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Johan Tham, the husband of celebrated actress Jenny Agutter, has died aged 81 following a battle with cancer.
The Swedish property entrepreneur and hotelier, responsible for transforming Grade I listed Cliveden House into one of the most luxurious hotels in Britain, passed away on November 17.
Tham and Agutter, best known for her starring roles in The Railway Children and An American Werewolf In London, married in August 1990, little more than an year after a chance meeting at the Bath Literary Arts Festival.
Their son Jonathan, the couple’s only child, was born that December.
Discussing their marriage with the Daily Mail in 2023, Agutter admitted her husband had no idea who she was when they first met.
She said: ‘One of the things about meeting people and forming relationships as an actor is that others have an idea of who you are before they meet you. That’s hard in any relationship, particularly with men.
‘When Johan and I met I did not feel he had any sense of who I was at all, but he wanted to find out, and that made a big difference. I’m still finding out about him 31 years on.’
Born in Nykoping, Sweden, in 1944, to Vollrath Tham, an international timber importer, and housewife Maja, he would live in his home country until the age of four, when the family – including older sister Christina and twin brothers Sebastian and Peter – relocated to England.
There, he was educated at Heatherdown and boarded at Charterhouse public school before studying law at university – a profession he turned away from upon graduating.
Tham would instead develop a keen interest in property and business, with his early management roles including that of a funeral home and a petrol station.
A devoted family man, Tham raised two stepchildren and a daughter, Johanna – now a special needs teacher – with first wife Anna Lallerstedt before their divorce in 1989.
