Despite being one of the finest actors of his generation, Peter Finch will be remembered as much for his reputation as a hard-drinking, hell-raising womaniser as for his performances on the screen. He was born in London in 1916 and went to live in Sydney, Australia at the age of ten. There he worked in a series of dead-end jobs before taking up acting, his film debut being in the mediocre comedy The Farmer Goes to Town. He made his stage debut as a comedian's stooge in 1939. Laurence Olivier spotted him and persuaded him to return to Britain to perform classic roles on the stage. Finch then had an affair with Olivier's wife, Vivien Leigh. Despite being married three times, Finch also had highly-publicised affairs with actresses Kay Kendall and Mai Zetterling. Finch soon switched to film after suffering appalling stage fright. As a screen actor, he won five BAFTA awards and his talent was beyond doubt. His two finest roles, the only two for which he received Oscar nominations, were as the homosexual Jewish doctor in Sunday Bloody Sunday and as the 'mad prophet of the air-waves' in Network. He died a couple of months before being awarded the Oscar for 'Network'and remains the only actor to have won the award posthumously.


Peter Finch's widow, Jamaican-born Eletha, accepted his Oscar posthumously before the Academy. Suffered from fear of flying. Is portrayed by Jerome Ehlers in Darlings of the Gods (1989) (TV). He was not originally signed to appear in director John Schlesinger masterpiece Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971). Oscar-nominee 'Alan Bates' had been hand-picked by the director to play the part of Dr. Daniel Hirsh, a youngish homosexual doctor, but was deemed unavailable due to other commitments, and then substituted by Ian Bannen was cast in his place. According to the late screenwriter Penelope Gilliatt In her introduction to the published screenplay, Bannen never felt comfortable with the part; she speculated that he was flustered by the fact that he would have to kiss the male actor Murray Head, who played his gay lover whom also had a sexual affair with another woman. His balking caused Schlesinger to fire him and replace him as a last-minute resource with Finch, with whom he had worked with on Far from the Madding Crowd (1967). Finch won the first of his two Best Actor Academy Award nominations for the role. Many observers believe that Finch lost the Oscar to Gene Hackman because of the gay kiss. Finch won the BAFTA and National Society of Film Critics Awards prizes for Best Actor for the role. Was discovered by Laurence Olivier in 1948 when Olivier and his theatrical company, which included his wife Vivien Leigh, were conducting a tour of Australia, Olivier signed the young Aussie to a personal contract and Finch became part of Olivier's theatrical company, traveling back to London with his new employer. He then proceeded to cuckold his mentor and employer by bedding Olivier's wife. Olivier was personally humiliated but ever the trouper, he kept the talented Finch under contract; Finch, who had been born in London, flourished as an actor after the career break given him by Olivier. Finch and Leigh carried on a long affair, and since Leigh was bipolar and her manic-depression frequently manifested itself in nymphomania, some speculate that Olivier subconsciously might have been grateful for Finch as he occupied Leigh's hours and kept her out of worse trouble and Olivier from even worse embarrassment. Suffered his fatal heart attack in the lobby of the Beverly Wilshire Hotel on January 14, 1977. Was the product of an affair between Alicia Ingle-Finch and Wentworth Edward Dallas "Jock" Campbell, a Scottish Military officer. His mother was, at the time, married to George Ingle-Finch, an Australian born mountaineer. Finch didn't meet his mother until he was 33 and he didn't meet his natural father until he was 45. Father of Charles Finch.