During his bodybuilding course, Prowse became friends with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Lou Ferrigno. He represented England in the weightlifting event at the 1962 British Empire and Commonwealth Games in Perth, Western Australia. Prowse won the British heavyweight weightlifting championship in 1962 and the following two years.

Career Weightlifting and training ĭavid Prowse and Lou Ferrigno at a public meetup Following his successes from 1961 in the British heavyweight weightlifting championship, he left Bristol in 1963 to work for a London weightlifting company. His early jobs included a bouncer at a dance hall, where he met his future wife, and a helper at Henleaze Swimming Pool. Prowse was tall, standing 6 ft 6 in (1.98 m), and developed an interest in bodybuilding. He was brought up on the Southmead housing estate in Bristol, gaining a scholarship to Bristol Grammar School. He is the son of Gladys ( née Burt) and Charles Prowse. Early life ĭavid Charles Prowse was born on 1 July 1935 in Bristol. Prior to his role as Vader, Prowse had established himself as a super-hero figure in the United Kingdom as the Green Cross Man in Green Cross Code media aimed at teaching children and young people road safety.

In 2015, he starred in two documentaries concerning his Darth Vader role, one entitled The Force's Mouth which included Prowse voicing Darth Vader's lines with studio effects applied for the first time, and the other titled I Am Your Father covering the subject of fallout between Prowse and Lucasfilm. He portrayed Darth Vader (voiced by American actor James Earl Jones) in the original Star Wars trilogy and a manservant in Stanley Kubrick's 1971 film A Clockwork Orange. David Charles Prowse MBE (1 July 1935 – 28 November 2020) was an English actor, bodybuilder, strongman and weightlifter.

Loving War by C.M. Owens