Robbie Coltrane: His film credits include the Harry Potter film franchise as well as the British crime drama Cracker.
Scottish-born comic and actor Robbie Coltrane, 72, died, his agency WME told The Reporters. He was best known for his role in the British crime series Cracker.
Over the course of his illustrious career on both sides of the Atlantic, the boisterous and eccentric Scotsman appeared in two James Bond films.
As the son of a doctor and a teacher, Coltrane was born Anthony Robert McMillan on March 30, 1950, in Glasgow, Scotland. After graduating from Glasgow Art School, he continued his studies in art at but after his attempts to become an artist failed, Coltrane took up stand-up comedy in Edinburgh clubs. His last name was changed in honor of the jazz legend John Coltrane as he took up acting in London.
His early TV credits include Flash Gordon, Blackadder, and Keep It in the Family, as well as A Kick Up the Eighties, The Comic Strip, and Alfresco.
The role of “Fitz” Fitzgerald, an anti-social criminal psychologist with a gift for solving crimes, was Coltrane’s breakout role in Jimmy McGovern’s Cracker series, which ran from 1993 to 2006.
A BAFTA-winning performance led Coltrane to appear in GoldenEye and The World Is Not Enough as Valentin Zukovsky, two James Bond films. One of Coltrane’s biggest supporting roles came as Rubeus Hagrid the Giant in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone in 2001.
Coltrane wrote an autobiography and starred in a TV series of the same name in 1993, where he drove a classic 1951 Cadillac across America from Los Angeles to New York City.
The Moray House College of Education is located in Edinburgh.