Peter Seamus O'Toole (/oʊˈtuːl/; 2 August 1932 – 14 December 2013) was a British-Irish stage and film actor. He attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and began working in the theatre, gaining recognition as a Shakespearean actor at the Bristol Old Vic and with the English Stage Company, before making his film debut in 1959.
He achieved international recognition playing T. E. Lawrence in Lawrence of Arabia (1962) for which he received his first Academy Award nomination. He received seven further Oscar nominations – for Becket (1964), The Lion in Winter (1968), Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1969), The Ruling Class (1972), The Stunt Man (1980), My Favorite Year (1982), and Venus (2006) – and holds the record for the most Academy Award acting nominations without a win. He won four Golden Globe Awards, one British Academy Film Award, and one Primetime Emmy Award. In 2002, O'Toole was the recipient of the Honorary Academy Award, whose remarkable talents have provided cinema history with some of its most memorable characters.
O'Toole is an Irish surname. It may refer to:
The O'Tooles of Leinster, one of the leading families of that province, are descended from Tuathal Mac Augaire, King of Leinster (died 958), who belonged to the Uí Dúnlainge dynasty. The name is an anglicisation of the Irish Ó Tuathail.
Their original territory comprised the southern part of the present County Kildare but they were driven from it during the Anglo Norman invasion and settled in the mountains of what is now County Wicklow around Glendalough.
Here, with their kinsmen the O'Byrne family, they were noted for their tough resistance to English domination for four centuries; including exercising great influence over the foundation of the Confederation of Kilkenny in 1642 in what had become Confederate Ireland.
At the start of the 16th century, there were five great houses, all, owing allegiance to "The O'Toole of Powerscourt" as the recognized chief:
It's a cold and bitter tale
About a man whose spent his time in jail