- Maurice Denham
-
Maurice Denham Born William Maurice Denham
23 December 1909
Beckenham, KentDied 24 July 2002 (aged 92)
Northwood, LondonYears active 1938–1997 Spouse Margaret Dunn (1936-1971, her death) 3 children Maurice Denham OBE (born William Maurice Denham, 23 December 1909 – 24 July 2002) was an English character actor who appeared in over 100 television programmes and films throughout his long career.
Contents
Life and career
Denham was born in Beckenham, Kent, the son of Eleanor Winifred (née Lillico) and Norman Denham.[1] He was educated at Tonbridge School and trained as an elevator engineer. Denham eventually became an actor in 1934 and appeared in live television broadcasts as early as 1938, continuing to perform in that medium until 1997.
Denham initially made his name in radio comedy series such as ITMA and Much Binding in the Marsh, and later provided all the voices for the animated version of Animal Farm (1954). He was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for his performance as Blore in 1954's The Purple Plain. Other film credits include 23 Paces to Baker Street (1956), Night of the Demon (1957), Two-Way Stretch (1960), Sink the Bismarck! (1960), H.M.S. Defiant (1962), Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines (1965), The Day of the Jackal (1973), Minder on the Orient Express (1985) and 84 Charing Cross Road (1987).
Among his television appearances were as the father in Talking to a Stranger (1966), The Lotus Eaters (1972-3), All Passion Spent with Dame Wendy Hiller (1986), Behaving Badly (1989), Inspector Morse (1991) and the Sherlock Holmes story The Last Vampyre (1993).
He made a guest appearance in the BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who in the 1984 serial The Twin Dilemma, the first story to star Colin Baker in the title role as the Sixth Doctor. He later appeared in the Doctor Who radio serial The Paradise of Death in 1993 alongside Jon Pertwee. As The Honourable Mr Justice Stephen Rawley in several episodes of the BBC prison comedy Porridge, he ends up in the same cell with Fletcher, whom he had sentenced.
In further radio work, he starred in a BBC Radio 4 version of the Oldest Member, based on stories by P. G. Wodehouse, from 1994 to 1999, as Rumpole in Rumpole: The Splendours and Miseries of an Old Bailey Hack, as Dr. Alexandre Manette in A Tale of Two Cities, as 'Father' in Peter Tinniswood's Winston series, and also as Chief Inspector Jules Maigret in several series beginning in 1976.[2]
Filmography
- Take My Life (1947)
- The Man Within (1947)
- The Upturned Glass (1947)
- They Made Me a Fugitive (1947)
- Holiday Camp (1947)
- Jassy (1947)
- Captain Boycott (1947)
- Fame is the Spur (1947)
- The End of the River (1947)
- Easy Money (1948)
- Blanche Fury (1948)
- Escape (1948)
- Miranda (1948)
- Daybreak (1948)
- Oliver Twist (1948)
- My Brother's Keeper (1948)
- London Belongs to Me (1948)
- The Blind Goddess (1948)
- Quartet (1948)
- Here Come the Huggetts (1948)
- Look Before You Love (1948)
- Traveller's Joy (1949)
- Once Upon a Dream (1949)
- The Blue Lagoon (1949)
- It's Not Cricket (1949)
- A Boy, a Girl and a Bike (1949)
- Poet's Pub (1949)
- Don't Ever Leave Me (1949)
- Madness of the Heart (1949)
- Landfall (1949)
- The Spider and the Fly (1949)
- No Highway (1951)
- Time Bomb (1953)
- The Net (1953)
- Street Corner (1953)
- Malta Story (1953)
- The Million Pound Note (1954)
- Eight O'Clock Walk (1954)
- The Purple Plain (1954)
- Animal Farm (1954)
- Carrington V.C. (1955)
- Doctor at Sea (1955)
- Simon and Laura (1955)
- 23 Paces to Baker Street (1956)
- The Spanish Gardener (1956)
- Checkpoint (1956)
- Man with a Dog (1957)
- Night of the Demon (1957)
- Barnacle Bill (1957)
- Our Man in Havana (1959)
- The Captain's Table (1959)
- Two-Way Stretch (1960)
- Sink the Bismarck! (1960)
- The Greengage Summer (1961)
- The Mark (1961)
- Invasion Quartet (1961)
- The Very Edge (1962)
- H.M.S. Defiant (1962)
- Paranoiac (1963)
- The King's Breakfast (1963)
- The 7th Dawn (1964)
- The Uncle (1965)
- Operation Crossbow (1965)
- Hysteria (1965)
- Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines (1965)
- The Alphabet Murders (1965)
- The Nanny (1965)
- The Heroes of Telemark (1965)
- The Night Caller (1965)
- After the Fox (1966)
- Jules Verne's Rocket to the Moon (1967)
- The Long Duel (1967)
- Danger Route (1967)
- Torture Garden (1967)
- Attack on the Iron Coast (1968)
- Negatives (1968)
- Some Girls Do (1969)
- Midas Run (1969)
- The Best House in London (1969)
- A Touch of Love (1969)
- The Virgin and the Gypsy (1970)
- Countess Dracula (1971)
- Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971)
- Nicholas and Alexandra (1971)
- The Day of the Jackal (1973)
- Luther (1973)
- Shout at the Devil (1976)
- Julia (1977)
- From a Far Country (1981)
- Recluse (1981)
- Martin Luther, Heretic (1983)
- The Chain (1984)
- Mr Love (1985)
- 84 Charing Cross Road (1987)
- Inspector Morse: Fat Chance (1991)
- El último viaje de Robert Rylands (1996)
References
External links
Categories:- 1909 births
- 2002 deaths
- English film actors
- English television actors
- English voice actors
- Officers of the Order of the British Empire
- Old Tonbridgians
- People from Beckenham
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