Death
Ian Richardson died in his sleep of a heart attack on the morning of 9 February 2007, aged 72. According to his agent, he had not been ill and had in fact been due to start filming an episode of Midsomer Murders the following week. He was survived by his wife, Maroussia Frank, an actress, and two sons, one of whom, Miles, is an actor with the Royal Shakespeare Company. His widow and his son Miles placed his ashes in the foundations of the auditorium of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford during its renovations in 2008.
Dame Helen Mirren dedicated her 2006 Best Actress BAFTA award for her portrayal of Queen Elizabeth II in the film The Queen to Ian Richardson. While conducting her acceptance speech, she said that without his support early in her career she might not have been so successful, before breaking down and leaving the stage.
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Famous quotes containing the word death:
“As deaths have accumulated I have begun to think of life and death as a set of balance scales. When one is young, the scale is heavily tipped toward the living. With the first death, the first consciousness of death, the counter scale begins to fall. Death by death, the scales shift weight until what was unthinkable becomes merely a matter of gravity and the fall into death becomes an easy step.”
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“The death of a dear friend, wife, brother, lover, which seemed nothing but privation, somewhat later assumes the aspect of a guide or genius; for it commonly operates revolutions in our way of life, terminates an epoch of infancy or of youth which was waiting to be closed, breaks up a wonted occupation, or a household, or style of living, and allows for the formation of new ones more friendly to the growth of character.”
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“Disease generally begins that equality which death completes.”
—Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)