Out and About July 2022 issue199

58 | OUT AND ABOUT COSTA BLANCA CELEBRITY PROFILE
Robert William “Bob”
Hoskins, Jr. (26 October
1942 – 29 April 2014) was
an English actor known
for playing Cockneys and
gangsters. He appeared in
films such as The Long Good
Friday (1980), Mona Lisa
(1986), Who Framed Roger
Rabbit (1988), Mermaids
(1990), Hook (1991), Super
Mario Bros.(1993), Nixon
(1995), A Christmas
Carol (2009), Neverland
(2011) and in his final
role in Snow White
and the Huntsman
(2012). Hoskins
was the recipient
of the prestigious
Prix d’interprétation
masculine as well as
winning the BAFTA
Award for Best Actor
in a Leading Role and
Golden Globe Award
for Best Actor – Motion
Picture Drama for his role
in Mona Lisa (he was also
nominated for the Academy
Award for Best Actor) and
an International Emmy
Award for best actor for his
appearance on BBC One
drama The Street in 2009.
Hoskins was born in Bury
St Edmunds, West Suffolk, to
Elsie Lillian (Hopkins), a cook
and nursery school teacher,
and Robert William Hoskins,
Sr., a bookkeeper and lorry
driver. His grandmother
was a Romani gypsy. From
the age of two weeks old, he
BOB HOSKINS
was brought up in Finsbury
Park, London. Hoskins left
school at the age of 15 with a
single O-Level and worked
as a porter, lorry driver and
window cleaner. He started
on a three-year accountancy
course but dropped out.
Hoskins’ acting career
began in 1968 at the Victoria
Theatre, Stoke-on-Trent. He
played a servant, Peter, in
a production of Romeo and
Juliet. In 1969 he worked
at the Unity Theatre. One
evening, he was waiting in
the Unity Theatre bar for
his friend, the actor Roger
Frost, to finish an audition.
Whilst drinking at the bar, he
was given a script and told
“You’re next.” He got the
part, with Frost ending up
his understudy. Frost recalled
that “Bob was a natural. He
just got up on stage and was
brilliant.”
His first major television
role was in On the Move
(1975-6) an educational
series intended to tackle
adult illiteracy, in which he
played Alf Hunt, a removal
man who had problems
reading and writing.
Up to 17 million
people watched the
Sunday programme,
according to eventual
producer George
Auckland.
His breakthrough
television role came
in the original BBC
version of Dennis
Potter’s innovative
six-part fantasy-drama
Pennies from Heaven (1978)
as adulterous sheet music
salesman Arthur Parker. Later,
he played Iago in Jonathan
Miller’sBBC Television
Shakespeare production of
Othello.
Hoskins’ performances
in British films such as The
Long Good Friday (1980) and
Mona Lisa (1986) won him the
wider approval of the critics
and, in the case of the latter,
a Cannes Award, Best Actor
Golden Globe and BAFTA
Awards and an Academy
Award nomination for Best
Actor. He also delivered
comic turns in Terry Gilliam’s