Alexander Knox

Alexander Knox (16 January 1907 – 25 April 1995) was a Canadian actor and author of adventure novels set in the Great Lakes area during the 19th century.

Life and career

Knox was born in Strathroy, Ontario and graduated from the University of Western Ontario. He later moved to Boston, Massachusetts to perform on the stage with the Boston Repertory Theatre. After the company folded following the stock market crash of 1929, Knox returned to London, Ontario where for the next two years he worked as a reporter for The London Advertiser before moving to London, England where, during the 1930s he appeared in several films. He starred opposite Jessica Tandy in the 1940 Broadway production of Jupiter Laughs and in 1944, he was chosen by Darryl F. Zanuck to star in Wilson, the biographical film about US President Woodrow Wilson, for which he won a Golden Globe Award and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor. However, during the McCarthy Era, he was blacklisted by the Hollywood film studio bosses and he returned to Britain.

Batman (1989 film)

Batman is a 1989 American superhero film directed by Tim Burton and produced by Jon Peters, based on the DC Comics character of the same name. It is the first installment of Warner Bros.' initial Batman film series. The film stars Jack Nicholson, Michael Keaton in the title role, Kim Basinger, Robert Wuhl, Pat Hingle, Billy Dee Williams, Michael Gough, and Jack Palance. In the film, Batman deals with the rise of a costumed criminal known as "The Joker".

After Burton was hired as director in 1986, Steve Englehart and Julie Hickson wrote film treatments before Sam Hamm wrote the first screenplay. Batman was not greenlit until after the success of Burton's Beetlejuice (1988). Numerous A-list actors were considered for the role of Batman before Keaton was cast. Keaton's casting caused a controversy since, by 1988, he had become typecast as a comedic actor and many observers doubted he could portray a serious role. Nicholson accepted the role of the Joker under strict conditions that dictated a high salary, a portion of the box office profits and his shooting schedule. The tone and themes of the film were influenced in part by Alan Moore's The Killing Joke and Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns. Filming took place at Pinewood Studios from October 1988 to January 1989. The budget escalated from $30 million to $48 million, while the 1988 Writers Guild of America strike forced Hamm to drop out. Uncredited rewrites were performed by Warren Skaaren, Charles McKeown and Jonathan Gems.

Alexander Knox (theologian)

Alexander Knox (17 March 1757 – 17 January 1831) was an Irish theological writer.

As a boy and young man, Alexander Knox befriended and corresponded with John Wesley, and - though he later asserted his theological independence from Methodism - he later published defences of Wesley against John Walker and Robert Southey.

In the 1790s Knox entered political life, briefly (in 1798) becoming private secretary to Lord Castlereagh and publishing Essays on the political circumstances of Ireland (1799) before retiring from politics in 1799.

Knox lived in or near Dublin for the final three decades of his life, becoming known as the 'sage of Bellevue'. Together with his friend John Jebb, bishop of Limerick, Knox developed a distinctive style of high-churchmanship (evidenced in his theology of sacraments) which also respected strains in evangelicalism, Methodism and seventeenth-century latitudinarianism. Knox wrote in defence of Catholic emancipation.

Works