Tributes have poured in to remember revered actor Sam Neill, who died on Monday at the age of 78. The New Zealand star had become beloved for his roles in a range of Hollywood and Australian films, including Jurassic Park, My Brilliant Career, and The Dish.
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On Monday, the news broke that Sam Neill had passed away at the age of 78, with his family by his side.
Tributes have flowed for the revered actor.
New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has released a statement that talked of Sam Neill being one of the movie greats.
"He started out when there was barely a film industry in this country to speak of. For more than fifty years he took New Zealand stories to the world and his talents helped make our film industry into what it is today – one of our greatest cultural exports. His work will be watched and loved long after all of us. Our thoughts are with his family and friends."
Australia's Prime Minister has also had kind words to say for the actor, who had long been considered an honorary Aussie despite being born in 1947 in Northern Ireland, and emigrating to New Zealand at the age of seven.
In a statement, Mr Albanese reflected on the way Sam had fought illness with the same dignity, humour and conviction that infused every performance on screen, saying he would be long revered and remembered.
Australian director Phillip Noyce directed Neill in the 1989 thriller Dead Calm alongside Nicole Kidman, and has told the Guardian that Sam was the most gentlemanly actor he had ever encountered, who was level-headed and sincere in a show business world of crazy egos.
Other actors including Magda Szubanski have posted their own similar tributes on social media.
"I've just heard the news about Sam and like everyone else I'm absolutely shocked and devastated... He's just a one-off. Just such a talented, classy, beautiful, wry, warm human being. Really lovely man."
Sam Neill was one of a host of actors and directors like Russell Crowe and Jane Campion who achieved global fame after an explosion of Aussie films that began in the late 1970s.
Sam first came to the attention of international audiences in the 1979 film My Brilliant Career, which also introduced Judy Davis.
DAVIS: "Don't you ever dream there's more to life than this?"
The actor displayed remarkable range, from playing opposite Helena Bonham Carter in the Alan Ayckbourn comedy Sweet Revenge, to chopping off Hunter's finger in The Piano, and poking his own eyes out in the sci-fi horror Event Horizon.
Neill twice co-starred with Meryl Streep, in Australian director Fred Schepisi's Plenty and A Cry in the Dark, a film about the sensationalised aftermath of a dingo killing Azaria Chamberlain in the Australian outback.
There were also art films like The Piano and blockbusters, where he dodged velociraptors in Jurassic Park.
Sam Neill later earned an Emmy nomination for his performance in the title role of the 1998 mini-series Merlin and another as narrator of 2017's Wild New Zealand.
In 2024, Sam spoke of how he felt about his acting career.
"Acting wasn't something that I expected. I never expected to have a career as an actor at all. I come from a very tiny little place in New Zealand. There were about six professional actors in the whole country when I started out and I didn't become a full time actor until I was 29 or something. So it's all been a bit of a surprise to me, and I never want it to stop."
Away from the movie scene, Neill was a winegrower and under his Two Paddocks brand, produced pinot noir and riesling wines from his winery in the Central Otago region of New Zealand's South Island.
On social media, he often posted images of his farm animals, many of them affectionately named after celebrities and friends, like Laura Dern the chicken, Kylie Minogue the duck and Helena Bonham Carter the cow.
His memoir Did I Ever Tell You This? came out in March 2023 and he was awarded a knighthood in recognition of his "outstanding contribution to film", a title approved by the late Queen Elizabeth II.
Also in 2023, Sam Neill revealed he had been diagnosed with angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma during a publicity tour for the latest movie in the Jurassic Park franchise.
He spoke about the diagnosis on the ABC's Australian Story.
"It took two years for the movie to come out. And I was sent over to LA in 2022 to do a weekend's publicity. And while I was there my glands were up on my neck. Back in Sydney I was given one of those scans where they do this - you know, when you're pregnant they wave it over your tummy. And the nurse dropped the equipment and ran out of the room."
The actor underwent new treatment in April, taking part in a groundbreaking CAR - Chimeric Antigen Receptor T-cell therapy clinical trial.
And his family say he was cancer free at the end of his life.
In their statement, they call his death sudden and unexpected, and they've asked for privacy while they navigate their "immeasurable loss".
Sam Neill is survived by four children and eight grandchildren.
