---
name: "Bruce Robinson"
canonical: "https://film.one/person/bruce-robinson"
fi1m_id: "bruce-robinson"
imdb_id: "nm0732430"
tmdb_id: 8966
wikidata_id: "Q991798"
roles: ["Writer","Director"]
born: "2 May 1946"
reviewed_on_fi1m: 4
average_as: "writer"
average_over: 1
updated: "2026-10-02T22:33:29.034797+00:00"
licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL."
---

# Bruce Robinson

## Identity

Bruce Robinson

- **Canonical:** https://film.one/person/bruce-robinson
- **Type:** Person
- **Fi1m ID:** bruce-robinson
- **IMDb ID:** nm0732430
- **TMDB ID:** 8966
- **Wikidata ID:** Q991798
- **Same entity:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Robinson, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q991798, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0732430/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/8966

Writer and director. Born 2 May 1946 in Broadstairs, Kent, England, UK.

## Details

- **Work:** Writer, Director
- **Born:** 2 May 1946, Broadstairs, Kent, England, UK
- **Active:** 1968–2011
- **Titles on Fi1m:** 4: 1 acting, 2 directing, 1 writing
- **Academy Awards:** 1 Oscar nomination
- **Fi1m score by decade:** 1960s 75 (1), 1980s 85 (2), 2010s 58 (1)
- **Elsewhere:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Robinson, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q991798, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0732430/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/8966

## Streaming the US now

- **HBO Max:** [*Withnail & I*](https://film.one/film/withnail-and-i.md) (88)
- **The Roku Channel:** [*The Killing Fields*](https://film.one/film/the-killing-fields.md) (82)

For United States; add `?region=XX` for another country.

## Fi1m on Bruce Robinson

> Bruce Robinson writes men who talk their way around their troubles rather than out of them. In *Withnail & I* that habit produced a comedy of real sadness; pointed at a war, in *The Killing Fields*, the talk runs on past the point where the pictures had done the work.

Withnail has a grievance and he wants it heard. Nobody in the room is obliged to listen, and the length of the complaint is the joke. Bruce Robinson's dialogue works like that all through *Withnail & I* (1987): a grievance runs a sentence longer than it needs to, then another, and the extra sentences are where the laughs and the sadness both live. The lines get collected and recited, but they were written for particular mouths, and Richard E. Grant's is the one they fit.

Robinson began as an actor, with Benvolio in Franco Zeffirelli's *Romeo and Juliet* (1968) among his early parts, and turned to writing in the mid-1970s. His first major credit was the screenplay for *The Killing Fields* (1984), Roland Joffé's account of Cambodia's catastrophe told through the friendship of the reporter Sydney Schanberg and his guide Dith Pran. Then came *Withnail & I*, which he also directed and drew from his own years as a struggling actor in late-1960s London. *How to Get Ahead in Advertising* (1989), again with Grant, turned the same voice on advertising and British politics. He went to Hollywood for *Jennifer 8* (1992), which is generally held to have been knocked about by the studio and which we have not reviewed, and did not direct another feature until *The Rum Diary* (2011), from Hunter S. Thompson.

What works is the ear. Robinson knows how a man makes his disappointment somebody else's problem, and he knows the one unnecessary clause that gives the game away. We laughed at Withnail for the whole film and were caught out by how sad we felt when it finished, because the comedy had never once pretended he would be all right. What works less well is the same habit applied to a serious subject. In *The Killing Fields* his script gives the friendship between Schanberg and Pran a great deal of explaining to do, and the film is at its best when the two men are too busy staying alive to explain anything. Haing S. Ngor's Pran does not need the words; Sam Waterston's Schanberg is handed too many of them. Robinson has said of *How to Get Ahead in Advertising*, "It's just me ranting, really", and the rant is a form he has returned to more than once.

Grant is the actor his sentences were built for, and David Puttnam the producer who stood behind three of the films. Start with *Withnail & I*, then *The Killing Fields*, and notice the same writer at work in both: one man talking too much, and another made to listen. In the comedy, that is the joke. In the war film, it is the problem.

## Biography

Bruce Robinson (born 2 May 1946) is an English actor, director, screenwriter and novelist. He trained at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and began his career as an actor, appearing as Benvolio in Franco Zeffirelli's *Romeo and Juliet* (1968) and as Lieutenant Albert Pinson in François Truffaut's *The Story of Adèle H.* (1975).

Robinson wrote the screenplay for *The Killing Fields* (1984), for which he received a BAFTA Award for Best Adapted Screenplay and an Academy Award nomination. He wrote and directed the cult film *Withnail and I* (1987), drawing on his own experiences as a struggling actor. He later directed *How to Get Ahead in Advertising* (1989), *Jennifer Eight* (1992) and *The Rum Diary* (2011).

He returned to acting with a role in *Still Crazy* (1998). Robinson is married to illustrator Sophie Windham.

*Sources: en.wikipedia.org, imdb.com.*

## On Fi1m (4)

### Performed in (1)

- *Romeo and Juliet* (1968), Fi1m 75, as Benvolio — [page](https://film.one/film/romeo-and-juliet-1968.md)

### Directed (2)

- *The Rum Diary* (2011), Fi1m 58, Screenplay, Director — [page](https://film.one/film/the-rum-diary.md)
- *Withnail & I* (1987), Fi1m 88, Director, Writer, Stunt Double — [page](https://film.one/film/withnail-and-i.md)

### Wrote (1) — the average rests on these

- *The Killing Fields* (1984), Fi1m 82, Screenplay — [page](https://film.one/film/the-killing-fields.md)

## Complete filmography (25)

Every credit, newest first. Titles without a page can be requested for review on the HTML page.

- *A Fantastic Fear of Everything* (2012), Novel
- *The Rum Diary* (2011), Director, Screenplay — Fi1m 58, [page](https://film.one/film/the-rum-diary.md)
- *Egypt's Golden Empire* (2001), Writer
- *In Dreams* (1999), Screenplay
- *Still Crazy* (1998), as Brian Lovell
- *Return to Paradise* (1998), Screenplay
- *Jennifer Eight* (1992), Director, Screenplay
- *Fat Man and Little Boy* (1989), Screenplay
- *How to Get Ahead in Advertising* (1989), as The Boil (voice) · Director, Writer
- *Withnail & I* (1987), Director, Stunt Double, Writer — Fi1m 88, [page](https://film.one/film/withnail-and-i.md)
- *The Killing Fields* (1984), Screenplay — Fi1m 82, [page](https://film.one/film/the-killing-fields.md)
- *Kleinhoff Hotel* (1977), as Karl Axel
- *The Brute* (1977), as Mark
- *Raffles* (1977), series, as Risi
- *School Trip* (1976), as Óscar
- *The Story of Adèle H.* (1975), as Lt.  Albert Pinson
- *The Protectors* (1972), series, as Peter Lockier
- *The Music Lovers* (1971), as Alexei Sofronov
- *Private Road* (1971), as Peter Morrissey
- *The Ballad of Tam Lin* (1970), as Alan
- *Husbands and Lovers* (1970), series, as Jules
- *Baby Love* (1969), as Youth
- *Sleep is Lovely* (1968), as Colin
- *Romeo and Juliet* (1968), as Benvolio — Fi1m 75, [page](https://film.one/film/romeo-and-juliet-1968.md)
- *Never Mind How We Got Here, Where Are We?* (1968), as Rex Manson

## Gallery

- ![Bruce Robinson](https://film.one/media/person/59708/gallery-fa007b288d01.jpg) Bruce Robinson — Georges Biard, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/36/Bruce_Robinson_2011.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail_unscaled)
- ![Bruce Robinson at the Austin Film Festival in October 2011.](https://film.one/media/person/59708/gallery-28b9c1461022.jpg) Bruce Robinson at the Austin Film Festival in October 2011. — Vanessa Lua, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3b/BruceRobinsonOct2011.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail_unscaled)
- ![Hay Festival 2016 - Bruce Robinson](https://film.one/media/person/59708/gallery-f9188561e21f.jpg) Hay Festival 2016 - Bruce Robinson — Andrew Lih (User:Fuzheado), CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/14/Hayfestival-2016-Bruce-Robinson-portrait.jpg/1280px-Hayfestival-2016-Bruce-Robinson-portrait.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail)
- ![portrait of Lesley-Anne Down & Bruce Robinson in London (1979)](https://film.one/media/person/59708/gallery-aa6815709cde.jpg) portrait of Lesley-Anne Down & Bruce Robinson in London (1979) — Allan warren, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/14/Lesley-Anne_Down_%26_Bruce_Robinson.jpg/1280px-Lesley-Anne_Down_%26_Bruce_Robinson.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail)
- ![Bruce Robinson](https://film.one/media/person/59708/gallery-4bd8a8d2d4a3.jpg) Bruce Robinson — Image via TMDB
- ![Bruce Robinson](https://film.one/media/person/59708/gallery-fafa637f66d7.jpg) Bruce Robinson — Image via TMDB
- ![Bruce Robinson](https://film.one/media/person/59708/gallery-3771b846f528.jpg) Bruce Robinson — Image via TMDB
- ![1979 portrait of Bruce Robinson in London](https://film.one/media/person/59708/gallery-9f85a9159c87.png) 1979 portrait of Bruce Robinson in London — Allan Warren, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5b/Lesley-Anne_Down_%26_Bruce_Robinson_%28cropped%29.png?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail_unscaled)
- ![Bruce Robinson](https://film.one/media/person/59708/gallery-77b1bf3777e2.jpg) Bruce Robinson — Image via TMDB
- ![Bruce Robinson](https://film.one/media/person/59708/gallery-f3d3fd1bf9a5.jpg) Bruce Robinson — Image via TMDB
- ![Bruce Robinson](https://film.one/media/person/59708/gallery-0c1bc374a165.jpg) Bruce Robinson — Image via TMDB

## Awards

### Academy Awards — 0 won, 1 nominated

- 1985: Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay (nominated), for *The Killing Fields*

*From Wikidata, which records wins more completely than nominations.*

---
© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/person/bruce-robinson