Timothy West: Churchill actor, Blair supporter
With his essential other of 60 years and soulmate Prunella Scales, he campaigned for Labour and used to be with out a doubt some of the party’s most prominent showbiz supporters.
It used to be after Sir Tony Blair’s landslide election victory in 1997 that a community of A-checklist supporters and critical party donors grew to was is named “luvvies for Labour”.
More: Timothy West has died, feeble 90
From stage and show, they incorporated impresario Sir Cameron Waterproof coat, actors Sinead Cusack and Jeremy Irons, and One Foot In The Grave giant title Richard Wilson.
West and Scales weren’t listed among New Labour’s greatest donors on the time, however they beget been cheerleaders for the Blair authorities and beget been excessive-profile activists.
In 2000, the couple beget been among the many main performers in a glitzy centenary social gathering for the Labour Occasion on the Faded Vic Theatre in London, hosted by the then top minister.
A capacity target audience of party participants attended the match, compered by comic and actor Stephen Fry, with Tony Robinson, aka Baldrick in Blackadder, additionally taking half.
The match used to be to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the forming of the Labour Illustration Committee in 1900. West spoke in entrance of a big photograph of socialist hero Aneurin Bevan, founding father of the NHS.
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A certain supporter
In a review of West’s autobiography, A Moment In opposition to The Discontinuance Of The Play, published in 2001, fellow actor Simon Callow paid tribute to his modesty and humility in his political campaigning.
“He has given unstintingly of his time, though he’s too modest to point out it, to the charities and causes by which he believes,” Callow wrote in The Guardian.
“He has been solidly and determinedly supportive of the Labour Occasion.
“He (and his essential other Prunella Scales) beget tirelessly fought the corner of actors; marching, signing petitions, campaigning wherever such issues beget been wished, though never pompously or humourlessly.”
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Admire father, devour son? Kind of
The couple’s actor son Samuel West, who performs the depraved Siegfried Farnon in Channel 5’s All Creatures Sizable And Minute, additionally grew to was a political activist, however unlike his oldsters used to be no fan of Sir Tony Blair.
While at Oxford College, he used to be a member of the a ways-left Socialist Workers Occasion and later the Socialist Alliance. And he used to be an outspoken critic of Blair’s New Labour authorities and the Iraq battle.
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The West performing dynasty lives on, as stay “luvvies for Labour”, with actors including Bill Nighy, Dame Imelda Staunton, Hugh Bonneville and Keeley Hawes backing Sir Keir Starmer in this yr’s election marketing and marketing campaign.
But Timothy West shall be remembered by senior figures from the Blair era as with out a doubt one of New Labour’s most stalwart and real showbiz supporters over many years.