John Reginald Neville CM OBE (2 May 1925 – 19 November 2011) was an English actor and theatre director whose career spanned more than sixty years. He was renowned for his roles on both stage and screen in genres ranging from classical theatre to fantasy and science fiction.

Neville was one of the young leading lights of the British theatre in the early 1950s, and he and contemporary and friend Richard Burton honed their craft at the Old Vic, where over the course of five years they worked their way through the Shakespearean canon. Based on their performance styles and physicality, it was commented at the time that Burton was seen as the successor to Laurence Olivier, whereas Neville was seen as the natural successor to John Gielgud. Neville was a great champion of young talent throughout his career, as was evident when a 23-year-old Judi Dench made her professional debut as Ophelia opposite his Hamlet in 1957.

Alongside the classical repertoire, Neville also worked on contemporary productions. He originated the titular role of Alfie in Bill Naughton's 1963 play Alfie. It was in that same year that he, along with Frank Dunlop and Peter Ustinov, became artistic directors of the Nottingham Playhouse, with Neville later assuming sole charge. It was under his leadership that he played the leading part in Coriolanus, directed by Tyrone Guthrie, playing opposite a young Ian McKellen in the role of Tullus Aufidius. After leaving Nottingham in 1972, Neville emigrated to Canada, where he enjoyed further theatrical success in Stratford, Ontario at the Stratford Festival Theatre.

Neville enjoyed a resurgence of international attention in the 1980s as a result of his starring role in Terry Gilliam's cult classic The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988) and latterly in the sci-fi series The X-Files, playing the sinister role of the Well-Manicured Man.

John Neville was born on 2 May 1925 in 197 Church Road, in the north London suburb of Willesden, the son of Mabel Lillian (née Fry) and Reginald Daniel Neville, who worked as a mechanic for the local council, Neville also had a younger sister called Joan. He was educated at Willesden and Chiswick County School for Boys. It was here at the age of eleven, that he directed his first play, 'The Lamentable Comedy of Pyramus and Thisby' from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, with the play being performed at the end of term.

Outside of school, Neville was being taken to the Old Vic and Stratford upon Avon by Frank Aubrey Dawson, the churchwarden at St Michael and All Angels Stonebridge Park, the local parish church where Neville sang in the choir. Towards the end of July 1937 the pair went on a holiday for two weeks to Stratford upon Avon. For three years in a row, he was taken along with Dawson's five nieces, one of which included future historian Lorna Arnold, who recalled that "in time he became one of our extended family". With the Blitz raining down on London, Neville and his family moved to Beaconsfield for six months, with his school being evacuated to nearby High Wycombe, it was here that Neville played, his first significant part as, Brutus in Julius Caesar.

Returning for his final terms at school near Wembley, Neville left before he was just 17. With him taking a small time job as a stores clerk in a nearby garage in Neasden. Persuaded to join the St. Michael's youth club from his church, Neville was asked to establish a youth drama group, something he later recalled when interviewed by Richard Ouzounian later in life. It proved tricky to get the local children to get as passionately involved with his drama club as he was, so had to barter with the boxing and table tennis clubs for members. The National Federation of Boys' Clubs was affiliated to the British Drama League, with Neville beginning to attend courses. A female director from the London County Council directed his club in Act I of Hamlet. With St. Michael's winning the first drama festival in Willeden. Audiences were impressed by his voice and the potential it held.

Thanks to Dawson's introduction to the classics, Neville had, by now, seen all of Shakespeare's plays and it was at those trips to the theatre that Neville's passion for acting, and Shakespeare in particular, began to develop. As a result of the interest in his recent performance, he decided that he wished to become an actor. However, with little money, his parents were unable to pay for such a venture. The local Willesden Borough Council suitably impressed informed Neville that they would provide him with a scholarship grant on the proviso that he got in, as would Middlesex County Council who would provide a grant for his living expenses. In 1943, after a successful audition, Neville gained his place at the prestigious drama school, the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.