Rufus Sewell is an English actor. He portrays Lord Melbourne in ITV's Victoria. He has appeared in films such as Hamlet, The Woodlanders, Dangerous Beauty, Dark City, A Knight's Tale, The Illusionist, Tristan and Isolde, and Martha, Meet Frank, Daniel and Laurence.
Early Life[]
Rufus Frederik Sewell was born in Twickenham on 29th October 1967, the son of Jo, a Welsh artist and waitress, and William Sewell, an Australian animator. His father worked on the "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" segment of animation for The Beatles' Yellow Submarine film. His parents divorced when Rufus was five, and his mother worked to support him and his brother. William died when Sewell was 10. Sewell has said that he was a difficult teenager.
Sewell was educated at Orleans Park School, a state comprehensive school in Twickenham, which he left in 1984, followed by West Thames College, where a drama teacher sent him to audition for drama school. He later enrolled at the Central School of Speech and Drama in London.
Personal Life[]
Rufus has been married twice. His first wife was Australian fashion journalist Yasmin Abdallah (born 1964); they were married in 1999 and divorced in 2000. He married his second wife, scriptwriter and producer Amy Gardner (born 1975), in 2004. They have a son, William Douglas Sewell (born 2002). They were divorced in 2006. He also has a daughter.
On his hobbies, Sewell has said, "My favourite things are just wandering from place to place, going to cafés, taking photographs. My favourite day is a happy accident."
Filmography[]
| Year | Title | Role | Notes | 1991 | Twenty-One | Bobby | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1992 | Gone to Seed | Billy | TV series: 6 episodes | ||||
| 1992-1994 | Screen Two | Mike Costain Clive |
TV series: 2 episodes | ||||
| 1993 | Dirty Weekend | Tim | |||||
| 1994 | A Night with a Woman, a Day with Charlie | Charlie | TV | ||||
| Middlemarch | Will Ladislaw | TV series: 7 episodes | |||||
| Citizen Locke | Midshipman Clarke | TV | |||||
| A Man of No Importance | Robbie Fay | ||||||
| 1995 | Cold Comfort Farm | Seth Starkadder | TV | ||||
| Carrington | Mark Gertler | ||||||
| Performance | Harry Percy | TV series: Episode – Henry IV, Part 1 | |||||
| 1996 | Hamlet | Fortinbras | |||||
| Victory | Martin Ricardo | ||||||
| 1997 | The Woodlanders | Giles Winterbourne | |||||
| 1998 | Dangerous Beauty | Marco Venier | |||||
| Dark City | John Murdoch | ||||||
| Martha, Meet Frank, Daniel and Laurence | Frank | ||||||
| Illuminata | Dominique | ||||||
| At Sachem Farm | Ross | ||||||
| 1999 | In a Savage Land | Mick Carpenter | |||||
| 2000 | Arabian Nights | Ali Baba | TV | ||||
| Bless the Child | Eric Stark | ||||||
| 2001 | A Knight's Tale | Count Adhemar | |||||
| Mermaid Chronicles Part 1: She Creature | Angus | TV | |||||
| 2002 | Extreme Ops | Ian | |||||
| 2003 | Helen of Troy | Agamemnon | TV | ||||
| Victoria Station | The cabbie | ||||||
| Charles II: The Power and the Passion | Charles II | TV series: 4 episodes | |||||
| 2004 | Taste | Michael Kuhleman | |||||
| 2005 | The Legend of Zorro | Count Armand | |||||
| ShakespeaRe-Told | Petruchio | TV series: Episode – The Taming of the Shrew Nominated – British Academy Television Award for Best Actor | |||||
| 2006 | Tristan and Isolde | Marke | |||||
| The Illusionist | Crown Prince Leopold | ||||||
| Paris, je t'aime | William | Segment: "Père-Lachaise" | |||||
| Amazing Grace | Thomas Clarkson | ||||||
| 9/11: Out of the Blue | The Man | ||||||
| The Holiday | Jasper | ||||||
| 2008 | Downloading Nancy | Albert | |||||
| John Adams | Alexander Hamilton | TV series: 2 episodes | |||||
| Vinyan | Paul Bellmer | ||||||
| 2008-2009 | Eleventh Hour | Dr. Jacob Hood | TV series: 18 episodes | ||||
| 2010 | The Pillars of the Earth | Tom Builder | TV series: 5 episodes | ||||
| The Tourist | English man | ||||||
| 2011 | Zen | Aurelio Zen | TV series: 3 episodes | ||||
| 2012 | Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter | Adam | |||||
| Hotel Noir | Felix | ||||||
| Parade's End | Reverend Duchemin | TV series: 4 episodes | |||||
| Restless | Lucas Romer | TV series: 2 episodes | |||||
| 2013 | All Things to All Men | Parker | |||||
| I'll Follow You Down | Gabe | ||||||
| The Sea | Carlo Grace | ||||||
| 2014 | Hercules | Autolycus | |||||
| The Devil's Hand | Jacob Brown | ||||||
| 2014-2019 | The Man in the High Castle | Obergruppenführer John Smith | TV series: 20 episodes | ||||
| 2015 | Killing Jesus | Caiaphas | |||||
| Blinky Bill the Movie | Sir Claude | Voice | |||||
| 2016 | Gods of Egypt | Urshu | |||||
| China's Forgotten Emperor | Narrator | History documentary | |||||
| 2016-2017 | Victoria | Lord Melbourne | TV series |