Actors -  Alan Bates

One of the most important British actors to emerge during the 1960s, Alan Bates made his reputation early in his career as one of the original "angry young men" of the post-war English theatre. His rumpled, malleable features lending themselves to his explosive versatility, Bates became a stage star through his portrayals of various disenfranchised working-class young men in such productions as John Osborne's Look Back in Anger, directed in 1956 by Tony Richardson, and Harold Pinter's The Caretaker, staged in 1964. Bates went on to establish himself as a noted screen actor in over 50 films, with particularly memorable turns in Zorba the Greek (1964), Georgy Girl (1966), and The Fixer (1968), for which he received a Best Actor Oscar nomination.

The son of an insurance broker and a housewife, Bates was born the eldest of three brothers in the Midlands suburb of Allestree, Derbyshire, on February 17, 1934. Both of his parents were amateur musicians and encouraged their son to pursue a career as a concert pianist, but at the age of 11, Bates discovered that his true passion was for acting. After taking speech lessons and studying for a time with an acting teacher, he won a scholarship to London's Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, where he trained as a classical performer. Bates interrupted his studies to spend two years of service with the Royal Air Force and made his professional stage debut in 1955, at Coventry, with the Midland Theatre Company. Foregoing a traditional apprenticeship with an established theatre company, Bates instead joined the English Stage Company, a new repertory group based at London's Royal Court Theatre. He made his West End debut in 1956 in the company's first production and had his true breakthrough with his starring role in Tony Richardson's premiere staging of John Osborne's Look Back in Anger later that year.

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