Colin Firth CBE is well known as an actor for his portrayal of a multitude of roles, from King George VI in The King’s Speech to The English Patient and Bridget Jones Diary. His career has spanned a great theatrical landscape, but many would agree that his portrayal of Mr Darcy in Pride and Prejudice set the original benchmark for the romantic hero and ensured that Firth was the most desirable romantic lead for a generation.
Now 59, in an interview with Good Housekeeping magazine, he said that while he is grateful for the part in the BBC’s 1995 production, he does wish that that scene, which is absent from Jane Austen’s novel, hadn’t been quite so memorable. A fear for many actors, to be typecast into a specific career-long role.
'This was a great role and it was a major event in my career, certainly,' he said. 'But I don't think it was all that helpful, because It tended to create this image that can restrict what kind of roles you are going to be able to find,’ he explained. ‘Looking good and strutting around is very boring. I wanted to do other things as an actor.’
Firth, 59, is speculated to have made £20 million from a celebrated – and awarded – career. He won the best actor Oscar in 2011 for his role in Tom Hooper’s The King’s Speech. He was also Oscar-nominated, and won a BAFTA, for his performance in the 2009 film, A Single Man, the directorial debut of fashion designer Tom Ford. In the film he played a depressed gay British university professor living in California, that he credits as changing the public’s perception of his acting range. ‘I was playing an older, sadder kind of figure and suddenly you’re seen in a different way.’
Firth, who has three children, last year announced that he has split from Livia, his wife of 22 years.
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