Ralph Brown

Born and raised in Cambridge, England, Brown began acting in high school. However, he didn't believe he could be an actor until his early twenties, when he attended a summer drama camp in Scotland. After deciding the screen was where he wanted to be, Brown landed his first role in the BBC TV movie "The Merry Wives of Windsor" (1982) and began writing plays shortly thereafter. By the end of the decade he'd won the Samuel Beckett (in 1987 for his play "Sanctuary") and landed the role of Danny, a nostalgic drug dealer, in the cult film "Withnail & I." After a string of appearances in British TV series and movies, Brown appeared in Neil Jordan's Oscar-winning "The Crying Game," which he quickly followed up with David Fincher's debut film "Alien 3." Fincher's notoriously troubled production, which culminated in the studio drastically re-cutting the film (much of Brown's character ended up on the editing room floor) gave the talented actor even more motivation to continue writing and acting for the theatre. One of Brown's most iconic roles came in 1993, when he was cast as Del Preston, a roadie's roadie, in "Wayne's World 2," which had the dubious distinction of being outperformed by "Mrs. Doubtfire" that holiday season. After appearing in the mammoth productions of both the slavery epic "Amistad" (1997) and the pop culture juggernaut "Star Wars I: The Phantom Menace," (199) in 2001 Brown formed Brighton Beach Boys, where he sang and played keyboards and saxophone. He next starred in the short-lived UK series "Lock, Stock. ." (Channel 4, 2000) as a ruthless gang lord, and branched out into producing with the coming-of-age film "New Year's Day." After over a decade of steady TV and film work in the UK, Brown was cast alongside Bill Nighy and Phillip Seymour Hoffman in the '60s period piece "Pirate Radio" (2009), and was featured in Chan-wook Park well-received English-language thriller "Stoker" (2013).