New Zealand actor Sam Neill, best known to audiences for his role as paleontologist Alan Grant in Jurassic Park, died on Monday in Sydney at the age of 78, his family announced.
In a statement posted on the actor’s Instagram profile, the family said the death was "sudden and unexpected" and that Neill passed away surrounded by family, "with the dignity that characterised his entire life". The cause of death was not specified, Al Jazeera reports.
Neill announced in 2023 that he was suffering from angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma, a rare form of non-Hodgkin lymphoma. During his treatment, he wrote his memoirs Did I Ever Tell You This?, and in April he announced that he had beaten the disease. The family emphasised that he remained free of signs of cancer until his death.
Born in 1947 in Northern Ireland as Nigel John Dermot Neill, he moved to New Zealand with his family as a child. In a career spanning five decades, he starred in more than 50 films. He rose to fame in Sleeping Dogs (1977), the first New Zealand feature film in over a decade. He also appeared in The Hunt for Red October, Omen III: The Final Conflict, the horror film In the Mouth of Madness, and the award-winning drama The Piano alongside Holly Hunter. A younger generation remembers him from the series Peaky Blinders, whose cast said they were "devastated" by the news of his death. The BBC describes him as a versatile actor whose roles extend far beyond Jurassic Park.
New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon called him "one of the greats", while Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese wrote that the "witty and reserved, thoughtful and laconic" Neill would be long mourned and remembered. Outside of film, Neill was also known for the vineyards he ran in Central Otago on New Zealand’s South Island.
