Tim Rice

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Tim Rice
Birth name Timothy Miles Bindon Rice
Born November 10, 1944 (1944-11-10) (age 63)
Origin Flag of England Amersham, Buckinghamshire, England
Genre(s) Musical Theatre, Film, Television
Occupation(s) Lyricist

Sir Timothy Miles Bindon Rice (born November 10, 1944) is an English Academy Award, Golden Globe Award, Tony Award and Grammy Award winning lyricist, author, radio presenter and television gameshow panelist.

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[edit] Career

Rice was born in Amersham, Buckinghamshire, England, and was educated at Aldwickbury school, St Albans School and Lancing College. He is best known for his collaborations with Andrew Lloyd Webber, with whom he wrote Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Jesus Christ Superstar and Evita, and his work for The Walt Disney Company with Alan Menken and Sir Elton John. He also collaborated with Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson of ABBA on Chess and with Rick Wakeman on the concept albums 1984 and Cost of Living.

He was a co-founder of the Guinness Book of British Hit Singles and served as an editor from 1977 to 1996. He has also been a frequent guest panelist for many years on the radio panel games Just a Minute and Trivia Test Match. Rice often jokes that he is most recognised in America for his appearance in the film About a Boy. The film includes several clips from a (real) edition of the game show Countdown on which he was the guest adjudicator. His other interests include cricket (he was President of the Marylebone Cricket Club in 2002) and maths. He wrote the foreword to the book Why do buses come in threes? by Rob Eastaway and Jeremy Wyndham, and featured prominently in Tony Hawks' One Hit Wonderland, where he co-wrote the song which gave Hawks a top twenty hit in Albania.

He released his autobiography Oh What a Circus - The Autobiography of Tim Rice in 1998, which covered his childhood and early adult life until the opening of the original London production of Evita in 1978. A sequel covering his life since then is in production.

[edit] Personal life

Mr Rice married Jane McIntosh, who retains the title Lady Rice, in 1974, but the marriage broke up in the late-1980s after the British tabloid newspapers revealed that he had been conducting an affair with actress/singer Elaine Paige.

Rice is a Sunderland A.F.C. supporter, and was awarded an honorary doctorate of letters by the University of Sunderland at a ceremony at the Stadium of Light in November 2006[1] Rice is also a supporter of the Conservative Party. His daughter, Eva Rice, is the author of the novel "The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets," which was a finalist for the British book award Best Read of the Year.

[edit] Film and television work

In addition to adaptations of his theatrical productions, Rice has worked on several original film and television projects:

[edit] Trivia

 Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines.
The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.

[edit] Contributions

 This article or section is missing citations or needs footnotes.
Using inline citations helps guard against copyright violations and factual inaccuracies. (December 2006)
  • Rice wrote the lyrics to two best-selling albums of the year: First for Jesus Christ Superstar in 1970 and then for The Lion King in 1994.
  • Rice wrote the lyrics to The Golden Boy and The Fallen Priest both taken from Freddie Mercury's solo album Barcelona.
  • Rice wrote the lyrics to the 1981 concept album 1984 composed by Rick Wakeman and inspired by the George Orwell novel of the same title.
Awards
Preceded by
Stephen Sondheim
for Sweeney Todd		 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Lyrics
1979-1980
for Evita		 Succeeded by
none

[edit] External links