Roger Lloyd Pack obit

Roger Lloyd Pack obituary

 Stage and screen actor best known for his roles in Only Fools and Horses, The Vicar of Dibley and Harry Potter

He was not on the list.

The talented and idiosyncratic character actor Roger Lloyd Pack, who has died of pancreatic cancer aged 69, achieved national recognition, and huge popularity, as Colin "Trigger" Ball, the lugubrious Peckham road sweeper in John Sullivan's brilliantly acted comedy series Only Fools and Horses. He appeared alongside David Jason's Del Boy and Nicholas Lyndhurst's "plonker" Rodney from 1981 for 10 years, with many a seasonal "special" for another decade.

This success cemented a career in which, up to that point, he had played important roles at the Royal Shakespeare Company, the National Theatre and the Almeida theatre in north London – he was a notably anguished Rosmer in Ibsen's Rosmersholm at the National in 1987, opposite Suzanne Bertish – without recognition any wider than usually appreciative reviews.

His enhanced status led to another hugely successful BBC television comedy series, The Vicar of Dibley (1994-2007), written by Richard Curtis, and starring Dawn French as the ecclesiastical new broom, Geraldine, in a sleepy Oxfordshire parish. He played Owen Newitt, the local farmer with a suspiciously ambiguous relationship with his own animals, who lusted after the breezy cleric and was not averse to misinterpreting her exiguous signs of encouragement.

Lloyd Pack described Trigger as both a blessing and a curse, as it made him susceptible to cheerily sarcastic greeting on the streets. This was not false modesty. The actor lived a full life in his local communities in north London and Fakenham, Norfolk, and was highly visible in all sorts of political and charitable activities, where his good nature and deep feeling about issues such as schools, the ambulance service and integrated traffic policies engaged him fully.

On stage he was very good at looking as though he would not hurt a fly, but his last work, in Mark Rylance's all-male company at Shakespeare's Globe (and in the West End) in 2012 revealed other facets in his apparent equability: he played the "deep, revolving" Duke of Buckingham to Rylance's Richard III with sudden revelations of shark-like attack; and paired this with a definitive Sir Andrew Aguecheek, the dim-witted, lovelorn sidekick ("I was adored once, too") of Toby Belch in Twelfth Night.

Roger's father, the actor Charles Lloyd Pack, was proud of his working-class origins in Wapping, east London. His mother, Elizabeth Ulrike Pulay, was a Viennese Jewish refugee, worked as a travel agent and later founded a kindergarten because she disapproved of what was available. Roger was born in Islington, north London. After prep school he was packed off to Bedales, in Hampshire, trained at Rada in London, made his stage debut in The Shoemaker's Holiday by Thomas Dekker at the Theatre Royal, Northampton, and joined the RSC.

Lloyd Pack made his television debut in The Avengers in 1965, subsequently appearing in many established series in the 1970s such as Jason King, Crown Court and Softly Softly: Taskforce. Still, he seemed doomed to the periphery, even when he made a film debut in Guy Green's The Magus (1968), based on the John Fowles novel and starring Michael Caine and Anthony Quinn, and had a minor role in Joseph Losey's The Go-Between (1970), adapted by Harold Pinter from LP Hartley's novel and starring Julie Christie and Alan Bates.

In the mid-1970s he was a committed member of the Joint Stock Theatre Company, formed by William Gaskill and Max Stafford-Clark. Other notable theatre appearances included Alan Bennett's Kafka's Dick (1986), directed at the Royal Court by Richard Eyre, and, 10 years later, as Albert Parker, one of the blind-sided town stalwarts, in a delightful revival by Jude Kelly of JB Priestley's When We Are Married at the Chichester Festival theatre (and the West End), both of these productions also featuring his great friend Alison Steadman.

Actually, Roger's friends were legion. Not only was he immensely respected in the theatre, he was immensely popular, and his enthusiasms for cricket (he was a member of the MCC), Tottenham Hotspur and (until recently) the Labour party defined, to a large extent, his attitude to work. Another friend, Stephen Frears, directed him in the film Prick Up Your Ears (1987), written by Bennett, about the playwright Joe Orton (played by Gary Oldman) and his lover, Kenneth Halliwell.

Even quirkier, and darker, was Peter Greenaway's dream-like The Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover (1989), which contains an amazing roster of the finest British actors led by Helen Mirren, Alan Howard and Michael Gambon. In one of the many take-over casts of Yasmina Reza's Art in the West End, he appeared alongside Nigel Havers and Barry Foster in 2001. In that play, Havers and Foster were witnesses to his own character's off-stage marriage and Lloyd Pack, on a sudden whim, decided to cast his colleagues in those roles in real life when he married his partner of over 20 years, the poet and dramatist Jehane Markham (herself of some theatrical pedigree: daughter of the actor David Markham and sister of the actors Kika and Petra).

He then joined forces with the director Mike Newell, another friend and neighbour, on Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005), the fourth film in the series, in which Lloyd Pack was Barty Crouch, and pulled another big surprise in playing a pantomime dame, Sara the Cook, in Dick Whittington, written, just as surprisingly, by Mark Ravenhill, at the Barbican in the City of London. This was not a huge success, but Lloyd Pack's view was that the critics who delivered mixed notices (all of them) had momentarily forgotten that panto was for the kids.

He had a good deal of fun as John Lumic on the reappearance of Doctor Who on television in 2006, playing opposite David Tennant, and returned to the stage in a revival of Patrick Marber's gambling classic, Dealer's Choice, at the Menier Chocolate Factory in 2007. He was much praised, too, for a growly old Davies in Pinter's The Caretaker at the Nuffield, Southampton, and a fierce and transported Prospero in The Tempest at the Edinburgh festival.

His last films included Nigel Cole's Made in Dagenham (2010), about the strike at the Ford car plant in Essex in 1968, and a nice cameo as Inspector Mendel in Tomas Alfredson's Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011), starring Oldman. And some of his last television, in 2009-10, was The Old Guys, in which he and Clive Swift played two ageing has-beens, focusing their attentions on the hopeless cause of Jane Asher's disobliging neighbour.

Lloyd Pack was married first in 1967 to Sheila Ball, with whom he had a daughter, the actor Emily Lloyd, and from whom he was divorced in 1972. He and Jehane had three sons, Spencer, Hartley and Louis. They, and his brother, Christopher, a stage manager, all survive him.

Filmography

Film

Year       Title       Role       Notes

1968      The Magus          Young Maurice Conchis

1968      Secret Ceremony             Cleaner                 Uncredited

1969      Hamlet Reynaldo            

1970      Figures in a Landscape   Soldier

1971      The Go Between              Charles

1971      Fright    Constable           

1971      Fiddler On The Roof        Russian Orthodox Sexton            

1974      Confessions of a Sex Maniac        Henry Milligan  

1975      The Naked Civil Servant Bermondsey Liz                

1979      Meetings with Remarkable Men                Pavlov  

1979      Cuba      Nunez  

1980      Bloody Kids         Hospital Doctor                

1984      1984      Waiter

1987      Prick Up Your Ears            Actor 2

1989      The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover             Geoff   

1990      Wilt        Dr. Pittman        

1991      American Friends             Dr. Butler            

1991      The Object of Beauty      Frankie

1993      The Trial               Stairman             

1993      U.F.O.   Solo      

1994      Princess Caraboo              Magistrate Haythorne   

1994      Interview with the Vampire         Piano Teacher   

1995      The Young Poisoner's Handbook                Fred      

1996      Hollow Reed       Hannah's Lawyer             

1997      Preaching to the Perverted          Mr. Cutts Watson            

2004      Vanity Fair           Francis Sharp    

2003      Margery and Gladys        D I Woolley        

2005      Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire          Barty Crouch, Sr.              

2006      The Living and the Dead                Donald Brocklebank       

2010      Made in Dagenham         George

2011      Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy                Mendel               

2011      In Love with Alma Cogan               Norman               

2013      Twelfth Night     Sir Andrew Aguecheek

Television

Year       Title       Role       Notes

1968      Crime Buster                     

1970      The Roads to Freedom   Bobby  

1972      Spyder's Web     Albert    12 episodes

1972      Jason King           Radio Operator

1972      The Protectors Paparazzo            Uncredited

1 episode

1973      Special Branch   Paul       1 episode

1973      The Protectors Russi      1 episode

1974      Within These Walls          Dr Osmonde       1 episode

1974      Crown Court       Dr Patrick Attwater         1 episode

1975      Churchill's People            Thug      1 episode

1975      Play for Today    Sidney Bagley    1 episode

1975      Softly, Softly: Taskforce Martin Webb     1 episode

1976      Dixon of Dock Green       Ron Fielding       1 episode

1976      Survivors              Wally     2 episodes

1977      The Professionals             Ramos the terrorist         Episode: "Long Shot"

1978      Life of Shakespeare         Jack Heminge     6 episodes

1981      Chronicle             Chambers            1 episode

1981      Private Schulz    Melvin 1 episode

1981–2003          Only Fools and Horses    Trigger 39 episodes

1985      Moving                 Jimmy Ryan        6 episodes

1985–1993          Screen Two         Selser

David Power

Derek    3 episodes

1987      Inspector Morse               Donald Martin   1 episode

1990      Mr. Bean              Waiter Episode: "The Return of Mr. Bean"

1990      Byker Grove       Beckett                 5 episodes

1990      Zorro     Carrillo 1 episode

1991      The Chief                             2 episodes

1991      Selling Hitler       David Irving        2 episodes

1991      The Bill Arnie     1 episode

1991      Stay Lucky           Eddie Vernon     1 episode

1991      The Gravy Train Goes East            Ferenc Plitplov 4 episodes

1991      Boon     Ray Watts            1 episode

1992      Archer's Goon    Quentin Sykes  

1992      Screen One         Gordon                

1993      Lovejoy                Smallman-Smith               1 episode

1993–1995          Health and Efficiency      Rex Regis             12 episodes

1993–1996          2point4 Children               Jake Klinger        3 episodes

1994–2013          The Vicar of Dibley           Owen Newitt     25 episodes

1996–1997          Paul Merton in Galton & Simpson's...      Various Characters         

1996      Murder Most Horrid       Frank Foster       1 episode

1996      Heartbeat            Reggie Rawlins Episode: "Catch Us If You Can"

1997      The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling    Anderson            2 episodes

1997      Noel's House Party          Builder

1997–1998          Knight School     Sir Baldwin De'Ath           2 episodes

1999      Kavanagh QC      Alex Watkins      1 episode

1999      Oliver Twist        Mr Sowerberry 2 episodes

2001      Murder Rooms: The Dark Beginnings of Sherlock Holmes                Dr. Ibbotson      

2002      Born and Bred   Norman Pendleton          1 episode

2002      The Bill Mick Mortimer 7 episodes

2002      Dalziel and Pascoe           Bishop Halliwell                1 episode

2004      Where the Heart Is          Don Nicholls       1 episode

2005      Doc Martin          Phil Pratt              1 episode

2006      Agatha Christie's Poirot Inspector Caux Episode: "The Mystery of the Blue Train"

2006      Doctor Who        John Lumic          Episodes: "Rise of the Cybermen", "The Age of Steel"

2008      New Tricks          Danny Jones       1 episode

2009      The Catherine Tate Show              Ghost of Christmas Future            Episode: "Nan's Christmas Carol"

2009–2010          The Old Guys     Tom Finnan        12 episodes

2010      Arena    Various Characters          Episode: "Harold Pinter: A Celebration"

2010      Survivors              Billy Stringer       2 episodes

2011      Hustle   Clive Ban              Episode: "Clearance From A Deal"

2012      The Borgias         Friar      

2012      Inspector George Gently               Hector Blackstone           

2014      Law & Order: UK               Alex Greene       Episode: "I Predict a Riot", (final appearance)

Stage

    Wild Honey (1984) by Anton Chekhov, playing the part of Osip

    Kafka's Dick by Alan Bennett – He played Kafka

    Blue/Orange by Joe Penhall

    'Art'

    Dick Whittington – a family pantomime by Mark Ravenhill at the Barbican Centre

    One for the Road

    Dealer's Choice by Patrick Marber – He played Ash, alongside Malcolm Sinclair and Stephen Wight.

    The Last Laugh – by Kōki Mitani (English version of Warai no Daigaku). He played The Censor, Japan, 2007.

    The Trojan Women (2012) - Caroline Bird's adaptation of the tragedy by Euripides at the Gate Theatre, Notting Hill, London – He played Poseidon.

    Richard III (2012) by William Shakespeare at the Globe Theatre, South Bank, London – He played Duke of Buckingham.

    Twelfth Night (2013) by William Shakespeare – He played Sir Andrew Aguecheek.