold Pinter, and co-starred Lia Williams as "Carol". He made his West End debut opposite Saskia Reeves in the Kempinski play '' Separation'', at the Comedy Theatre in 1987. In 1996–97 he played opposite Dame Diana Rigg in the West End production of ''Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?'' He was also featured as Salieri from 1998 to 2000 in the Broadway production ''Amadeus''. In 2007, at the Chichester Festival Theatre, he played Cardinal Benelli in ''The Last Confession'', about the death of Pope John Paul I. In 2014, he reprised the role of Benelli in the Australian tour of the play.

He has been starring as Lady Bracknell in '' The Importance of Being Earnest'' by Oscar Wilde at the Vaudeville Theatre in London since June 2015 and on tour. In January 2022, Suchet had a three-week residency at the Harold Pinter Theatre performing ''Poirot and More, A Retrospective''.

Television and film

In 1988, Suchet played Leopold Bloom in the Channel 4 documentary ''The Modern World: Ten Great Writers'', in which some of James Joyce's ''Ulysses'' was dramatised. The year 1988 also saw Suchet appear in the penultimate episode of the television series '' Tales of the Unexpected''. He appeared as Yves Drouard, a scheming adulterer, in the episode ''A Time To Die''.

In 1989, he took the title role of Hercule Poirot for the long-running television series ''Agatha Christie's Poirot''. In his book, ''Poirot and Me'', Suchet mentions that prior Poirot actor Sir Peter Ustinov one day approached him and told him that Suchet could play Poirot and would be good at it. Suchet then spoke to Brian Eastman from ITV, who sent him some of the novels to read. "And as I did so, it slowly dawned on me that I'd never actually seen the character I was reading about on the screen...He was quite, quite different: more elusive, more pedantic and, most of all, more human than the person I'd seen on the screen." Still unsure, Suchet rang his brother John, who advised him against it, calling Poirot "a bit of a joke, a buffoon. It's not you at all." Suchet took his brother's advice as a challenge and accepted the role. In preparation, he wrote a five page character study of Poirot detailing 93 different aspects of his life. Suchet said he took the list on set with him and "gave a copy to every director I worked with on a Poirot film."
Suchet went on to play the role in adaptations of every novel and short story featuring the character written by Agatha Christie.

In 2001, he had the lead role in the David Yates-directed BBC
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