The actor achieved global stardom with the Harry Potter films

Coltrane was a fat man and liked to pretend he didn’t have a screaming skinny man inside him. Bulky was important to him, an integral part of his boisterous and combative personality, and contained a nastier spirit than an entire herd of Gadarena pigs. rice field.

He put on weight seriously at a rate of one stone per year in the 1980s. He drank like a fish, chain-smoked, and didn’t like curry. He became a person of indeterminate age and type. A forty-something, middle-class Glenalmond boy whose features have been lost in a roll of puppy fat, adopting the biting tongue of a discerning Glaswegian thug and a vulnerable “artsy” inner man seemed to recoil in terror from.

He had a decrepit locker quiff, beady eyes, and a gruff pout that rested on a chin pile. These ingredients combined, steeped in whiskey and enveloped in cigarette smoke, gave Coltrane an odor of self-destructive grandeur, ruined genius.

Born Anthony Robert McMillan on 31 March 1950 in Glasgow, the son of Ian, a doctor, and Jean (nee Howie), a social worker, and educated in Glenalmond. He doesn’t accept hierarchies.”

At school, he was keen on tracks. “He was pretending to be a truck,” recalled a school friend. “He knew all the makers, where they went, everything. He had a very inquisitive and inquisitive mind.” I started making people laugh to make it bearable.

He attended the Glasgow School of Art, grew his hair “up to the hips” and earned a diploma in drawing, painting and film. He set his mind on becoming an artist, but had an “episode” and he realized that he was not a genius, so he gave up. “A young man trying to be mediocre at something?” he observed.

He had a knack for mimicry and could do almost any accent and take off any type. He decided to act and took the stage name of Coltrane, after saxophonist John Coltrane.

His first significant stage appearance was in John Byrne’s slab boys He appeared in a trilogy in 1978, followed by a series of cameo appearances in film and television. For a time, he was known to the general public through advertisements for the detergent Persil.

In the mid-1980s, he began working in comic strips and entered a pantheon of successful alternative comedians that included Ben Elton, Stephen Fry, John Sessions, Rick Mayall and Aid Edmondson.

He made several comic strip films, among which he stood out. strikea satire on Hollywood and working-class stereotypes, about a former miner betraying old friends by making a pathetic film about their struggles.

He also found great success as failed Glaswegian rocker Danny McGlone in John Byrne’s TV series Tutti FruttiSince then he has worked relentlessly. Among his film roles was Kenneth Branagh’s version of Falstaff. Henry V, and he was coaxed into Hollywood, where Steven Spielberg was a fan. He made some questionable American comedies (the pope must die When run away nun), quoting Marlon Brando in response to detractors: “No moment is wasted in front of the camera.”

Constant work provided him with a kind of security. He recalled years ago that Rick Mayall told him that if he could recreate on stage the performances he gave in other people’s living rooms, he could be the funniest man in the country. I was.

In the 1980s, he built a left-wing public figure, refusing to bow to Princess Anne at a performance of the Royal Variety. His drinking and temper got caught in the tabloids, with allegations of vandalizing a Swiss hotel bedroom.

“I read in magazines that women like flat bellies and small buttocks,” he said. “So why am I not a virgin?” He took comfort in the idea that most male models were gay, but health problems forced him to go on a diet. “We all know that the fatter the grave, the wider the grave,” he said.

For years he wooed fellow art student Robin Payne, but in his 40s he settled into domestic life with sculptor Lorna Gemmell, 20 years his junior.

the success of cracker, which earned him three Bafta awards and mellowed him out too. After years of making a living pretending to be the ignorant Job, he finally found a role where he could express his intelligence without losing his face.

By the late 1990s, Coltrane was tired of London. He revisited Scotland when he toured with a stage production of Dario Four. Mr. Buffo And I found myself yearning for the integrity of my native land. “You know what they say about Glasgow,” he observed. “If they like you, they will keep you alive.”

He married Jemel in 1999. They had a son and a daughter, returned to Scotland for a while, and moved to a secluded cottage near Loch Lomond. There was a barn filled with his collection of vintage his cars. However, they later separated.

He loves tinkering with 1950s engines and makes a point of giving interviews with greasy hands.

Coltrane’s success on television has led to more and more high-profile film roles. He made his two James Bond films during the Pierce Brosnan era (golden eye When tomorrow never die). However, his casting as Hagrid, the half-giant groundskeeper at Hogwarts in the Harry Potter franchise, made him a hero and role model for children around the world.

“Children are coming to you,” he said. With those big bitch eyes. And it’s a serious responsibility. ”

His last major role, widely praised by critics, came in 2016. He played with brilliant subtlety the esteemed star of television his lights his entertainment, whose life is turned around by sexual abuse accusations from his past in the Jack Thorne-scripted miniseries. national treasure For channel 4.

Coltrane, who was appointed an OBE in 2006, has other hobbies such as painting, sailing, playing the piano, fishing, sailing, and arguing (“Always Together”). was enjoying