It is that time of year again when our most-loved Christmas movies get dusted off and played on TV or streaming services.

Whether you’re a fan of the 2003 family comedy Elf, romantic comedy Love Actually or old-time favourites, there is nothing quite like a Christmas movie to herald the start of the festive season.

When 9Celebrity polled Christmas film buffs to find the top 10 festive movies of all time, making the cut was the 2006 comedy romance The Holiday.

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But while Cameron Diaz, Jude Law, Kate Winslet and Jack Black were stars of the film, it was an actor by the name of Eli Wallach who stole the show with his portrayal of ageing Hollywood screenwriter Arthur.

So who is Eli Wallach and what is he famous for?

Early life and army career

Eli Wallach was born to Polish immigrants Abraham and Bertha in Brooklyn on December 7, 1915. He and his family, which included a brother and two sisters, were among the only Jewish family in an otherwise Italian American neighborhood.

The family ran a small store that sold toys, candy and stationery, called Bertha’s, named after his mother.

After school, he attended the University of Texas and graduated in 1936 with a degree in history. He followed this with a master of arts degree in education from the City College of New York.

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He began acting at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre in New York City, where he studied under acting teacher Sanford Meisner, but his studies were cut short when he was drafted into the Army during WWII.

He served from 1940 to 1945, rising to the rank of captain. He was discharged after the war ended and was awarded a number of service medals.

Acting break

After the war, he took more acting classes and became a founding member of the famed Actors Studio, where Lee Strasberg taught.

He studied method acting alongside the likes of Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift and Marilyn Monroe, who became a close friend.

He made his Broadway debut in 1945 and three years later married actress Anne Jackson. The two worked together frequently and became one of the best-known acting couples of the time.

Despite winning a Tony Award in 1951 for the play The Rose Tattoo, the couple barely got by on their acting wages, and lived in a tiny apartment while drawing unemployment.

He continued to appear on stage but made the move into TV and film, starring in the 1956 film Baby Doll, which earned him a BAFTA for Most Promising Newcomer.

He also played Mr Freeze in two episodes of the 1960s Batman TV series, and once said the role netted him more fan mail than all of his other parts combined.

He starred as a bandit in the 1960 film The Magnificent Seven and the following year starred opposite his old friends Monroe and Clift as well as Clark Gable in The Misfits.

He went back to type, playing a baddie in the 1966 western The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, opposite Clint Eastwood.

The two reportedly became firm friends, despite Wallach once calling Eastwood “the tall, silent type.”

“He’s the kind where you open up and do all the talking. He smiles and nods and stores it all away in that wonderful calculator of a brain.”

Almost 40 years later, they worked together again when he took a small role in the 2003 film Mystic River, which Eastwood produced and directed.

In 1990, he played ageing mob boss Don Altobello in Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather Part III.

One of his best known roles was in the 2006 film, The Holiday.

He played Arthur, an ageing and barely mobile screenwriter from the Golden Age of Hollywood who is befriended by Iris, played by Kate Winslet, when she swaps houses with Cameron Diaz’s character, Amanda.

Wallach was 90 when The Holiday was filmed.

Many of his scenes were opposite Winslet, who went on to describe him at a 2008 ceremony in his honour as one of the “most charismatic men” she’d ever met and “my very own sexiest man alive.”

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The two became so close, Wallach even gifted Winslet a prized possession.

She made the revelation during a 2018 interview with The Hollywood Reporter.

“He was a huge collector of watches, which no one really knew, and he loved interesting clocks as well,” she recalled.

Winslet said she had dinner at Wallach’s home in 2007 when he led her into a bathroom and pulled out a vintage watch on a heavy chain that was in a cabinet.

“It’s very old, from 1902, and more than ever, I absolutely cherish it,” she said.

In all, he appeared in more than 90 films.

In 2010, Wallach, then 94, received an Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Honorary Award for his contribution to the film industry.

His final acting role was in the 2015 short film The Train, where he played a Holocaust survivor. The movie was filmed shortly before his death on June 24, 2014, of natural causes. He was 98.

Eastwood was among those to pay tribute to the actor, releasing a statement in which he said, “Eli Wallach was a wonderful guy and a wonderful actor. I have fond memories of us working together.”

He was survived by his wife of 66 years and their three children. Jackson passed away in 2016.

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