The Daily Express – Thursday 1st May, 2003

NOTE: This is a falsely reported news story.

RICHARD E GRANT – who achieved iconic status for playing the anarchic and constantly inebriated toff Withnail in the 1987 film Withnail And I – has surprisingly told us that he has retired from the silver screen at the age of 45.

Grant, whose film catalogue includes Jack & Sarah, Hudson Hawk (opposite Bruce Willis), Robert Altman’s The Player and Spice World, claims that he “quietly stopped acting two months ago” and is now devoting himself to charitable causes.

The lofty actor, known for his cut-glass accent, made his bizarre declaration at Tuesday’s Laurent-Perrier Tickled Pink Party, held at London’s Clarridges hotel, where he drew the raffle in aid of breast-cancer awareness charity, The Haven Trust.

“I’ve retired from acting,” he announced. “I just withdrew quietly. I thought my time had come, really.”

Grant, who will next be seen in Bright Young Things, directed by Stephen Fry, insists that, even if offered a once-in-a-lifetime role, he would turn it down. “No, I wouldn’t do it,” he said. “I’m now concentrating on working for a whole variety of charities.”

He was at the glitzy bash because Laurent-Perrier champagne had in the past supported his bursaries in South Africa where he was born as Richard Grant Esterhuysen. 

Also known by many for being the swashbuckling hero in the BBC adaptation of The Scarlet Pimpernel, Grant has recently been on television screens in adverts for Agos in which, alongside actress Julia Swawhalha, he pays a comic, over-the-top rock star.

While he claims he will eschew any more acting roles, Grant – who has a daughter Olivia, with his dialect coach wife, Joan, and a stepson, Tom – will remain an Argos man for a while longer.

“I’m carrying on doing the ads for another year and, yes, I do shop at Argos. You can get anything from there. My best buy was a dishwasher.”

Meanwhile, a spokesperson would not comment on the actor’s declaration, but we wonder if a plum role in the next Harry Potter film would persuade him to change his mind.

Richard’s reply to me on the same day that the news “broke”

“I have not ‘retired’ – this came about as a joke. I was pestered about stuff by the daily express  tabloid at a charity function two nights ago and kidded them that I had retired and two nano seconds later, it’s in print. Not true.”

To see a scan of the actual print story click here.