Love Actually director Richard Curtis has revealed his sister killed herself after a 25-year battle with mental health issues as he urged people to open up about their problems.
In an emotional speech, Mr Curtis broke his silence over the death of his sister Belinda, who died the day before her 55th birthday party in October 2009.
The writer and director spoke out against the lack of support available for mental health patients and their families.
He said: ‘You have to be aware how much we’re failing. We had a 25-year stab at trying to help my sister and couldn’t do it…
Love Actually director Richard Curtis (pictured at a screenig last year) has revealed his sister killed herself after a 25-year battle with mental health issues as he urged people to open up about their problems
‘The lack of resources available – the lack of beds, the places she should have gone there was just no space.
‘I was so privileged and we had so much money and so much access and still couldn’t do anything. I can’t believe what it must be like for someone whose relatives aren’t in that situation and they have nothing.’
Mr Curtis, whose credits include the Notting Hill, Four Weddings and a Funeral and television series Blackadder and The Vicar of Dibley, also revealed a designer on his latest film – who he did not name – committed suicide last week.
And he referenced the problems suffered by Scarlett Curtis, his daughter with wife Emma Freud.
The 18-year-old has publicly documented her struggle with depression after a botched spinal operation left her in chronic pain.
His voice broke as he said: ‘My sister took her own life after years of battles. My daughter is partly hit by it [mental health problems] because she had an operation that went wrong and spent four years in her bedroom screaming. The designer of the movie I’m working on took his life on Tuesday.’
Speaking about his sister’s death, he added: ‘I so don’t believe in thinking about what you could have done. I can’t talk about it, I get too emotional, but the circumstances of my sister’s suicide could not have been jollier, as it were.
‘They were shopping for her birthday party the next day, they couldn’t have done anything more right, and yet that was still the day she chose to take her own life. I don’t think it’s in our hands.’
Companies House records show Belinda Curtis was a dental surgeon who at one point was a director of a property management company in Kensington, West London.
An obituary in The Times newspaper shortly after her death on October 13, 2009, stated she died in Sydney, Australia. The Curtis family are Australian, although Richard was educated in England.
She was described as ‘gorgeous, beautiful and deeply brave’, a ‘wonderful daughter’, ‘loving sister’ to Richard, his sister Amanda and brother Jamie, and ‘adored auntie’.
The family included a quote from the Beatles song To Know Her Is To Love Her: ‘To know, know, know her was to love, love, love her – just to see her smile made your life worthwhile…’
Emma Freud stands with husband Richard Curtis at Buckingham Palace after she was awarded an OBE for services to charity
Mr Curtis was speaking to the Public Health England conference at Warwick University on Tuesday evening about his work as co-founder of Comic Relief.
Asked about the charity’s support of mental health projects, he said: ‘I suddenly feel, particularly with this young generation, that they understand that mental illness – it isn’t the same as physical illness – but it is as complicated, as in need of work, progress, care, than ever before.
‘I think it will be one of the huge things in the next 10 years.’
‘The campaign around mental illness is finally getting through so people see the truth in front of their eyes, which is the one in four statistic [that one in four people suffer from mental health problems at some point in their lives].’
He added: ‘I think the answer is to continue to focus on it so that it does become a priority and we gain expertise and get more resources.’
Mr Curtis described suicide as like ‘a psychological heart attack’ which could potentially be avoided if people got the right treatment at the right time.
Samaritans chief executive Ruth Sutherland said she welcomed his comments. She added: ‘The more we discuss the issues around suicide the better.
‘If we are more open as a society, it will help people who are struggling to feel able to seek help without fear of being judged.
‘The earlier they seek that help, the more chance there is they will get effective help, rather than descending into a crisis that is harder to recover from.’
Sue Baker, director of campaign Time to Change, which is part-funded by a Comic Relief grant, said Mr Curtis’s comments were ‘undoubtedly helpful’.
‘It is helpful for the public to realise how common mental health problems are and they can affect any of us, regardless of circumstances,’ she added.