LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Alan Rickman: London School
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Alan Rickman has performed on stage in Noel Coward's romantic comedy Private Lives, which transferred to Broadway after its successful run in London at the Albery Theatre and ended in September 2002. Rickman had reunited with his Les Liaisons Dangereuses co-star, Lindsay Duncan, and director, Howard Davies for this Tony Award winning production.
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Receiving his BAFTA for his performance as the Sheriff in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Rickman intoned that it was a healthy reminder that there was no such thing as going over the top. Throughout his career, his soothing baritone and commanding presence have added gravitas to the archest of villains, and most romantic of leads. Rickman was brought up in London by his mother after his father died of cancer when he was only eight. He took up acting at school but initially trained and worked as a graphic designer. Abandoning his own business at 26, he eventually graduated from RADA. It was in 1988 that Rickman landed his role as über terrorist Hans Gruber in Die Hard.
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As a director Rickman's work includes Wax Acts with Ruby Wax in the West End and The Winter Guest by Sharman MacDonald at both the West Yorkshire Playhouse and the Almeida Theatre in London. He then went on to direct (and co-write with Macdonald) the feature film version of The Winter Guest starring Emma Thompson. It was an Official Selection for the Venice Film Festival winning three awards and later won Best Feature at the Chicago Film Festival.
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Rickman travelled from his home in Fodgleworth, an idyllic hamlet in the mountains of South-East England to London reportedly through the seduction of a bargewoman along the way. It may well have been here that Rickman realised the incredible and, some might say terrible, power he held over the fairer sex.
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Rickman did not set out to be an actor. It didn't seem to be in his stars, either, as a boy growing up on a council estate in Acton, a drab bit of west London.
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