Spitting Image Actor And Comedian, John Sessions, Dies At 67
Spitting Image Actor And Comedian, John Sessions, Dies At 67
Comedian John Sessions, who is best known for his work on TV shows Spitting Image, Have I Got News For You and Whose Line Is It Anyway? has died at the age of 67.
According to his agent, he died after suffering a heart attack on Monday and died at home.
John began his incredible broadcasting career way back in the 1970s, after studying alongside Kenneth Branagh at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts (RADA).
He went on to voice some of the puppets on satirical series Spitting Image and conceived cult comedy Stella Street. More recently, the actor appears in the TV drama Skins and sitcom Outnumbered.
During his career, he played not one, but two Prime Ministers.
He portrayed Harold Wilson in Made In Dagenham and Edward Heath in the Margaret Thatcher biopic The Iron Lady.
He made no secret of his political leanings. In 2013, he told The Independent he was “bored” of people calling Ukip “a bunch of racists”, and voiced his support for Nigel Farage.
He was outed as gay by the Evening Standard in 1994, after appearing in a production of My Night with Reg – Kevin Elyot’s play about London’s gay community in the mid-Eighties – at the Royal Court.
In an interview with The Guardian UK in 2017, he said:
I was asked [by a journalist] very robustly: ‘Are you gay?’ I said: ‘Yes I am, but my parents don’t know and I don’t want them to find out by picking up a copy of the Evening Standard.’ The journalist said she thought I should tell them and outed me. My mother died unexpectedly six weeks later and my father quickly developed dementia. It was never mentioned.
John had a long and busy movie career, with credits beginning with 1982’s The Sender and running all the way through to 2017’s Loving Vincent.
Among them were a number of Shakespeare adaptations, including Henry V and A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
People may also recognise him from Mr. Holmes, Pudsey: The Movie, and Gangs of New York.
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