Sam Neill Dies at 78

Screen icon Sam Neill has died contiguous successful Sydney, Australia. The quality was confirmed via a connection published connected Neill’s Instagram connected Monday, July 13 2026. He was 78.

“It is with immense sadness that the whānau of Sam Neill stock the quality of his passing connected Monday 13th July, successful Sydney Australia,” reads the post. “Sam was surrounded by household and passed with the dignity that has characterised his full life.”

“The nonaccomplishment was abrupt and unexpected but blessed by the information that Sam remained crab free. They would similar to explicit their deepest gratitude to the unit astatine St Vincent’s Private Hospital for their unthinkable care.

“More details volition beryllium shared later, but for now, connected behalf of the family, we inquire that you respect their privateness arsenic they navigate this immeasurable loss.”

Born successful Northern Ireland to an English parent and a New Zealand-born father, Neill and his household moved to the South Island of New Zealand successful the mid-1950s, settling successful Christchurch.

Neill’s amusement vocation began successful New Zealand, initially culminating successful a relation successful the 1977 enactment thriller Sleeping Dogs, directed by Roger Donaldson. The movie was a important occurrence and launched Neill’s planetary career.

Neill past headed to Australia, wherever helium would person further planetary vulnerability via award-winning 1979 Australian play play My Brilliant Career, which helium starred successful alongside Judy Davis.

In 1981 Neill played the big Damien Thorn, lad of the Devil, successful Omen III: The Final Conflict, and had roles successful a drawstring of Australian films passim the ’80s, including Attack Force Z alongside Mel Gibson, Dead Calm alongside Nicole Kidman, and galore more.

In 1993, Neill made himself a household sanction arsenic Dr. Alan Grant successful Steven Spielberg’s blockbuster Jurassic Park, a relation helium reprised twice, successful 2001’s Jurassic Park III and 2022’s Jurassic World Dominion.

Neill continued to show his immense versatility implicit the adjacent 3 decades, arsenic adept astatine handling the sci-fi fearfulness of 1997’s Event Horizon arsenic helium was the adust humour of thing similar 2000 comedy-drama The Dish. Other highlights from Neill’s agelong vocation see The Hunt for Red October (1990), The Piano (1993), Dirty Deeds (2002), Daybreakers (2009), The Hunter (2011), and Hunt for the Wilderpeople (2016). He besides appeared successful a agelong database of TV shows, including The Tudors and Peaky Blinders.

In 2023, Neill revealed that helium had been diagnosed with a benignant of humor cancer, and had been privately undergoing chemotherapy for a year. In April 2026, helium shared an update that helium had precocious undergone a caller signifier of immunotherapy treatment, and subsequently was informed that scans nary longer detected crab successful his body.

Neill is acceptable to marque 1 of his last movie appearances successful 2027’s Godzilla x Kong: Supernova, which is presently successful post-production.

Luke is simply a Senior Editor connected the IGN reviews team.