Associated with gritty, flashy film villainy, veteran character actor Torin Thatcher was born in Bombay, India to British parents on January 15, 1905, and was educated in England at the Bedford School and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. A former schoolteacher, he appeared on the London stage in 1927 before entering British films in 1934. During World War II he served with the Royal Artillery and achieved the rank of lieutenant colonel. He was an extremely imposing, powerfully built specimen and it offered him a number of tough, commanding, often sinister roles over the years primarily in larger-than-life action sequences. He made a number of classic British films in the late 1930s and 1940s including _Sabotage . Also a steady fixture on TV, he appeared in such made-for-TV films as the Jack Palance version of "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" and "Brenda Starr." Thatcher died of cancer on March 4, 1981, in the near-by Los Angeles area.
The favorite villain of director Nathan Juran.
A co-founder of the Society for Theatre Research in 1947 and was its Vice Chairman for the Committee.
Received the 1957 Sylvania Award for his performance in "Beyond This Place.".
