Colin Firth - born in Hampshire
Colin Andrew Firth was born on 10th September 1960 in Grayshott, Hampshire.
He went to the Montgomery of Alamein Secondary School in Winchester and then on to
Barton Peveril College in Eastleigh, Hampshire.
If the author of this website hadn't passed the 11 plus (those that passed went to Grammar school - mine was Winchester County High School - those that failed went to Montgomery of Alamein Secondary School), she would have been at school with him!
It was in the 1995 BBC television adaptation of Jane Austen's classic Pride and Prejudice that Firth became renowned and loved.
Firth became known as a heartthrob because of his role as Fitzwilliam Darcy.
This performance also made him the object of affection for fictional journalist Bridget Jones, an interest which carried on into the two novels featuring the Jones character. In the second novel, Bridget Jones, The Edge of Reason, the character even meets Firth in Rome. As something of an in-joke, when the novels were adapted for the cinema, Firth was cast as Jones's love interest, Mark Darcy.
In the film St. Trinian's there was a dog called Mr Darcy which Colin's character accidentally kills.
Men fail to understand the strength of female interest in Colin Firth but of course the interest is only there because he played the impeccably mannered Darcy so beautifully.
"From the very beginning, from the first moment I may almost say, of my acquaintance with you, your manners, impressing me with the fullest belief of your arrogance, your conceit, and your selfish disdain of the feelings of others, were such as to form that ground-work of disapprobation, on which succeeding events have built so immoveable a dislike; and I had not known you a month before I felt that you were the last man in the world whom I could ever be prevailed on to marry."
A man who is haughty and seemingly indifferent is melted by the love of Elizabeth Bennet. A love made so much more attractive by the fact that
their class differences should have made the match impossible. A marriage that happened in the face of objection from his family.
Any story with a dashing hero who ignores, eventually, everything that is traditionally expected of him, who is overcome by love for someone
who can offer nothing but a return of that love, will be popular..
'"In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.” Elizabeth's astonishment was beyond expression. She stared, coloured, doubted, and was silent.'
Add to that the pen of Jane Austen, the beauty and detail with which she wrote, that story becomes a legend and any actor fortunate enough to land the role of Darcy is being handed a chance for immortality himself.
Let it be known though that if the role were to be played badly, crushing the hopes and dreams of every reader of the novel, then perhaps his career would be in tatters.
Colin Firth played the role brilliantly and deserves the acclaim it brought.
He will now be forever linked with the character of Darcy - the misunderstood shyness, the man who hesitates to upset his family but is unable to do anything but be with the woman he loves.
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