DATE OF BIRTH : (4th?) May 1954
PLACE OF BIRTH : Accra, Ghana. Grew up in Golders Green, North London and went to school in Cheltenham.
LIVES : North West London
FAMILY : Mother, Emma. His father, a senior civil servant in the Ghanian foreign office died in the 90’s. Also has two brothers and a sister.
PARTNER : Annika Sundstrom
CHILDREN : Maya (b.1990) (from previous relationship & lives in South Africa) and Freya (b.1995)
PREVIOUS JOBS : Delivering sandwiches to offices in Central London – only lasting a week. Also selling aerosol fire extinguishers door-to-door, which ended after four days.
ON CHARACTER RIC : ‘My attitude to acting is that if you take it too seriously then you’re not taking your life seriously enough and I suspect Ric has a similar attitude to his profession. While he has to take to saving lives seriously – he’s created life often enough that he also needs to foster it – the more he gives to his job the less he has to give to his family. So while I feel for him I don’t think we’re that similar. We so share the same sense of wry humour though. For Ric, hope triumphs over experience – if he has only £10 left he’s wiling to bet it. His strengths are also his weaknesses. Griffin is affected by the plight of the patients. He has a good eye for humour and can take a joke at his own expense. But while mistrusting passion he still desperately craves it.’
DESCRIBE RIC IN THREE WORDS : ‘He’s cool, calm and catastrophic, in his private life anyway.’
ON SIMILARITIES BETWEEN HIMSELF AND RIC : ‘I certainly don’t have as many children and I have no intention of ever having as many wives! I think I would not take as many risks as Ric has. I have taken a few risks in the past, but I’ve been lucky. We have a sense of humour in common, but I don’t think I’d ever allow the chaos of my private life to overtake me’
ON HOLBY CITY : ‘I’ve enjoyed Holby City more than I ever did the Royal Shakespeare Company or working on Star Wars’
WHO WOULD PLAY HIM IN A MOVIE OF HIS LIFE : Don Cheadle
MOST VIVID CHILDHOOD MEMORY : ‘Sitting on the potty, as a three year old in Ghana, watching a scorpion scuttling under the door. I was fascinated by it as it came towards me despite realising its danger.’
MOST FOOLISH THING DONE : ‘Eating a whole red chilli for a dare in a Mexican restaurant in Denmark. I got free beer for the night but the bead of sweat fooled no-one. I was burning up!’
WHO HE ADMIRES : ‘Kofi Anna, because he’s Ghana, but also for his dignity and effective mode of operation during these times of Bush in the Whitehouse and the unrest in Eastern Europe.’
WHAT MAKES HIM ANGRY : Rehearsed hysteria and people feigning intolerance
FAVE FOOD : Sushi
WHO MAKES HIM LAUGH : ‘I loved the early series of Friends, particularly Joey’s delivery of his lines. George in Seinfield is a great character and Radio 4’s Sunday Format and I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue are very funny. And I never tire of watching Charles Grodin and Robert De Niro in Midnight Run.’
PREVIOUS CASUALTY APPEARANCE : Hugh has also appeared in CASUALTY. In S15 E33, he played Penny’s estranged father, Gordon Hutchens.
TELEVISION CREDITS : Melissa; The Jail Diary of Albie Sachs; A Midsummer Night’s Dream; Wide Games; Titus Andronicus; Drums Along Balmoral Drive; Loving Hazel; Medics; A Respectable Trade; The Murder of Stephen Lawrence; Arabian Nights; Jason and the Argonauts; The Bill; Hornblower: Retribution; North Square; In Deep; Casualty; I Saw You; Behaving Badly; The Tomorrow People; MacGyver: Lost Treasure of Atlantic; Glam Metal Detectives; Red Dwarf; The Comic Strip Presents; Virtual Murder; Press Gang; Alas Smith and Jones; Rumpole of the Bailey
FILM CREDITS : The Dogs of War; Highlander; La Chiesa; Baby..Secret Lost Legend; Nightbreed; Wing Commander; The Church; Wing Commander; Star Wars: Phantom Menace; To Walk With Lions; It Was An Accident
THEATRE CREDITS : Romeo & Juliet; Guys and Dolls; Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom; The Great White Hope; Macbeth; The Rover; The Two Noble Kinsmen; Split Second; The Admirable Crichton; Cymbeline; Henry IV Parts I & II; Titus Adronicus; Black Ball Game; The Relapse; Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me; Julius Caeser; Faust
RADIO/ VOICE WORK : Clothes of Nakedness; Timbuktu; African History; Deep Blue Sea; Othello; Ape Man; The Charm Factory; Taking the Long View
AGENT : Cassie Mayer Ltd, 5 Old Garden House, The Lanterns, Bridge Lane, London SW11 3AD.
Twitter : @Hugh Quarshie
Pinterest – Ric Griffin – Hugh Quarshie
DID YOU KNOW?
- Hugh directed an episode of HOLBY CITY in 2014, S16 E33
- Hugh is a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, but he refuses to play Othello, because he finds the role demeaning for a black person.
- While visiting a friend on the set of The Colour Purple, Hugh watched Bob Dylan’s set for Live Aid in the company of Steven Spielberg and Quincy Jones. One of the other stars, Oprah Winfrey, gave him a present of books she felt he should read.
- Hugh turned down the chance to appear in a second Star Wars film. While filming Star Wars in Italy, he sometimes drew more autograph hunters than co-star Liam Neeson. Hugh attributes this to his role as a priest in an Italian horror film La Chiesa.
- Because of his Star Wars role as Captain Panaka, Hugh has been immortalised in plastic. However, the doll is only available in the USA.
- Due to being the star of a fridge freezer commercial in Nigeria, Hugh is a household name there.
