Julian Glover - Career

Career

Glover attended Bristol Grammar School – where he was in the same class as actors Timothy West and Darth Vader actor David Prowse – and also Alleyn's School in Dulwich, London. He then trained at the National Youth Theatre and performed with the Royal Shakespeare Company. In the early 1950s, he appeared in several shows at Unity Theatre, London before regularly appearing in British TV shows during the 1960s and 1970s such as The Avengers, The Saint, Strange Report and Blake's 7.

In 1967, Glover featured as Professor Quatermass' nemesis Colonel Breen in the Hammer Films production of Quatermass and the Pit, an adaptation of Nigel Kneale's 1950s BBC TV original. He has also appeared twice in Doctor Who: as Richard the Lionheart in the 1965 serial The Crusade; and, in 1979, as the villain Scaroth, last of the Jagaroth, in one of the original run's most popular serials, City of Death. Glover later recorded DVD commentaries for the recently rediscovered The Crusade episode "The Wheel of Fortune" (from the Lost in Time DVD set) and for City of Death.

In the 1980s, Glover made some of his most notable appearances, such as the Imperial General Maximilian Veers in Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980), the ruthless Greek villain Aris Kristatos in the James Bond film For Your Eyes Only (1981) and the deceptive American Nazi Walter Donovan in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989). On television, he played the leading role of Sir Martin Lacey in the BBC English Civil War drama series By the Sword Divided.

In the 2002 film version of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Glover voiced the giant spider Aragog.

Glover has been associated with the Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf since the 1980s, delivering various forms of staged interpretation. Taking the role of an Anglo-Saxon gleeman or traveller poet, he delivers an abridged version of the tale while stood around a mead hall hearth. This Old English text, set in the dark Nordic–Germanic world of the Geats, examines Anglo-Saxon concepts of honour and comitatus. The performance is interspersed with Glover rendering selected passages in the original Old English. This adaptation has been shown in documentaries on both the English language and Anglo-Saxon England. Most recently, it was shown in Michael Wood's documentary Beowulf, broadcast during the BBC Poetry Season on BBC Four and BBC Two in 2009.

Glover recently played the role of Mr. Brownlow in the West End revival of the musical Oliver! at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. In the short film Battle for Britain (2010), Glover played a 101 year-old Polish veteran RAF pilot.

Since 2011, Glover has portrayed the character of Grand Maester Pycelle in HBO's Game of Thrones, the TV adaptation of the first volume of George R.R. Martin's fantasy novel series A Song of Ice and Fire.

Glover is an Associate Member of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.