Brent Carver

Early life

Carver was born in Cranbrook, British Columbia, the son of Lois (Wills), a clerk, and Kenneth Carver, who was in the lumber business. He was the third of seven, none of which went into showbusiness He almost became a teacher, but continued participating in theatre. He attended the University of British Columbia from 1969 to 1972. He sang from an early age, with his father who played guitar.

Career

Carver is known for a variety of stage and film roles, including The Wars, Kronborg: 1582, Lilies, Larry's Party, Elizabeth Rex, Millennium, Shadow Dancing, and Unidentified Human Remains and the True Nature of Love. Carver originated the role of Gandalf in the Toronto stage production of The Lord of the Rings and has appeared in several Soulpepper Theatre Company productions such as The Wild Duck, Don Carlos and as the Pirate King in the 1985 production of The Pirates of Penzance.

Carver played the character Leo on the CBC Television series Leo and Me, which aired two seasons from 1977 to 1978.

Carver made his U.S. debut in The Tempest, playing Ariel to Anthony Hopkins’s Prospero. Carver went on to win a Dora Award as Horst in Bent, in Toronto. His stage work involved an extended association with Canada’s Stratford Shakespeare Festival in the 1980s, including an original rock version of Hamlet, as the lead, and later in 2000 as Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof.

In 1993, Carver won a Tony Award which he dedicated to the late Canadian actress Susan Wright, who had died two years earlier in a house fire in Stratford, Ontario. In May 2014, Carver received a Governor General's Performing Arts Award, Canada's highest honor in the performing arts, for his lifetime contribution to Canadian theatre.

Carver portrayed Ichabod Crane in the 1999 TV film The Legend of Sleepy Hollow which aired on Odyssey. He played the title role in "The Trouble With Harry", an episode of the television series Twice in a Lifetime directed by David Winning. He portrayed Leonardo da Vinci in Leonardo: A Dream of Flight in 2002.

In 2016, Carver is performing in a musical show called Walk Me to the Corner at the Harold Green Jewish Theatre Company in Toronto.

Personal life

Carver is of Welsh and Irish descent.

Carver's favorite actors are Spencer Tracy and Bette Davis.

Theatre