It has been suggested by at least one critic that Rory Kinnear’s superb performance as Hamlet — a son grieving over the death of his father — probably owes something to his own experience of such a loss.

Rory’s father, the much-loved comic actor Roy Kinnear (above), died of a heart attack in Spain after falling from a horse during the filming of The Return of the Musketeers in 1988. Rory was only ten at the time.

The theory seemed a sound one to me — even sounder once I had looked into the matter a little more closely. Specifically, I found myself reading with great interest an interview that Rory gave to The Oxford Times early in his student days in Oxford.

Here to study English at Balliol College, he quickly became a much-sought-after performer on the Playhouse stage. I reviewed him in a number of productions and it always seemed pretty clear that here was a star in the making.

He talked to my colleague Helen Peacocke early in 1997, during his second term, as he was preparing for a role as the fire-and-brimstone-preaching priest, Father Toulon, in the Oxford University Dramatic Society’s production of Peter Barnes’s black comedy Red Noses.

He admitted to spending ten hours a day in preparation for the part, adding that he really needed to get down to serious academic work.

“I came to Oxford to read English but so far I have been reading more scripts than text books. There was a time when I didn’t want to tie myself down and commit myself to an acting career. But I am getting so involved with student productions, and really enjoying them, that it looks as if I will end up following in dad’s footsteps.”

Speaking of Roy, he said: “He was a great dad, so relaxed, you’d never know he was an actor when he was at home.

“If I’ve got to take after someone, it might as well be my dad. He was the greatest, the funniest and the kindest person I have ever known.”

By embarking on Hamlet, Rory is supplying another illustration of a phenomenon I first identifed in this column five years ago — the propensity of actors with famous dads to take on the role.

At the time Ed Stoppard (son of Sir Tom Stoppard) was playing the part with English Touring Theatre. The RSC’s preceeding two Hamlets had been Samuel West (son of Timothy West) and Toby Stephens (son of Sir Robert Stephens).

Incidentally, Hamlet’s friend Rosencrantz is being played at the National Theatre by Ferdinand Kingsley, the son of Oxfordshire’s Sir Ben Kingsley. In years to come perhaps he will graduate to the title role.