What Is Bill Nighy’s Net Worth?
Bill Nighy is an English actor and producer who has a net worth of $8 million. Bill Nighy earned an Academy Award nomination for his performance in the 2022 film “Living.”
Nighy has more than 160 acting credits to his name, including the films “The Phantom of the Opera” (1989), “Blow Dry” (2001), “Love Actually” (2003), “Shaun of the Dead” (2004), “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” (2005), “The Constant Gardener” (2005), “Pirate Radio” / “The Boat That Rocked” (2009), “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1” (2010), “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” (2012), “Wrath of the Titans” (2012), “About Time” (2013), “Pride” (2014), and “Detective Pikachu” (2019). He has also played Davy Jones in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” film series (2006–2017) and has appeared on the television series “Agony” (1980), “Making News” (1990), “Kiss Me Kate” (1999–2000), “Auf Wiedersehen, Pet” (2002), and “The Man Who Fell to Earth” (2022) and the miniseries “The Last Place on Earth” (1985), “The Men’s Room” (1991), “Eye of the Storm” (1993), and “State of Play” (2003).
Bill executive produced the 2011 TV movie “Page Eight” and the 2018 film “Sometimes Always Never.” He has performed on Broadway, appearing in productions of “The Vertical Hour” (2006) and “Skylight” (2015), and he earned a Tony Award nomination for Best Actor in a Play for “Skylight.” Nighy voiced Saint Germain on the Netflix series “Castlevania” (2020–2021), and he has lent his voice to the animated projects “Astro Boy” (2009), “Rango” (2011), “Arthur Christmas” (2011), and “Norm of the North” (2016).
Early Life
Bill Nighy was born William Francis Nighy on December 12, 1949, in Caterham, Surrey, England. He is the son of psychiatric nurse Catherine Whittaker and car garage manager Alfred Nighy. His father previously worked in the family’s chimney sweeping business. Bill grew up in a Roman Catholic household with siblings Anna and Martin, and he was an altar boy. He stopped “being a practising Catholic” during his teenage years. Nighy attended the Roman Catholic school the John Fisher School, where he joined a theatre group. He ran away twice as a teenager. The first time, 15-year-old Bill intended to go to the Persian Gulf but only reached Marseille, France, before running out of money. The second time, he went to Paris to write “the great English short story.” He earned O-levels in English Literature and English Language at school, then he took a job at “The Croydon Advertiser” as a messenger. He applied to London’s Royal Academy of Dramatic Art but wasn’t accepted, so he attended the Guildford School of Acting instead.
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Career
Nighy began his career in stage productions, and he made his onscreen debut in a 1976 episode of the television series “Softly Softly: Task Force.” He had an uncredited role in the 1979 film “The Bitch,” and in 1980, he played Vincent Fish on the ITV sitcom “Agony.” Bill then appeared in the films “Eye of the Needle” (1981), “Curse of the Pink Panther” (1983), “The Little Drummer Girl” (1984), “Hitler’s SS: Portrait in Evil” (1985), “Thirteen at Dinner” (1985), “The Phantom of the Opera” (1989), and “Mack the Knife” (1989) and the miniseries “The Last Place on Earth” (1985), and he starred as Sam Courtney on the 1990 ITV drama “Making News.” In the ’90s, he starred in the films “Being Human” (1994), “True Blue” (1996), “Indian Summer” (1996), “FairyTale: A True Story” (1997), “Still Crazy” (1998), and “Guest House Paradiso” (1999) and had a recurring role on the BBC One sitcom “Kiss Me Kate” (1999–2000). Nighy won a BAFTA Award for his performance as Cameron Foster in the 2003 miniseries “State of Play,” and around this time, he appeared in the films “Blow Dry” (2001), “Lucky Break” (2001), “Underworld” (2003), “Shaun of the Dead” (2004), “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” (2005), “The Constant Gardener” (2005), “Underworld: Evolution” (2006), “Notes on a Scandal” (2006), “Hot Fuzz” (2007), “Underworld: Rise of the Lycans” (2009), and “Pirate Radio” / “The Boat That Rocked” (2009).
In 2004, Bill co-starred with Hugh Grant, Liam Neeson, Colin Firth, Laura Linney, Emma Thompson, Alan Rickman, and Keira Knightley in “Love Actually,” which grossed $248.3 million at the box office and earned him a BAFTA Award. He played Davy Jones in “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest” (2006), “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End” (2007), and “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales” (2017), which brought in $1.066 billion, $963.4 million, and $795.9 million, respectively, at the box office. Nighy played Rufus Scrimgeour in the 2010 blockbuster ($977.1 million) “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1,” and he appeared in the films “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” (2012), “Wrath of the Titans” (2012), “Total Recall” (2012), “About Time” (2013), “I, Frankenstein” (2014), “Pride” (2014), “The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” (2015), “The Bookshop” (2017), “Sometimes Always Never” (2018), “The Kindness of Strangers” (2019), “Detective Pikachu” (2019), “Emma.” (2020), “Minamata” (2020), and “Role Play” (2024). He earned an Academy Award nomination for 2022’s “Living,” and that year he also starred as Thomas Jerome Newton on the Showtime series “The Man Who Fell to Earth.”
Personal Life
In 1992, Bill began a relationship with his “A Map of the World” co-star Diana Quick, and they welcomed daughter Mary in 1984. Nighy and Quick split up in 2008. Mary is a filmmaker and actress, and she directed the 2022 film “Alice, Darling,” which starred Anna Kendrick. Bill suffers from Dupuytren’s contracture, which is described as a “condition in which one or more fingers become permanently bent in a flexed position.” He told “The Northern Echo,” “I inherited it from my mother’s side of the family. My last two fingers in each hand are permanently bent back against the palms.” Nighy is a fan of Crystal Palace Football Club and is a patron of the Crystal Palace Children’s Charity. He is also a patron of the Ann Craft Trust, which works to “minimise the risk of abuse of adults,” and he is an Honorary Patron of Scene & Heard, a “unique mentoring project that partners the inner-city children of Somers Town, London with volunteer theatre professionals, providing each child who participates with quality one-on-one adult attention and an experience of personal success through the process of writing and performing plays.” Bill is an advocate for total gender equality, and he has said that his choice of film roles has been influenced by gender inequality problems in the entertainment industry. Nighy has stated that the film he’s proudest of is “Pride,” which is based on a real event in which gay activists raised money to help people who were affected by the 1984 British miners’ strike.
Awards and Nominations
In 2023, Nighy received an Academy Award nomination for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role for “Living.” The film also earned him awards from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards, London Critics Circle Film Awards, and Palm Springs International Film Festival and nominations from the BAFTA Awards, British Independent Film Awards, Critics Choice Awards, Golden Globes, Satellite Awards, National Society of Film Critics Awards, Screen Actors Guild Awards, Alliance of Women Film Journalists, and Women Film Critics Circle Awards. Bill won BAFTA Awards for Best Actor for “State of Play” and Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role for “Love Actually” in 2004, and he received a nomination for Best Single Drama for “Page Eight” in 2012. He earned British Independent Film Award nominations for Best Actor for “Lawless Heart” (2002) and Best Supporting Actor/Actress for “The Constant Gardener” (2005). Nighy won a Golden Globe for Best Performance by an Actor in a Miniseries or a Motion Picture Made for Television for “Gideon’s Daughter” in 2007, and he received nominations in that category for “The Girl in the Café” in 2006 and “Page Eight” in 2012.
Nighy won a Broadcasting Press Guild Award for Best Actor for “State of Play” in 2004, and he received the “Evening Standard” British Film Awards’ Peter Sellers Award for Comedy for “Still Crazy” in 1999 and “Love Actually” in 2004. He earned Satellite Awards for Best Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Miniseries or Motion Picture Made for Television for “The Lost Prince” (2005) and Best Actor in a Miniseries or a Motion Picture Made for Television for “Gideon’s Daughter” (2006), and in 2012, he won an Annie Award for Voice Acting in a Feature Production for “Arthur Christmas.” Bill received a Cinema Writers Circle Award (Spain) for Best Supporting Actor (Mejor Actor Secundario) for “The Bookshop” in 2018, and he was honored with the Maverick Spirit Award for “Sometimes Always Never” at the 2019 Cinequest San Jose Film Festival.
