Norman Beaton

Norman Beaton
Born	Norman Lugard Beaton 31 October 1934(1934-10-31) Georgetown, Guyana
Died	13 December 1994(1994-12-13) (aged 60) Guyana

Norman Lugard Beaton (31 October 1934 in Georgetown, Guyana – 13 December 1994) was a Guyanese actor long resident in the United Kingdom.

Beaton attended Queen's College in Guyana until he was expelled for truancy and bad grades.^{[citation needed]} He was given a second chance at the Government Teachers' Training College and graduated with distinction.^{[citation needed]} Beaton taught and played with the calypso band The Four Bees before leaving Guyana for London in 1960.^[1]

Early career

Beaton developed a parallel career as a Calypso singer, scoring a no. 1 hit in Trinidad and Tobago with 'Come Back Melvina' in 1959. He then obtained a post in the shipping department of a bookshop until his wife and children arrived in London in 1960.^{[citation needed]} He then became a teacher in Liverpool, becoming the first black teacher to be employed by the Liverpool Education Authority.^[1] Beaton became increasingly unhappy with his work as a teacher and began writing plays, his first play being the musical Jack of Spades, which was about the doomed relationship between a black man and a white woman, quite controversial at that time. The moderate success of this play gave Beaton enough confidence to give up teaching and to concentrate on the theatre. He moved first to Bristol and then to Sussex where he played the leading role in a musical he had written, Sit Down, Banna at the Connaught Theatre. This was the beginning of his acting career.^[1]

Success

In the early 1970s, Beaton began to perform in plays in London's West End. In 1970 he played the role of Ariel in Shakespeare's The Tempest, which he described in his autobiography as "the most important role of my acting career". In 1975, he helped to establish the Black Theatre of Brixton. In 1975 Beaton played Nanki-Poo in The Black Mikado, a modern version of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado. In 1976, Beaton broke into television in the series The Fosters, which also featured a young Lenny Henry, and the following year played the lead role in a low-budget independent film about a West Indian community in London, Black Joy; he also appeared in the BBC series Empire Road. However, it was his six year run (starting in 1988) in Channel Four's Desmond's, (written by Trix Worrell) as the title character, that would become his best known role. For Desmond's Beaton received the Royal Television Society Best Comedy Performer Award.^[2]

He played the lead role of Willie Boy in the 1987 comedy Playing Away about a West Indian cricket team invited to play a rural white team. He appeared as a guest on The Cosby Show in 1991 (episode: "There's Still No Joy in Mudville"), and in Little Napoleons. He also appeared in several movies including The Mighty Quinn (1989). After years of hard living began taking its toll on his health, he retired to Guyana in 1994 (just as his character in Desmond's was doing the same), where he collapsed at the airport and died a few hours later at the age of 60. He is survived by five children from three marriages.^{[citation needed]}

Personal life

M. Gloria Moshette (1958-?)

• Jayme Beaton (b. 1958, British Guiana)
• Kim Beaton (b. 1960, British Guiana)
• Jeremy Beaton (b. 1962, England)
• Norman Beaton Jr (b. 1964, England) married with Marie-Agnes André

grand daughter - Mica Beaton

With Jane Atto

• William (b. 1969, England)

M. Leah Garady (1976-?)

• (Leah adopted Beaton's children of his first marriage)

Beaton formed a more lasting relationship with Jane Cash in 1978.

His father William Solomon Beaton died in 1983, and his Mother Ada Beaton (née Mackintosh) died in 1962.^[3]

Legacy

BBC Radio Drama have founded the Norman Beaton Fellowship (NBF) to "broaden the range of actors available to Radio Drama producers across the UK by encouraging applicants from non-traditional training backgrounds".^[2]

Death

It was published that the actor had flown back to his home country of Guyana when he collapsed at the airport of natural causes on 13 December 1994.

It was announced in the spin-off show of Desmond's called Porkpie that his character, Desmond, had died in the previous year.

References

1. ^ ^{a b c} screenonline: Beaton, Norman (1934-1994) Biography
2. ^ ^{a b} BBC - SoundStart - What is the Norman Beaton Fellowship?
3. ^ http://www.britmovie.co.uk/forums/actors-actresses/11760-norman-beaton.html

External links

• Norman Beaton at the Internet Movie Database
• Norman Beaton biography and credits at BFI Screenonline

Persondata
Name	Beaton, Norman
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	31 October 1934
Place of birth	Georgetown, Guyana
Date of death	13 December 1994
Place of death	Guyana