Born: Richard Grant Esterhuysen on 5 May, 1957, in Mbabane, Swaziland.

Richard E. Grant is a British actor known for portraying the world-weary, drug-crazed alcoholic Withnail in Withnail and I (1986). His father was Henrik Esterhuysen, a head of education for the British government administration in Swaziland. His mother was the local ballet teacher. Grant attended primary school at St Marks, a local government school in Mbabane that had only recently become racially integrated, and went on to secondary school at Waterford Kamhlaba, just outside Mbabane, where he was a day scholar. He studied English and Drama at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, and moved to London in 1982.

I'm still star-struck. I'm thrilled to say that hasn't changed. I think it has a lot to do with coming from nowhere and going somewhere. Where I grew up all there was in live entertainment was a drive-in cimnema. I'm very aware of the leap from there to here. Ultimately, I think I'm too curious and enthusiastic to take any of it for granted.

Grant is a successful author, with works such as By Design calling on his Hollywood experience. He has twice portrayed the Doctor from Doctor Who, unofficially on both occasions. In the comedy sketch Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death, he portrayed a version of the Tenth Doctor, referred to as the Quite Handsome Doctor. He also voiced a version of the Ninth Doctor for the BBC original animated webcast Scream of the Shalka.

He wrote and directed the 2005 film, Wah-Wah, loosely based on his own childhood experiences. In 2008, Grant will star in the movie adaptation of Irvine Welsh's best-selling novel Ecstasy: Three Tales of Chemical Romance.

Grant married Joan Washington in 1986 and has one daughter with her (Olivia) and a stepson (Tom).