He was a son of the Rev. John Gill, of Cambridge.[2]
His first stage appearance, in Bury, Lancashire in 1897, was in The Sign of the Cross (Wilson Barrett's most successful play); the following year he appeared in this play in London. He then toured Australia and the US with The Sign of the Cross and Ben-Hur.[2]
In 1903 he joined Herbert Beerbohm Tree's company at His Majesty's Theatre, London, and appeared in plays of Shakespeare, playing several important roles. He left the company in 1907. He continued to perform, into the 1930s, in Shakespeare's plays during his career. As well as being a Shakespearean actor, he was regarded as a matinée idol and played romantic parts in modern plays.[2][3]
His career as a film actor started with Henry VIII (1911): he appeared with Beerbohm Tree, on whose version of the play the film was based. In 1926, Gill appeared in two short films made in the De Forest Phonofilm sound-on-film process, Santa Claus as the title character, and Julius Caesar as Brutus. He appeared in many more films, the last being The Citadel of 1938.[1][4]
