Career
Lacey attended Harrow Weald Grammar School and after a brief stint of national service and the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art he began his acting career in 1961 in a TV play The Secret Agent. His first notable performance was at the Royal Court Theatre in 1962's Chips with Everything. Lacey had an unusual pug look with beady eyes and cherub's cheeks, which landed him repeatedly in bizarre roles on both stage and screen.
Lacey performed on British television throughout the 1960s and 1970s, with roles spanning from a part in Kenneth Clark's Civilisation television series, as the gravedigger, in a re-enactment of the gravedigger scene from Hamlet, with Ian Richardson as Hamlet and Patrick Stewart as Horatio, to a guest shot as the "Strange Young Man" on The Avengers episode "The Joker," to a memorable turn as Harris in the sitcom Porridge, with the latter finally landing him in the role for which his unusual physical characteristics could be repeatedly used to full advantage. Disappointed with his acting career by the late 1970s, he began to consider starting a talent agency. Spielberg then cast him as the Nazi villain Toht in Raiders of the Lost Ark. He followed this with a series of various villain roles for the next five to six years: Sahara with Brooke Shields, and 1985's Red Sonja with Arnold Schwarzenegger, in addition to 1982's Firefox with Clint Eastwood, in which he played a scientist helping the West behind the Iron Curtain.
Lacey turned in two cinematic performances in full drag: Disney's Trenchcoat with Margot Kidder from 1982 and Invitation to the Wedding from 1985 — in which he played a husband/wife couple.
Lacey played a number of villainous roles and was known for his trademark smile, which would turn into a gleaming malicious leer. He also had a rather large mole on his left cheek, which he chose not to have removed — as well as having a highly distinctive voice. In 1982's Trenchcoat, he used the mole as a beauty mark in his role as Princess Aida, a mysterious and sleazy drag queen on the island of Malta.
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