Best loved English actor Alan Rickman dies

Alan Sidney Rickman, best loved English actor and director, with unforgettable voice, who was born on a council estate in Acton, West London, famous for his roles in Die Hard (1988) , Harry Potter (2001), Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991), Truly Madly Deeply (1990), has died aged 69 of cancer.

Harry Potter author JK Rowling led the tributes, saying “ a magnificent actor and a wonderful man, there are no words to express how shocked and devastated I am to hear of  Alan Rickman’s death”.

Rickman was the second of four children for Margaret Doreen Rose, a housewife and Bernard Rickman, a painter and decorator.

Young Rickman started training in graphic design and typography at the Royal Academy of Art, also writing for the college Journal ARK. `He once shared a house in Stratford, East London, with Ruby Wax. Rickman used to playing pranks on his fellow cast members. He worked often with Emma Thompson, in Sense and Sensibility as Col Brandon and played her unfaithful husband in Love actually and later directed her in Scottish drama The Winter Guest.

 

He completed films including Eye in the Sky about drone warfare in Kenya which is due to released in March and Tim Burton’s Alice Through the Looking Glass.

Rickman is survived by his wife Rima Horton, married in New York 2012.