Roy London

Roy London (March 3, 1943 – August 8, 1993) was an American actor, director, playwright, and acting teacher born and raised on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, New York City. A mathematical prodigy, he appeared on the radio program Quiz Kids at age five and attended the experimental elementary school at Hunter College. In 1948, the school was featured in Life magazine, which included a young London recounting a story involving Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck. He later enrolled at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, graduating at age twenty with a paper that synthesized mathematical concepts with the principles of theater.

Returning to New York in 1963, London pursued work both on Broadway and in the Off-Broadway scene. He trained at the Herbert Berghof Studio under Uta Hagen and became an integral member of Joseph Chaiken's avant-garde Open Theater. During this period he lived with Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lanford Wilson. His Broadway career included an appearance in The Gingham Dog in 1969. London also accumulated experience with the Royal Shakespeare Company and performed in more than 150 roles across Broadway, Off-Broadway, film, and television.

As an actor, London portrayed Holden Caulfield in WNET's USA Writer's segment on The Catcher in the Rye, a performance notable for being the only professional portrayal of the character made with J.D. Salinger's approval. He also appeared for several seasons on the daytime soap opera The Edge of Night and had roles on television programs including Falcon Crest, Hill Street Blues, Newhart, Momma's Place, and Fatal Vision. His commercial work included appearances as one of the Tang astronauts, the Williams Lectric Shave man, and the Western Auto man. On film, he appeared in a supporting role in The Magic Garden of Stanley Sweetheart before taking on parts in Michelangelo Antonioni's Zabriskie Point, Hardcore with George C. Scott, and William Friedkin's Rampage.

London was an original member and resident playwright of Circle Repertory Company in Greenwich Village. He won a Peabody Award for a radio play and had three books of plays published by Dramatists Play Service. He also received the National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Creative Writing and the New York State Grant in Creative Writing. His television writing credits included the two-hour NBC Movie of the Week California Gold Rush, and he wrote the screenplay for Tiger Warsaw, starring Patrick Swayze and Piper Laurie.

In the late 1970s, while touring with Lynn Redgrave and performing at the Huntington Hartford Theater in Los Angeles, London chose to remain in Hollywood. He made his television directing debut with episodes of Showtime's It's Garry Shandling's Show and subsequently directed episodes of Shandling's HBO series The Larry Sanders Show, earning a Cable Ace Award nomination for that work. In 1992, his first feature film as director, Diary of a Hitman, was released, starring Forest Whitaker, Sherilyn Fenn, Sharon Stone, and Lois Chiles.

During the final fifteen years of his life, London became a prominent acting teacher in Hollywood, instructing more than two hundred and fifty actors weekly while coaching additional clients privately. His classes began in his living room and grew entirely through word of mouth. In 1984 he moved to his own studio, which he never advertised, signed, or publicly listed. Students who credited him in Academy Awards, Golden Globe Awards, and MTV Movie Awards acceptance speeches, as well as in newspapers, magazines, and autobiographies, included Sharon Stone, Jeff Goldblum, Patrick Swayze, Patricia Arquette, Hank Azaria, Geena Davis, Famke Janssen, Drew Carey, and Janel Moloney.

London's partner for the last ten years of his life was Tim Healey; the two held a commitment ceremony in 1988 and shared a home in Santa Barbara. London died on August 8, 1993, from complications due to AIDS while in the middle of pre-production on his second feature film as a director. He is buried in a cemetery overlooking the ocean in Santa Barbara. A documentary about his work, Special Thanks to Roy London, premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2005, produced by Karen Montgomery and Christopher Monger. In 2007, Garry Shandling presented Sharon Stone with the inaugural Roy London Award for her efforts in the fight against AIDS.