Raphael Coleman, actor from 'Nanny McPhee' and Extinction Rebellion activist, collapses and dies at 25 after a jog
Raphaël Coleman, the child actor in the 2005 Emma Thompson-Colin Firth comedy ‘Nanny McPhee’, has reportedly died at the age of 25. He collapsed and died after coming back from a jog on Friday, February 7, in South Africa.
The news of Coleman’s death was confirmed by his mother Liz Jensen, who wrote on Twitter: “Rest in peace my beloved son Raphael Coleman, aka Iggy Fox. He died doing what he loved, working for the noblest cause of all. His family could not be prouder. Let’s celebrate all he achieved in his short life and cherish his legacy.”
His stepfather, Carsten Jensen, wrote in a Facebook post: “He collapsed without prior health problems in the middle of a trip and could not be restored. I got to know Ralph when he was six years old, and we were so close.”
“I will never forget you, we say in a farewell greeting to the dead. But when it’s your own child, it’s your genes, your whole body, something greater than the word I who forever refuse to accept the judgment of death,” he further wrote, adding, “Raph wasn’t my child, even though I was close to him,” Carsten continued. “But I can feel it myself. I see it in his mother’s eyes, and I hear it in her voice, the irreversible loss of the most precious thing in life.”
Apart from ‘Nanny McPhee’ where he played the role of Eric Brown, Coleman has also acted in films like ‘The Fourth Kind’ and ‘It’s Alive’.
Coleman was born on September 30, 1994, in Wandsworth, London as Raphael Pierre Jensen Coleman. According to IMDb, He attended the University of Manchester in 2013, where he received his Bachelor of Science degree for Zoology in 2017. Per Radar Online, he won the best young actor at the British Independent Film Festival in 2010.
According to the Evening Standard, after a brief career in science, Coleman began working for Extinction Rebellion, an international movement that uses “non-violent civil disobedience in an attempt to halt mass extinction and minimize the risk of social collapse”. Coleman handled their social media.
In a statement, post his death, Extinction Rebellion said: “James ‘Iggy’ Fox died yesterday. He was 25, had given up a career in science to join XR and fought hard for the cause, especially for Indigenous rights. Iggy was a burning bright soul and he will be deeply missed by us all.”
Extinction Rebellion also shared a letter from his mother that she wrote after learning about his death.
“You were a force of nature, and now you are a new kind of force: you are atoms of chlorophyll, you are water, you are an ants nest, you are moss on a stone, a birds feather, a wolf’s paw print, a tiger, a tree, a praying mantis, a stingray, a squirrel. You are the sky and the sea and the forests and the mountains and the marshes and the deserts and everything in between. With your scientist’s and your writer’s eye, I think that’s how you’d see it,” she wrote in the letter.
“You didn’t believe in heaven because you knew heaven was here on Earth. You saw it clearly and you helped others see it. It’s all here. All we could ever wish for or need us is all around us,” she added. “I feel my life is over because your life - your physical life, your life in that multiply tattooed and apparently healthy young body - is over.”
She mentioned that at the time of his death Coleman was preparing his legal defense for vandalizing the Brazilian Embassy in London, something he had done as an action against the Amazon fire. “Like many climate activists he was prepared to go to jail for his belief that we owe it to the future to do all we can to protect and defend this beautiful Earth from those who are hastening its collapse,” she wrote.