Born Krishna Bhanji in Snaiton, northern England, in 1943, the boy who would become Ben Kingsley was raised in Salford by his physician father Rahimtulla Harji Bhanji and his fashion model mother Anna Lyna Mary. After being turned down by the prestigious London acting school RADA in 1965, Ben spent two years plying his trade in the English provinces before returning to London in 1967 on being invited to join the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC). Over the next two decades, he would go on to perform at both the Royal Court and the National Theatre. Despite his glittering stage career, however, Ben's passage into films was a slow one. It took another ten years before he landed a starring role in Gandhi, film on biopic of Indian independence leader Gandhi. As the film roles poured in, the actor still managed to balance a film career with a range of work on TV. Ben lives with his partner Kate Townsend and has three sons by his two previous marriages.
