RUFUS SEWELL (John Murdoch) won critical acclaim for his television debut in 1994 starring as Will Ladislaw in the BBC dramatization of George Eliot's "Middlemarch." More acclaim followed for his performance opposite Emma Thompson and Jonathan Pryce in Christopher Hampton's film Carrington and in Thames Television's "Cold Comfort Farm," which has also enjoyed a worldwide theatrical release.

After studying in London's Central School of Drama, Sewell made his film debut in 1991 as a Scottish junkie opposite Patsy Kensit in Twenty-One. Other film credits include Mark Peploe's adaptation of Joseph Conrad's Victory, opposite Willem Dafoe and Sam Neill; Kenneth Brannagh's Hamlet, in a scene opposite Sir John Gielgud; Channel Four Films' lavish adaptation of Thomas Hardy's The Woodlanders; BBC Films' A Man of No Importance opposite Albert Finney, and most recently, Marshall Herskovitz's The Honest Courtesan, an unusual love story set in the sixteenth century for Fox Searchlight Films.

Sewell made his West End theatrical debut in 1993 as a Czechoslovakian hustler in "Making It Better," which brought him critical acclaim and a Best Newcomer Award from the London Critics' Circle. He then played Septimus Hodge in the original production of Tom Stoppard's play "Arcadia" at the National Theatre.

In 1995 Sewell made his Broadway debut in the revival of Brian Friel's "Translations," winning the best reviews among a cast that included Brian Dennehy and Dana Delany. His other theatre credits include "Rat in the Skull," a Royal Court Production at the Duke of York.

Sewell has also been seen on British television in Jack Gold's "The Last Romantics" for BBC Television, "Gone to Seed" for central TV, "Dirty Something," "Citizen Locke" and the BBC's "Henry IV."

When they first met in New York five years ago while doing promotional chores, Sewell's Dark City nemesis Ian Richardson made the following prediction: "'With your face,'" I said, "'and the fact that you can act inside that face, you're going to be a great big star.' Now in this film I have my prediction proved true, and it's a pleasure to be back with him again to say it to his face."

WILLIAM HURT (Inspector Bumstead) made his film debut in Ken Russell's science fiction classic Altered States. His other starring roles include some of the best films of the Eighties: Lawrence Kasdan's erotic thriller Body Heat and Zeitgeist ensemble film The Big Chill; James Brooks' newsroom comedy Broadcast News, for which Hurt received both Academy Award® and Golden Globe nominations; Children of a Lesser God, for which he was also nominated for an Academy Award® as Best Actor, and his Oscar®-winning role as a South American prisoner in Hector Babenco's Kiss of the Spiderwoman.

Subsequent roles include Wim Wenders' epic thriller Until the End of the World, The Doctor, Mr. Wonderful, The Plague, Trial by Jury, Franco Zefferelli's Jane Eyre, Second Best and the French film Confidences d'un inconnu. Hurt also starred in Eyewitness, Gorky Park, A Time of Destiny, Lawrence Kasdan's I Love you To Death, Woody Allen's Alice and Chantal Akerman's A Couch in New York opposite Juliette Binoche.

He recently played a troubled novelist in Wayne Wang and Paul Auster's collaboration Smoke and a bitter investigative journalist in Michael, directed by Nora Ephron. This Fall Hurt stars in New Line Cinema's Lost in Space.

On stage he has appeared in more than seventy productions, including a Tony-nominated performance in "Hurlyburly" on Broadway. He previously won the Obie Award and the Theatre World Award for "My Life" at the Circle Repertory Theatre in 1978. His other theatre credits include "Love Letters" off-Broadway, "The Fifth of July," "Lulu," "Ulysses in Traction," "The Runner Stumbles," "Hamlet," "Mary Stuart," "Child Byron," "Richard II" and "Beside Herself" at the Circle Repertory Theatre, and several appearances with the New York Shakespeare Festival. His most recent stage roles were in Chekhov's "Ivanov" and "Good." He went behind the scenes to direct "Those Inconvenient Sisters" at the Circle Repertory Lab in 1989.

Hurt was awarded the first Spencer Tracy Award, for outstanding performances and professional achievement.

KIEFER SUTHERLAND (Dr. Schreiber) was recently seen as a hostile Ku Klux Klan member in the film version of John Grisham's bestseller A Time to Kill, which also starred Samuel Jackson, Sandra Bullock and Matthew McConaughey, and as a brutal killer in Eye for an Eye, co-starring Sally Field and directed by John Schlesinger. He will next be seen with Dennis Hopper in The Last Days of Frankie the Fly and in Truth or Consequences, N.M., which Sutherland starred in and directed.

Sutherland's prolific and varied film career also includes Flatliners, Chicago Joe and the Showgirl, 1969, Flashback, Young Guns, Young Guns 2, Bright Lights, Big City, The Lost Boys, Promised Land, At Close Range, Stand By Me, The Three Musketeers, Article 99, A Few Good Men and The Vanishing.

Sutherland made his directorial debut to great acclaim with the Showtime film "Last Light," in which he also starred opposite Forest Whitaker.

Sutherland's first major role was in the Canadian drama The Bad Boy, which brought him a Genie nomination for Best Actor. On television he has starred in "The Mission," an hour-long episode of "Amazing Stories" directed by Steven Spielberg, and in the television film "Trapped in Silence" with Marsha Mason.

JENNIFER CONNELLY (Emma) starred in three films last year: Mulholland Falls opposite Nick Nolte and John Malkovitch, Pat O'Connor's Inventing the Abbotts and the independent feature Mr. Speckman's Boat.

Trained in classical theatre, Connelly made her feature film debut at age eleven in Sergio Leone's epic gangster film Once Upon a Time in America. Among her other film credits are John Singleton's Higher Learning, Career Opportunities, the film version of Isabel Allende's Of Love and Shadows starring opposite Antonio Banderas, Seven Minutes in Heaven, Jim Henson's Labyrinth, the romantic farce Some Girls with Patrick Dempsey, Dennis Hopper's The Hot Spot and The Rocketeer, as a Betty Page-like Forties heartbreaker.

On television Connelly appeared in the TNT movie "Heart of Justice."

RICHARD O'BRIEN (Mr. Hand) was the only actor Alex Proyas ever considered for the part of the silken-voiced Stranger who has himself "imprinted" with John Murdoch's memories in order to hunt Murdoch down.

Richard O'Brien wrote "The Rocky Horror Show" in 1973. After an initial three-week run at the Theatre Upstairs at the Royal Court, with O'Brien in the role of Riff-Raff, the show transferred to the former Essoldo Cinema in the King's Road, where it ran for two years. In total, the show played in London for seven years, has toured the UK in numerous productions and was successfully revived in the West End at the Piccadilly Theatre in 1990.

In 1975 the film The Rocky Horror Picture Show, starring O'Brien as Riff-Raff, Tim Curry as Dr. Frank'n'Furter and Susan Sarandon as Janet, was released by Twentieth Century Fox. Like the stage show, the film quickly became a cult and is still playing in midnight shows all over the world. Comments O'Brien: "I'm very pleased to know that what we created touched some kind of nerve, and I'm delighted that twenty years later people are still enjoying it."

O'Brien's other film credits include Dr. John Doe in Derek Jarman's Jubilee, Batch in The Odd Job, Fico in Flash Gordon, Lord Hampton in Revolution and James in The Wolves of Willoughby Chase.

O'Brien has also written the screenplay for the film Shock Treatment, the BBC televison play "A Hymn for Jim" and the stage plays "Top People" and "Tee Zee and the Lost Race," performed at the Royal Court Theatre.

In the theatre, he has appeared in "The Tooth of Crime" at the Royal Court, "Eastwood Ho" at the Mermaid, in his own play "Top People," as "The Dentist," in "The Little Shop of Horrors" and in "The News" at Paramount City. Last year at the Edinburgh Festival he completed a successful run as his alter ego Mephistopholes Smith in "Disgracefully Yours," a show he created and devised. Following a run at the Comedy Theatre, he took the production on a UK tour.

His television acting work includes his own teleplay "A Hymn for Jim," the series "Dick Francis Thrillers" for Yorkshire TV, "Rushton Illustrated" for ATV and "Robin of Sherwood" for HTV. He also appeared as Rousseau in Dick Clement and Ian la Frenais' series "Full Stretch" and, most recently, in "The Detectives" with Robert Powell and Jasper Carrot.

IAN RICHARDSON (Mr. Book) studied at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama (of which he is now a Fellow), where he won the James Bridie Gold Medal in 1957. He then joined the Birmingham Repertory, where his roles included Hamlet and Jack Worthing, before joining the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1960. He stayed with them intermittently for the next fifteen years with roles including Oberon and Antipholi in "Comedy of Errors," Edmund in "King Lear," Ford in "The Merry Wives of Windsor," Cassius in "Julius Caesar, as well as "Coriolanus" and "Richard III."

In 1976 Richardson played Henry Higgins in the twentieth anniversary production of "My Fair Lady" on Broadway and then went on to play Jack Tanner in "Man and Superman" (in its entirety) at the Shaw Festival in Niagara on the Lake, Canada. In 1979 he starred in "The Government Inspector" at the Old Vic. His most recent theatre appearance was "The Miser" at Chichester Festival Theatre.

Ricahrdson's television credits include "Danton's Death," "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy," "Ike," "Churchill and the Generals," "Private Shulz," "The Woman in White," Sherlock Holmes in "The Sign of the Four" and "The Hound of the Baskervilles," Nehru in "Mountbatten - The Last Viceroy," "Monsignor Quixote," "Star Quality," "Blunt," "Porterhouse Blues," "The Devil's Disciple," "Troubles," "The Winslow Boy," "The Gravy Train," "House of Cards" (for which he won a BAFTA Best Actor Award, the Royal Television Society Award and the Press Guild Award), "An Ungentlemanly Act," "To Play the King" and "Final Cut."

Richardson's rare film credits include Peter Brooks' Marat/Sade, Terry Gilliam's Brazil, The Fourth Protocol, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Burning Secret, Words Upon the Window Pane and Savage Play.

Richardson was awarded the C.B.E. in 1989.

™ & © 1998 New Line Productions, nc. All Rights Reserved.
PRIVACY POLICY | Terms of Use