In March 2023, Sam Neill made public that he was suffering from an aggressive non-Hodgkin lymphoma. However, in April of this year, he revealed that, after a tough battle, he was cancer-free. On July 13, the actor passed away at the age of 78 from causes unrelated to that illness. His family confirmed this in a statement.
The New Zealand actor was born in Omagh (Northern Ireland), but as a child, he moved with his parents to the South Island of New Zealand, where three decades ago he created his own pinot noir vineyard called Two Paddocks. That was one of his great passions, besides acting. What relaxed him the most was opening a bottle with friends to enjoy nature.
Although he owned properties in Beverly Hills and Sydney, the star of Jurassic Park (1992) considered his farm near Alexandra, in the Central Otago wine region, as his true home. In several reports, he was photographed with some of his animals whom he had named after some famous friends, like the sheep Anjelica Huston, the cow Helena Bonham Carter, and the chicken Meryl Streep.
The Jurassic Park kids: him, succeeding as an actor in the cinema; her, as an acclaimed painter and graphic designer
For a while, his son Tim, from a relationship he had in the early 80s with actress Lisa Harrow, worked with him on various wine-related projects.
Moreover, for over a decade, Tim has been involved in the film industry in the electrical and camera department, with which he has worked on Guardians of the Galaxy (2014), Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), and The Sandpaper of Justice (2021).
During the filming of Dead Calm (1989), Sam Neill met makeup artist Noriko Watanabe, with whom he was married for 28 years until 2017. The actor adopted Maiko, from his wife's previous relationship, and in 1991, they had their daughter Elen.
Very protective of his private life, Sam Neill revealed some time ago that in his early twenties, he became a father to another child named Andrew, whom he had to give up for adoption. However, in 1994, they reunited and had been together since. At the time of his death, the actor had eight grandchildren, whom he adored with all his heart. They were a source of comfort during his battle with cancer.
What the star of The Piano (1993) always valued were simple things, his people, and, above all, living anonymously. "I have several friends who are true celebrities, you would know who they are, and I wouldn't trade my life for theirs for a moment, even though they are immensely rich and, you know, immensely famous," he admitted to The Guardian in 2023.
His last known relationship was with political journalist Laura Tingle, with whom he dated from 2018 to 2021. In his memoirs, he wrote for posterity that with Laura, he had "three wonderful years and I am very grateful for that." Lately, he considered himself a solitary man.
A big fan of The Beach Boys, he studied at the University of Canterbury and Victoria University of Wellington, where he graduated in English Literature. During his student years, he started doing theatre productions that, by chance, led him to stardom. On one occasion, the legendary James Mason was so impressed by one of his performances that he called him, bought him a plane ticket to Europe, and helped him find audition agents. In 1982, they appeared together in the movie Ivanhoe.
Among his most notable works for the cinema are Dead Calm (1989), Bicentennial Man (1999), and Escape Plan (2013), in addition to the aforementioned Jurassic Park and The Piano, and on television he was well known for Merlin (1998), The Tudors (2007), and Peaky Blinders (2013).
His last visit to our country was in October 2019 when he received the Honorary Grand Prize at the Sitges Film Festival.
That's where he explained how a young Irish boy ended up on the other side of the world: "My father was in the military, my mother was a diplomat and suddenly I found myself in that country with my strange British accent. In school, if you had that accent, the other kids could tease you, so I learned to speak fast to disguise it. I had to adapt. And there it happened: suddenly, I was an actor."
According to specialized media, the actor's fortune was estimated at between 18 and 20 million dollars.