opposite Virginia Bruce in 1934

Born: Colin Glenn Clive-Greig January 20, 1900 in St. Malo, France

Died: June 25, 1937 (age 37) in Los Angeles, California, USA

Known for Frankenstein 1931

He was 34 when he played Rochester

opposite Joan Fontaine in 1944

Born George Orson Welles May 6, 1915 in Kenosha, Wisconsin, USA

Died: October 10, 1985 (age 70) in Hollywood, California, USA

Known for Citizen Kane 1941, Touch of Evil 1958

He was 27 when he played Rochester

opposite Mary Sinclair in 1949

Born: John Charles Carter October 4, 1923 in Evanston, Illinois, USA

Died: April 5, 2008 (age 84) in Beverly Hills, California, USA

Known for Ben-Hur 1959, Planet of the Apes 1968 ,The Ten Commandments 1956

He was 26 when he played Rochester

opposite Katharine Bard in 1952

Born: February 15, 1914 in Seattle, Washington, USA

Died: September 11, 2010 (age 96) in Hyannis, Massachusetts, USA

Known for Invasion of the Body Snatchers 1956

He was 38 when he played Rochester

opposite Joan Elan in 1957

Born: Daniel Patrick Macnee February 6, 1922 in London England, UK

Known for The Avengers 1961, A View to a Kill 1985

He was 35 when he played Rochester

opposite Sally Ann Howes in 1961

Born: Zachary Thomson Scott Jr. February 21, 1914 in Austin Texas, USA

Died: October 3, 1965 (age 51) in Austin, Texas, USA

Known for Mildred Pierce 1945

He was 47 when he played Rochester

opposite Susannah York in 1970

Born George Campbell Scott October 18, 1927 in Wise, Virginia USA

Died: September 22, 1999 (age 71) in Westlake Village, California, USA

Known for Dr. Strangelove 1964, Patton 1970

He was 43 when he played Rochester

opposite Sorcha Cusack in 1973

Born; Michael James October 29, 1935 in Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England, UK

Known for Nicholas and Alexandra 1971, Doctor Who 1985

He was 37 when he played Rochester

On playing Mr. Rochester:

"It was marvellous stuff to do, a part you can really get your teeth into. I played it once before at drama school, though obviously I was much too young. It was when the film version, with Orson Welles as Rochester, came out, and I thought he was dreadful! He looked magnificent, but I don't think American actors can cope with period dialogue. Rochester is all women's ideal of a man; arrogant yet strangely vulnerable. The character [has] wit, brooding sensitivity, and a romantic quality.

I landed the role of Rochester as a result of a practical joke. My then wife, Heather, sent a funny letter to the director, Joan Craft, saying, ‘It’s about time Michael played Rochester’, and we used to think that I got the part as a result.Looking back, though, I was on a roll at the time. I’d just come from playing several highprofile roles such as Tsar Nicholas II in Nicholas And Alexandra, and A Bequest To The Nation opposite Glenda Jackson. And here was the ultimate romantic part.

Sorcha was only 23 and I was 37. People said there was an electrifying chemistry between us, which was true. I did find her attractive, but we kept things quite jokey on the set to alleviate the intensity. It’s not that romantic performing love scenes on a cold morning at 8am, with a props guy holding a hot fan right next to you to stop your lips freezing. Professionally, playing Rochester didn’t do me much good. I never played a romantic part on TV after that. I was baffled because when it was shown on TV, I received the biggest fan mail I’ve ever had."

opposite Zelah Clarke in 1983

Born: March 21, 1944 in Colwyn Bay, Wales, UK

Known for Licence to Kill 1989

He was 39 when he played Rochester

On playing Mr. Rochester:

"I think why it worked so well was because, in truth, it's such a good part. What a blow to the image! Rochester is tough and hard, short-tempered and curt on the one hand, and concealing a soul that's been hurt and made sensitive. So you have a lot of the qualities that really appeal to women in Rochester, and I was simply lucky enough to be playing him.

"There's got to be a bit of yourself in it. I don't think you can be a good actor unless you reveal something of yourself. You're revealing a character through the knowledge you have of yourself and the life around you. Yes, I can see certain elements of myself in Rochester... Of course, Rochester was no fisherman, while fishing is my obsession."

opposite Charlotte Gainsbourg in 1996

Born: William M. Hurt March 20, 1950 in Washington, District of Columbia, USA

Known for A.I. 2001, A History of Violence 2005

He was 46 when he played Rochester

On playing Mr. Rochester:

“I had read the book a long time ago, and when the project was first mooted, I went back to the book and was blown away by it. The more I delved, the more inspired I became by it. It is a great work of art and it has been a privilege to spend time with it,” says William Hurt.

“Rochester is a wonderful character; he rises out a great romantic figure with tremendous energy and power. Of course I have to throw away everything that is not useful in realizing the work – other people’s reputations, their vision, don’t have to be mine. I can’t think of him as a hero, I have to let the structure of the work do that. I can only think of him as a human being or I give myself added pressure if I see him as a famous role with a lot of expectations riding on the piece. As an actor I have to put those expectations aside and look at him freshly: he is very much at the centre of many conflicting loyalties; he is compelled and repelled, and he is really at the crossroads of many different forces. The fact that other actors have played him is not important: roles are made to be played by different actors. What frightens me is what Charlotte Brontë might think of me as Rochester!”

opposite Samantha Morton in 1997

Born: February 9, 1953 in Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK

Known for Persuasion 1995, There Will Be Blood 2007

He was 44 when he played Rochester

On playing Mr. Rochester:

He was chosen for Rochester after the director, Robert Young, heard him play the part on radio. "He told me there was passion in my voice. I couldn't evaluate whether I was right or wrong. I haven't seen any film versions, or read the book. I don't want to because I'd worry about the impossibility of translating it to the screen. I'd wonder why particular scenes are left out, and that would cause frustration as well as getting in the way of the screen writer, who has worked very hard for a long time and knows more about it than me. Sam (his co-star Samantha Morton) has read the book several times, so I developed the character through her. She's only 19 and has an amazing talent. She treated me like her grandfather," he jokes. "The danger is that Rochester has been played so many times I risk being shot down by the critics. But a good story is a good story, whatever, and this is still about two hearts. I hope I can communicate real emotions. I hope against hope sometimes, but there's an extraordinary feeling when you get it right."

"Rochester is, he believes, selfish, arrogant, chauvinistic, bullying, sexist. "You could say he's a man of his time, a rich landowner, with power which he abuses. I wouldn't fancy him, and I wonder why women find him attractive. It's the power, I think. My job is to try and make viewers have sympathy. I hope we show how his heart was hit badly by his first wife. She'd been a bit of a sex siren when younger. How was he to know she was barking mad? Jane is employed as a governess and responds to him like a genuine person. It's not 'Yes, sir, no, sir.' She looks him in the eye and speaks her mind, which is a new experience for him. He finds her fascinating. In the end he says 'We are one soul,' but he can't trust himself to open up completely and admit, 'I love you'. He is callous, too, in the way he flirts with Blanche in order to make Jane jealous".

opposite Marla Schaffel in 2000 Broadway Musical

Born: James Stacy Barbour April 25, 1966 in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, USA

Known for Eight Crazy Nights 2002, Alchemy 2005

He was 34 when he played Rochester

On playing Mr. Rochester:

Some critics think I'm the worst thing to hit the stage. Others see me as the epitome of Rochester. Part of the problem in building this character is that if you go back to the novel ['Jane Eyre' by Charlotte Bronte], you only see him through Jane's eyes.

"The big challenge, however, is that viewers are expecting a performance like one of the many Rochesters who have appeared in the movies. Audiences usually envision Orson Welles [who played the part in 1944]--a 250-pound55-year-old, who is a gruff, dark, tortured soul.

"For starters, I am not that much older than the actress who plays Jane[Maria Schaffel]. I'm 35. More important, I try to bring humor and irony toRochester. If he is all that stoic, and has no sense of lightness, why would Jane fall in love with him? He is not a wall of stone. His biting wit is a form of self-protection. In some ways, he is not unlike the Beast in 'Beauty and the Beast' or Billy in 'Carousel,' two characters I've played."

[He] describes Rochester as "a rebel who doesn't care what others think about him. Yet, he is a highly moral figure. He feels very confined and breaks away in order to feel alive," Barbour asserts. "Rochester is constantly running away--he has no home--and he has a true sense of responsibility."

Barbour defines himself as an actor who sings as opposed to a singer who acts and he comes to each role with the actor's sensibility. That is not to say his strategy for each part is the same. "When I played the Beast["Beauty and The Beast"], I approached the character physically--what he moved like, what he looked like. With Rochester, I took a more intellectual tack--his history, his ideals. Then I moved on to what he was about physically--the way he stood and sat. Of course, the period influenced those things as well."

In preparation for the role, Barbour boned up on the era, reading a host of books on Victorian women, aristocracy, social mores, and values. "Victorians of Rochester's class were always aware of what they looked like and the impression they were making. That would be true of Rochester as well. But because he is a rebel in our view, he would deliberately break some of those conventions."

opposite Ruth Wilson in 2006

Born: April 21, 1969 in Middlesex, London, England, UK

Known for Die Another Day 2002

He was 37 when he played Rochester

On playing Mr. Rochester:

The contradictory aspect of this is that Stephens knows what Jane Eyre could mean for him. He says he grabbed at the chance with both hands. He then worked extraordinarily hard filming it, mainly at Haddon Hall, over a particularly cruel Derbyshire winter. "I remember sitting in the main hall thinking: 'This is f***ing torture.' My face was frozen in this kind of rictus and I thought: 'This is going to be Rochester's expression. I canít move anything.' It was horrible for about three, four weeks and then it slowly started thawing out. By the summer it was the most beautiful place on earth.

He appreciates that, rictus grin or not, his Rochester will not satisfy all of the bookís devotees. "Every woman has their own idea of Mr Rochester. I'd had this image in my head of him being this rather remote, enigmatic, taciturn figure. And I read the book again and, actually, he never shuts up. He just grinds on and on and on, and he's actually quite theatrical.

In the book Rochester has to adapt to a female personality as wilful as his own. Susanna White says that Stephens exhibited no comparable agonies working for a female director.

opposite Mia Wasikowska in 2011

Born: April 2, 1977 in Heidelberg, Germany

Known for 300 2006, Inglourious Basterds 2009

He was 33 when he played Rochester

On playing Mr. Rochester:

Iconic or not, Fassbender found himself drawn to a character whose "gruffness and darkness make him more challenging to take to. This is not a straightforward love story.

"I play Rochester primarily as a Byronic hero. He’s quite jaded, yet he is sensitive and has a good heart. He’s in touch with his sensuality and humor. He’s traveled, and some things happened along his journeys which have stayed with him."

Fassbender delved into his character’s history and how it informs Rochester’s interactions with Jane. He says, "Rochester has been hurt. He went to Jamaica at such a young age, and his life got spun around. I think that he would have been quite happy without huge amounts of money, but his father said, ‘You have to go and marry this woman, because you need to be taken care of financially.’ Subsequently his older brother died, and he took over Thornfield.

"He’s somebody who is quite opposed to aristocratic judgments. He doesn’t mind crossing boundaries through perceived social handicaps. He doesn’t mind that Jane is a governess, or that for him to be with a governess would be frowned upon."

The actor sees the relationship as "Rochester’s last hope, really. He sees Jane when everyone else looks past her, and she inspires him, bringing him back to a point in his life where he was more pure and overtly better-natured, not as cynical and arrogant. When Jane responds to him in a way that doesn’t kowtow to his beliefs and that challenges him, he sees a real fire within her that she’s been suppressing. That intrigues him. The audience should be invested in the prospect that these two people can heal each other and nourish each other."