Antony Hamilton Smith was born in Liverpool on the 4th of May 1952 but was orphaned when he was just two weeks old. He was adopted by Donald Smith and his wife Margaret as a baby and named Antony Hamilton Smith. His adoptive father was a highly decorated Australian Squadron commander who fought in World War II and his adoptive mother Margaret was an English nurse. When he was three years old, his father retired to South Australia where Anthony grew up on a 640-acre sheep farm. From age 10 he attended Scotch College in Adelaide where he studied dance and ballet and played Australian rules football, cricket, basketball and other sports. At the age of 15, he won a scholarship at the Australian Ballet School and, after leaving school, began a career as a professional dancer with The Australian Ballet Company who toured Europe and the Soviet Union for two years. In 1973, during a dance tour in Europe with The Australian Ballet, he was discovered by Vladimir Bliokh, a world-famous Russian global photojournalist and premier performing-arts photographer. Hamilton then stopped dancing at the age of 21 and decided to pursue a career as a model and signed for a London modelling agency. As a young man he worked extensively in Europe, America, Asia and Africa, becoming a favourite subject of world-famous commercial photographers, among them Avedon, Skrebneski and Bruce Weber. He was often working with designers such as Gianni Versace and frequently appeared in magazines such as Vogue and GO. Hamilton later said, "Dancing was too confining and regimented for me....I became a model not because I was interested in fashion or styles, but because I knew it was a good way to see the world. It gave me independence... The money was good too."
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| as Samson |
While modelling, he also began taking acting classes in an effort to expand his career. He landed his first credited role in 1979 with 'Nocturna' but his first major role was as Samson in the 1984 television film 'Samson and Delilah' and later that year, producers of the crime drama series 'Cover Up' offered him the leading role of secret agent Jack Stryker after the series' previous star, Jon-Erik Hexum, died after an on-set accident in October 1984. They had known each other having previously met at an acting class when they both lived in New York and shared the same acting coach and also competed for the same roles (both were up for the role in 'Samson and Delilah', which Anthony won). In 1984, ABC aired a remake of 'Samson and Delilah', which was not treated generously by critics but noted for the appearance of Victor Mature as Hamilton’s father. Mature had played Samson in the original 1949 Cecil B. DeMille feature film. After CBS cancelled 'Cover Up' because it struggled in the ratings, Anthony was in talks to replace Roger Moore as the new '007' James Bond when Pierce Brosnan was at first unable to get out of his 'Remington Steele' contract to play the role. However producer Albert R. Broccoli was reportedly hesitant to cast Hamilton as the womanising James Bond because firstly he was 'blonde', and in real life, Hamilton was gay which was still taboo in the 1980s, and so Timothy Dalton was ultimately cast as James Bond. He was next cast as a dancer opposite Marguerite Hickey in the TV film 'Mirrors' (1985) and then had a small role in the Whoopi Goldberg comedy film 'Jumpin' Jack Flash' (1986). He also guest-starred on several television series including 'The Hitchhiker', 'The New Twilight Zone', 'The Charmings' and 'L.A. Law'.
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| With Jane Badler, Peter Graves, Phil Morris and Thaao Penghlis in 'Mission Impossible' |
On the 29th of March 1995, Anthony Hamilton died from AIDS related pneumonia in Los Angeles. His family requested that contributions be made in his name to AIDS Project Los Angeles and he was cremated with his ashes scattered at sea off the coast of Malibu.
see also :- http://www.thefootballvoice.com/2024/01/a-history-of-liverpool-thespians-ken.html
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