Austin Trevor

Who was Austin Trevor?

Austin Trevor was a Belfast born actor who had a long career in British films and television.

He played the parson in John Galsworthy's 1927 Broadway production Escape. He was the first actor to play Agatha Christie's detective Hercule Poirot on screen in three British films during the early 1930s: Alibi, Black Coffee and Lord Edgware Dies. He subsequently turned up in a character part in a later Poirot adaptation The Alphabet Murders in 1965. He stated that he only got the Poirot role because he could speak with a French accent.

During the 1960s he worked largely in television, appearing in series such as The First Churchills in which he played Lord Halifax. He appeared in an episode of the legal drama The Main Chance.

He died in Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk.