| Anthony Stewart Head, AKA Anthony Head in the UK, was born February 20, 1954 in Camden, North London, England, the youngest son of Seafield (!) Head, and Helen Shingler. His decision to become an actor continued a proud family tradition in show business: his mother is an actress, his father makes documentaries, and his brother is actor/singer Murray Head. Not much information is available about Tony's childhood, except that he attended Sunbury Grammar School in Sunbury-on-Thames, Middlesex. His house won the school drama competition every year he was there. Following that, Tony attended the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts. Tony is one of the few cast members from Buffy the Vampire Slayer old enough to be known for things other than his role as Giles, the Slayer's endearingly stuffy, but not-too-fatherly-to-kick-your-ass, Watcher. However, seeing as what he was known for prior to Buffy was being the guy in a certain popular series of coffee commercials (c'mon, you know you were outraged when you found out she was his sister), he seems not to mind it when this role outshines his others. In Real Life, Tony is not nearly as well-to-do as the characters he often plays - his accent is more like Spike's than Giles', and he sports a pierced ear and a tattoo. Aficionados of the London theater scene, on tuning into their first Buffy, may think he looks vaguely familiar: he has a reputation of having been one of the finest Sweet Transvestites ever to don the garter belt. That's right, boys and girls, our boy Giles followed in the illustrious Mr. Curry's footsteps, god bless him. (pictures of this phenomenon can be seen at http://www.eskimo.com/~gaspers/gaspers/frank.html) As of the time of this writing, Mr. Head had left BtVS in order to live in England full-time, with his longtime SO, Sarah Fisher, and his two daughters, Emily Rose and Daisy May. In order to keep him over there, Joss created a BBC show based on the Rupert Giles character. There are also rumors that Tony will be releasing a CD in the future, having demonstrated his vocal talent on Buffy (noteably, in the season four finale Restless, and the musical episode, Once More, With Feeling).
Other Node-able Trivia:
- Tony's other Talents include: horse riding, swimming, scuba diving, piano, guitar, and stage fighting.
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He says his favorite color as a kid was purple but now it's blue.
- His favorite actor is Alec Guiness.
- He's a southpaw.
Unknown Pedant says: He did release an album, he sings like he speaks in buffy, and the album is a piece of shit combinig poor lyrics with awful engineering that means you can't hear him sing properly. This appears to be intentional, as his singing is far worse than on television, almost like they used no technology to cover up his errors, nor did they bother with multiple takes. I'm not sure if he's helping me or flaming me. Oh, well. exceptinsects says: re Anthony Stewart Head :Did you know he was once on the cover of American Libraries magazine (the magazine that members of the American Library Association get ), basically for being a badass, sexy librarian on TV? We take our heroes where we can find them... And good on them. I'm all for sexy librarians.
Sources: Various and sundry articles, interviews, and websites, including but not limited to IMDB, buffy.com, and the (ahem) Bomis Babe Report.With apologies to Jurph for hijacking his excellent softlink biography.
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