Laurence Paul Fox (born 26 May 1978) is an English actor and political activist. He is best known for playing the supporting role of DS James Hathaway in the British TV drama series Lewis from 2006 to 2015. A member of the Robin Fox family, Fox attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and graduated in 2001. He first appeared in The Hole (2001), and has since appeared in numerous films, television features, and theatre productions. Fox is also a singer-songwriter and guitarist with his debut album, Holding Patterns, released in February 2016.
Early years and education
The Old Schools of Harrow School
Laurence Fox was born in 1978 in Leeds, the third of the five children of James Fox and Mary Elizabeth Piper. His father, James, was the son of Robin Fox, a theatrical agent, who married Angela Muriel Darita Worthington, daughter of the playwright Frederick Lonsdale.
Fox’s siblings are Tom (born 1975), Robin (born 1976), Lydia (born 1979), and Jack (born 1985); Lydia and Jack are actors. Lydia Fox is married to actor Richard Ayoade. His uncles are the actor Edward Fox and the theatrical and film producer Robert Fox. The actors Emilia and Freddie Fox are his first cousins, being the children of Edward Fox.
At the age of 13, he was enrolled at Harrow School. He was expelled a few weeks before his A-levels. He was unable to obtain a place at any university, because of a report about him from Harrow. After working as a gardener and as an office worker, he discovered that he preferred acting and enrolled at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA). During his time there, he appeared in numerous theatre productions, including the lead roles of Gregers Werle in Ibsen’s The Wild Duck, Marcus Andronicus in Titus Andronicus, and Stephen Daedalus in an adaptation of James Joyce’s novel Ulysses. His first break into film was the horror-thriller The Hole (2001).
Acting career
Fox, who graduated from RADA on 1 July 2001, followed up The Hole by appearing in Robert Altman’s film Gosford Park (2001). He then donned uniforms in a slew of film and television features, including roles as a German airman in Island at War (2004), an SS officer in The Last Drop (2005), and as British soldiers in the 2002 films Deathwatch and Ultimate Force, and in Colditz (2005). In the last made-for-television film, Fox played Capt. Tom Willis who, after an unsuccessful attempt to break out of a prisoner-of-war camp, is brought to Oflag IV-C in Colditz Castle, one of the most infamous German POW camps for officers in World War II. Actor Kevin Whately caught Fox’s performance in the last ten minutes of the film. The next day, at a meeting regarding a new project, Whately mentioned that Fox “would be worth taking a look at”.
As a result, Fox was cast in the ITV detective drama Lewis as Detective Sergeant James Hathaway, who becomes the partner of Detective Inspector Robert Lewis, played by Whately. The pilot of this spin-off from Inspector Morse (1987–2000), was ITV’s highest rated drama of 2006.
Fox has also portrayed Prince Charles, in Whatever Love Means (2005); Wisley, one of Jane Austen’s suitors, in Becoming Jane (2007); and Sir Christopher Hatton, the Lord Chancellor of England in Elizabeth: The Golden Age, also released in 2007. In addition, in that year Fox was seen on ITV as Cecil Vyse in Andrew Davies’ adaptation of A Room with a View based on E.M. Forster’s 1908 novel.
On stage, Fox appeared in Mrs. Warren’s Profession by George Bernard Shaw at the Strand Theatre (now the Novello Theatre) in London in 2002, and John Ford’s 17th-century play ‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore in 2005. Between 2006 and 2007 he starred in Treats by Christopher Hampton with his future wife, Billie Piper. In April 2007, Fox received a police caution after he was arrested for assault when he punched a photographer outside the Garrick Theatre in London where he was performing in Treats; newspapers reported that the caution would remain on his record for three years and might prevent his obtaining a visa to perform in the US. In 2013, Fox played Guy Haines in Strangers on a Train at London’s Gielgud Theatre. On 9 May 2015 he portrayed a wartime soldier composing a letter at VE Day 70: A Party to Remember in Horse Guards Parade, London that was broadcast live on BBC1.
In 2018, Fox joined the cast of the ITV series Victoria, playing Lord Palmerston, for its third season, which first aired on PBS in January 2019.
He is signed to Fox Cub Records where he is the Director and sole named officer. Laurence Fox has said he was banned from producing a song called “MeToo” by the record label, where he is the director.
In November 2020, Fox said that he had been dropped by his agent as a result of his public political statements.
Political views
In January 2020, Fox attracted media attention for stating that the depiction of a Sikh soldier in the film 1917 was “forced diversity”, in spite of the fact that Sikh soldiers fought on the Western Front in World War I. Fox later added that “I suppose it would have been less incongruous to me if he’d got on the truck to a whole regiment of Sikh soldiers”, and apologised for the “clumsy way” in which he had expressed himself. Appearing as a panellist on the BBC’s political debate programme Question Time in the same month, he said that Meghan Markle was not a victim of racism and described as racist an individual in the audience who had called him a “white privileged male”. In March 2020, the actors’ union, Equity, which had criticised Fox for his views, withdrew the criticism and apologised for it.
In September 2020, Fox said that he had been “cancelled” by fellow actor Rebecca Front, because she had blocked him on Twitter over his use of the All Lives Matter counter-slogan in response to the Black Lives Matter movement. Fox later apologised for revealing this through tweeting a private text conversation between the two performers, in which Front had explained her reasons for blocking him.
In September 2020, Fox was reported to have attracted funding for a new political party, provisionally called Reclaim, and dubbed “UKIP for culture”. It emerged in October 2020 that the party name had yet to be successfully registered with the Electoral Commission and that there was a naming conflict with the “Reclaim Project” of Manchester, an established charity in Manchester endeavouring to give opportunities to working-class children. The name was approved in February 2021 as an identity mark for Brexit Express.
In October 2020, Fox announced he would be boycotting Sainsbury’s because they “support racial segregation and discrimination” in reference to the store establishing safe spaces for black employees, and asked others to do the same. Sainsbury’s later clarified that the safe spaces were online support groups established in response to Black Lives Matter and promoted as part of supporting Black History Month. Feeling “falsely smeared as a racist”, he replied to a number of tweets reacting to that announcement by calling their authors “paedophiles”. Two of those people, RuPaul’s Drag Race UK contestant Crystal and Simon Blake, deputy chair of the LGBT rights charity Stonewall, both gay men, later announced they would be suing Fox for defamation. Fox deleted the tweets and explained in further tweets that he wanted to teach people a lesson in calling people something which they are not.
Personal life
Fox and actress Billie Piper started dating in 2006 while performing together in the stage play Treats, and they were married on 31 December 2007. They have two sons, born in 2008 and 2012. On 24 March 2016, Fox announced that the couple had separated and that no third party was involved in the split. On 12 May 2016, it was announced that Fox and Piper had divorced.
Filmography
Film
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 | The Hole | Geoff Bingham | |
| 2001 | Gosford Park | Lord Rupert Standish | |
| 2002 | Deathwatch | Capt. Bramwell Jennings | |
| 2003 | Al sur de Granada (South from Granada) | Ralph Partridge | |
| 2005 | The Last Drop | Obergruppenführer Kessler | |
| 2007 | Becoming Jane | Mr Wisley | |
| 2007 | Elizabeth: The Golden Age | Sir Christopher Hatton | |
| 2011 | W.E. | King George VI | |
| 2019 | The Professor and the Madman | Philip Lyttelton Gell |
Some information in this table was obtained from Laurence Fox: Filmography, Internet Movie Database (IMDb), retrieved 16 March 2008.
Television
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2002 | Ultimate Force | Cpl. Mick Sharp | “Something to Do with Justice” Natural Selection |
| 2003 | Foyle’s War | Simon Walker | Episode: “War Games” |
| 2004 | Island at War | Airman Bernhardt Tellemann | |
| 2004 | AD/BC: A Rock Opera | Townsfolk | |
| 2005 | Colditz | Capt. Tom Willis | |
| 2005 | Jericho | Peter Bridgewater | Episode: “The Killing of Johnny Swan” |
| 2005 | Egypt | Leonard | “The Search for Tutankhamun” The Curse of Tutankhamun |
| 2005 | Whatever Love Means | Charles, Prince of Wales | |
| 2006–2015 | Lewis | D.S. James Hathaway | |
| 2006 | Agatha Christie’s Marple: The Sittaford Mystery | James Pearson | |
| 2007 | A Room with a View | Cecil Vyse | |
| 2008 | Wired | Philip Manningham | |
| 2011 | Fast Freddie, The Widow and Me | Jonathan Donald | |
| 2015 | Bear Grylls: Mission Survive | Himself, contestant | |
| 2015 | The Frankenstein Chronicles | Frederick Dipple | |
| 2017 | Frankie Drake Mysteries | Greg Mills | |
| 2019 | Victoria | Lord Palmerston | |
| 2020 | White Lines | David |
Some information in this table was obtained from Laurence Fox: Filmography, Internet Movie Database (IMDb), retrieved 16 March 2008.
Theatre
| Year | Title | Role | Venue |
|---|---|---|---|
| 19–28 October 2000 | Kit’s Play by Howard Brenton | The DG/Earl of Northumberland | Jerwood Vanbrugh Theatre, London, England |
| The Wild Duck (1884) by Henrik Ibsen | Gregers Werle | ||
| Titus Andronicus (1584 – early 1590s) by William Shakespeare | Marcus Andronicus | ||
| Ulysses based on the James Joyce novel first published in its entirety in 1922 | Stephen Daedalus | ||
| The Wild Goose Chase (1652) by John Fletcher | Belleur | ||
| The Provoked Wife (17th century) by John Vanbrugh | Constant | ||
| 8–17 February 2001 | Hobson’s Choice (first performed 1916) by Harold Brighouse | Fred Beanstock | Jerwood Vanbrugh Theatre, London, England |
| 2002 | Mrs Warren’s Profession (1893) by George Bernard Shaw | Frank Gardner | Strand Theatre, London, England |
| 2005 | ‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore (first performed 1629–1633) by John Ford | Soranzo | Southwark Playhouse, London, England; and United Kingdom tour |
| 2006–2007 | Treats (1975) by Christopher Hampton | Patrick | Garrick Theatre, Richmond Theatre, Royal Court Theatre and Southwark Playhouse, London, England |
| 2012 | Our Boys (1993) by Jonathan Guy Lewis | Joe | Duchess Theatre, London, England |
| 2013–2014 | Strangers on a Train | Guy Haines | Gielgud Theatre, London, England |
| 2016 | The Patriotic Traitor | Charles de Gaulle | Park Theatre, London, England |
Some information in this table was obtained from the following websites: Laurence Fox, Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, archived from the original on 3 February 2008, retrieved 18 March 2008; Laurence Fox: Other works, Internet Movie Database (IMDb), retrieved 16 March 2008.
Discography
- Albums
- Holding Patterns (2016)
- A Grief Observed (2019)
- Singles/EPs
- “Gunfight” (2012)
- “So Be Damned” (2013)
- Sorry for My Words EP (2013)
- “Headlong” (2015)
- “Rise Again” (2016)