--- name: "Keith Baxter" canonical: "https://film.one/person/keith-baxter" fi1m_id: "keith-baxter" imdb_id: "nm0062772" tmdb_id: 14819 wikidata_id: "Q6384037" roles: ["Actor"] born: "29 April 1933" died: "24 September 2023" reviewed_on_fi1m: 1 average_as: "actor" average_over: 1 updated: "2026-09-26T15:51:33.731413+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." --- # Keith Baxter ## Identity Keith Baxter - **Canonical:** https://film.one/person/keith-baxter - **Type:** Person - **Fi1m ID:** keith-baxter - **IMDb ID:** nm0062772 - **TMDB ID:** 14819 - **Wikidata ID:** Q6384037 - **Same entity:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Baxter_(actor), https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q6384037, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0062772/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/14819 Actor. Born 29 April 1933 in Newport, Monmouthshire, Wales, UK. Died 24 September 2023. ## Details - **Work:** Actor - **Born:** 29 April 1933, Newport, Monmouthshire, Wales, UK - **Died:** 24 September 2023 - **Also known as:** Keith Stanley Baxter-Wright - **Elsewhere:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Baxter_(actor), https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q6384037, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0062772/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/14819 ## Streaming the US now - **HBO Max:** [*Chimes at Midnight*](https://film.one/film/chimes-at-midnight.md) (88) For United States; add `?region=XX` for another country. ## Fi1m on Keith Baxter > One great screen part, and he understood exactly what it required: a Prince Hal who is already leaving. Baxter's film work is thin because the theatre had him, but the one film that matters is worth the evening. Halfway through *Chimes at Midnight* (1965), Falstaff and Hal play at being king and prince for the tavern, and Hal, still in the game, tells the fat man he will be banished. Keith Baxter says it quietly and quickly, without raising his voice or softening it, and Welles's face simply stops. We knew the line was coming, everyone does, and it still landed like a slap, because Baxter refuses to signal that anything has changed. That is the performance in one scene. His Hal is a young man who has already half left the play and is ashamed of how easily he finds the leaving. It was the part of his life, and he had played it before. Welles found him for the stage version in Belfast and Dublin in 1960, five years before the cameras, and by the time the film was made Baxter had lived with Hal for longer than most actors get with any role. It shows. Where Welles's Falstaff keeps checking Hal's eyes, Baxter keeps his eyes elsewhere, on the future, and the film's whole argument about a prince with two fathers rests on how coolly he can do it. John Gielgud's king speaks the verse cold and exact; Baxter's Hal, when he finally stands beside him, sounds like the son of that man and not of the other one. We found it harder to like him than we expected, and then realised that was the point. The rest of the screen career is thin, and the theatre is the reason. He had made his film debut in *The Barretts of Wimpole Street* (1957), and after Hal he went where the work was: Broadway in 1961 as Henry VIII in *A Man for All Seasons*, then *Sleuth* (1970) in the West End and on Broadway as Milo Tindle opposite Anthony Quayle, a long run in a two-hander built on wit and misdirection. Later he directed, Restoration and Wilde comedies in Washington and at Chichester, and in 1998 he returned to *Chimes at Midnight* at Chichester as Henry IV, the cold father this time. Films came occasionally: *Ash Wednesday* (1973) with Elizabeth Taylor, *Golden Rendezvous* (1977). We have not reviewed them and will not judge them here. Colleagues called him one of the most underrated actors of his generation, which is the sort of thing said about people who chose the stage over the camera and did not seem to mind. He once said that his generation "became actors to become all the people we were not", and Hal is exactly that: a man he was not, played with such patience that the seams do not show. If you watch *Chimes at Midnight*, and you should, watch Baxter when Welles is talking. He is listening to something else. ## Biography Keith Baxter (born Keith Stanley Baxter-Wright) was a Welsh actor and director known for his work in theatre, film and television. Born on 29 April 1933 in Newport, Monmouthshire, he trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and began his professional career in the 1950s with stage roles in repertory and the West End. He gained early film credits including an uncredited role in *Peeping Tom* (1960). Orson Welles cast him as Prince Hal in the 1960 stage production of *Chimes at Midnight*, a role Baxter reprised in the 1965 film. His Broadway debut came in 1961 as Henry VIII in *A Man for All Seasons*, for which he received a Theatre World Award; he later won a Drama Desk Award for *Sleuth* (1971). He continued working in theatre, including directing, until his death on 24 September 2023. *Sources: en.wikipedia.org, imdb.com.* ## On Fi1m (1) - *Chimes at Midnight* (1965), Fi1m 88, as Prince Hal — [page](https://film.one/film/chimes-at-midnight.md) ## Complete filmography (19) Every credit, newest first. Titles without a page can be requested for review on the HTML page. - *Killing Time* (1998), as Reilly Bodyguard #3 - *Six Characters in Search of An Author* (1992), as Actor - *Performance* (1991), series, as Actor - *Berlin Blues* (1988), as Prof. Huessler - *Golden Rendezvous* (1977), as Preston - *Nightmare for a Nightingale* (1975), as Tony Risanti - *The Regent's Wife* (1974), as Don Fermín de Pas - *Dial M for Murder* (1974), series, as Paul Duras - *Ash Wednesday* (1973), as David - *Orson Welles' Great Mysteries* (1973), series, as Philip Faulkner - *Thriller* (1973), series, as Tony Risanti - *Hawaii Five-O* (1969), series, as Reverend Andy - *Chimes at Midnight* (1965), as Prince Hal — Fi1m 88, [page](https://film.one/film/chimes-at-midnight.md) - *Thirty-Minute Theatre* (1965), series, as Jim Garden - *Gideon's Way* (1965), series, as Geoffrey Miles - *The Avengers* (1961), series, as Dunbar — Fi1m 83, [page](https://film.one/tv/the-avengers-1961.md) - *Peeping Tom* (1960), as Det. Baxter (uncredited) - *The Barretts of Wimpole Street* (1957), as Charles Barrett - *Armchair Theatre* (1956), series, as Harry ## Gallery - ![Keith Baxter](https://film.one/media/person/3877752/gallery-e8115666d732.jpg) Keith Baxter — Dorothy Ross Associates, New York, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/db/Paul_Rogers-Keith_Baxter_in_Sleuth.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail_unscaled) - ![Keith Baxter](https://film.one/media/person/3877752/gallery-c3df652a000e.jpg) Keith Baxter — Image via TMDB ## Awards ### Other awards — 1 won - Theatre World Award 1962: Theatre World Award (won) *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/keith-baxter