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Philip Grenz, Neill’s longtime agent, issued a statement on Thursday to clarify details of the death after what he termed inaccurate and outright falsehoods in some media coverage. According to reports from The Guardian and ABC News, the actor passed away from pneumonia at a Sydney hospital. Grenz said he had consulted with the family before releasing the update. “Sam passed away from pneumonia. Prior to becoming sick, Sam had valiantly fought and beaten lymphoma through a new treatment called CAR-T therapy,” Grenz said in the statement.
The family initially announced Neill’s passing on July 13, describing it as sudden and unexpected while confirming he had remained cancer free. Neill revealed in April that he was in remission from stage three angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma, a rare blood cancer diagnosed in 2022, The Guardian reported. He had filmed four projects back-to-back over the past year, all scheduled for release in the coming months, according to the agent’s account.
Tributes arrived from fellow performers, political leaders and fans worldwide following the announcement. Jurassic Park co-star Laura Dern described him as “my beloved lifetime friend,” while Australian actor Toni Collette called Neill a “hero, legend and sweetheart,” the BBC reported. New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon hailed him as “one of the greats,” and director Steven Spielberg was among those leading industry tributes, MSN reported.
Born in Northern Ireland in 1947 before growing up in New Zealand, Neill built an acting career that extended more than five decades. Data from The Movie Database places his known credits at more than 210 across film and television. He gained widest recognition as Dr Alan Grant in Jurassic Park and for his performance in The Piano, with additional credits in The Hunt for Red October, Dead Calm, Event Horizon and the BBC series Peaky Blinders.
Neill detailed his health battle in the 2023 memoir Did I Ever Tell You This?. “I’m not afraid of dying,” he told the BBC at the time. “What I don’t want to do is to stop living, because I really enjoy living.” He added, “I’ve regarded it as an adventure, quite a dark adventure, but an adventure nevertheless.”
Neill is survived by four children and eight grandchildren. His family will hold a private memorial service at his farm in New Zealand on a date yet to be determined, Grenz said. The agent asked that the actor’s privacy and that of his loved ones be respected during this time.
