Jane Campion remembers Sam Neill: ‘He was radiating peace, beaming love’

The Piano director shares her memories of the actor on set – and the last time she saw him in hospital Sam Neill’s final interview and his life in pictures ‘A true gentleman’: actors, directors and leaders pay tribute to Sam Neill Neill interviewed in 2023, 2024 and 2026 Sam. So effortlessly handsome, and that rare thing in New Zealand and Australia: a movie star. My hands actually shook when I met him at a cafe in Vulcan Lane, Auckland, to discuss rehearsals. He had arrived, we all had, to start pre-production on The Piano. He was to play the repressed and violent Stewart, the one who would chop off his wife’s finger. Who but Sam could play that part, could surprise with that part? Sam was kind, committed and supportive. He looked after me and actually everyone on the set. He stomped through mud, organised dinners, bossed me around at rushes and told me off if he thought I was letting the lighting get too dark. I loved him as Stewart. I can remember gasping as he pulled Holly [Hunter] out of his hut, into the streaming rain and mud, with a force I had not expected but at once realised the story needed. He already knew, Stewart’s jealousy was terrifying. Sam and his the