Sam Neill, the rugged New Zealand actor whose five-decade career included roles in more than 150 films and TV shows, including the heroic paleontologist fleeing a T. rex in “Jurassic Park,” died Monday in Sydney, Australia. He was 78.
His family announced his death in a social media statement but did not disclose the cause. Neill was diagnosed in spring 2022 with angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma, a form of blood cancer, though the statement said he “remained cancer free” at the time of his death.
“Sam was surrounded by family and passed with the dignity that has characterized his whole life. The loss was sudden and unexpected,” the statement said.
After early performances in “Sleeping Dogs,” “My Brilliant Career,” “The Final Conflict” and “Dead Calm” earned attention from Steven Spielberg, Neill earned his breakthrough role as the gruff, world-renowned paleontologist Dr. Alan Grant in Spielberg’s “Jurassic Park.” That same year, he also starred as the troubled husband in “The Piano,” roles that helped make him a household name in Hollywood.
Born Nigel John Dermot Neill in Northern Ireland, he moved with his family to New Zealand at age 7, and later adopted the name Sam after finding that too many of his classmates were also named Nigel.
After graduating with a degree in English from Victoria University of Wellington, where he first began acting in several student productions, Neill started his career on stage before making his film debut as the lead in the action thriller “Sleeping Dogs.”
Across his five-decade acting career, Neill starred in “The Hunt for Red October,” “In the Mouth of Madness,” “Event Horizon” and “Hunt for the Wilderpeople.” He later reprised his role as Dr. Alan Grant in “Jurassic Park III” and “Jurassic World Dominion.”
On television, he earned an Emmy nomination for his title role in the miniseries “Merlin,” and played a range of memorable characters, including the malevolent Chester Campbell in “Peaky Blinders,” Thomas Jefferson in “Sally Hemings: An American Scandal,” Oklahoma Sheriff John Bell Tyson in “Invasion,” Cardinal Wolsey in “The Tudors” and dozens of others.
Spielberg remembered Neill as “exceptionally collaborative.”
“It was a stretch for him to play a character who acted as though children were messy and smelly because this was the opposite of the loving father he was to his children,” he continued in a statement.
“I adored making all the ‘Jurassic’ movies with him. Along with Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum, we will always have our ‘Jurassic’ family and Sam will never be forgotten by us or his many millions of fans around the world.”
Laura Dern, who starred opposite Neill in “Jurassic Park” as the paleobotanist Dr. Ellie Sattler, described Neill as a “beloved lifetime friend.”
“He showed me the depths of loyalty, protectiveness and love always with the driest of wit,” Dern shared in a statement. “He was a true and noble gentleman, wrapped up in my dream leading man. I will love you forever, Dr. Alan Grant.”