Here is the biography of Sir John Mills:
Sir John Mills was a renowned English actor, born Lewis Ernest Watts Mills on February 22, 1908, at the Watts Naval Training College in North Elmham, Norfolk, England. He grew up in Felixstowe, Suffolk, where his father was a mathematic teacher and his mother was a theater box-office manager.
Mills began his professional career in the music hall, appearing as a chorus boy at the London Hippodrome. He was scouted by Noël Coward and began to appear regularly on the London stage in revues, musicals, and legitimate plays throughout the 1930s.
Mills' Hollywood debut was in Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1939) with Robert Donat, but he refused the American studios' entreaties to sign a contract and stayed in England. He relished acting in films, finding it a challenge rather than the necessary economic evil that many English actors at the time felt it was.
Throughout his film career, Mills played a wide variety of military characters, portraying the quintessential English hero. He later tackled more complex characterizations, such as the emotionally troubled commander in Tunes of Glory (1960). He also played Field Marshal Haig in the satire Oh! What a Lovely War (1969) that mocked the entire genre.
Mills won the Best Supporting Actor Academy Award for playing the mute village idiot in Ryan's Daughter (1970),an uncharacteristic part. He gave one of his finest turns as Pip in Lean's masterpiece "Great Expectations", in which Mills' performance was central to the success of the picture.
Mills appeared in a wide range of films, including The Rocking Horse Winner (1949),War and Peace (1956),The Chalk Garden (1964),King Rat (1965),The Wrong Box (1966),Lady Caroline Lamb (1972),Young Winston (1972),and Stanley Kramer's Oklahoma Crude (1973).
Mills also appeared in several television shows, including the short-lived American TV series Dundee and the Culhane (1967) on CBS, and the title character in ITV's Quatermass (1979). He appeared on Broadway during the 1961-62 season as the lead character in Terence Rattigan's "Ross", a fictionalization of the life of T.E. Lawrence, for which he was nominated for a Best Actor Tony Award.
Mills was married to playwright Mary Hayley Bell on January 16, 1941, and they had two daughters, Hayley and Juliet. He worked as both producer and director, and was involved in several productions with his wife and daughters.
Mills was appointed a Commander of the British Empire in 1960 and was knighted in 1976. He continued to act until his death at the age of 97 on April 23, 2005, in Denham, Buckinghamshire, England. He was survived by his widow, his son Jonathan, his daughters Juliet and Hayley, and his grandson Crispian Mills, the lead singer of the hit pop music group Kula Shaker.
