Gerald Harper, actor best known as the suave squire Hadleigh and the out-of-time crime fighter Adam Adamant
He was not on the list.
Gerald Harper, who has died aged 96, was a British actor whose silky manner, smooth voice, immaculate dress and self-assured, lady-killing charm personified the well-heeled Englishman.
In Yorkshire Television’s series Hadleigh (1969-76), he portrayed the young huntin’, shootin’ and fishin’ squire James Hadleigh, stylishly facing the problems of keeping up his stately home. Playing the elegant cad superbly, Harper delighted a peak audience of 17 million viewers by transporting them to a world that was light years from their own.
Always dismissing his butler with a terse “Thank you, Sutton”, Harper based his on-screen master-servant relationship on his close observation of Lord Lucan during a game of golf. “While I was chatting my head off to my caddy, there’s old Lucan waving his hand imperiously and treating his caddy as if he wasn’t there. I realised there and then the difference between acting a gent and being one.”
He first played Hadleigh in 1968 in the series Gazette, as
the proprietor of a weekly newspaper in Yorkshire. The character proved so
popular that he was upgraded to squire and given his own eponymous spin-off.
The Daily Telegraph critic Richard Last delighted in the series as “a rebellion
not only against fashionable working-class melodrama but even more against the
successful social and business climber who is the obligatory hero of so many TV
drama series”.
Its ratings allowed Harper to tear up his contract with Yorkshire Television’s bosses and start again, with a vastly increased salary and “the loan of a country estate for a year complete with staff,” he recalled. “I lived like a lord.”
Harper had enjoyed earlier success with the title role in Adam Adamant Lives! (1966-67), about a swashbuckling Edwardian crime fighter who finds himself in Swinging London after being frozen in a block of ice for 64 years by his anonymous nemesis “The Face”. Produced by Doctor Who’s begetter Verity Lambert, the series successfully exploited the clash of mores from different eras and proved extremely popular Saturday-night viewing.
“Gerald Harper [has] the right wooden good looks and mad blue eye and voices the authentic bombast (‘My resolve is as blue steel…’),” wrote The Sunday Telegraph’s Philip Purser, adding approvingly that “when Adam displays, in 1966, his 1902 attitudes to women, propriety, manners and patriotism, he is not the one who suffers from the comparison.”
Having set the tone for his career by making his London stage debut in How He Lied to Her Husband (Arts Theatre, 1951), he remained the consummate ladykiller. Hugh Massingberd once argued in the Telegraph that Harper should have been cast as James Bond in the Sixties: “I believe that Fleming’s Etonian original would have been much better played by a proper ‘smoothie’ such as Gerald Harper.”
Nevertheless he became better-known later in his career as a radio disc jockey rather than a leading man. He was one of the biggest names in Capital Radio’s line-up when it launched in 1973, sending doting housewives dotty with his customary charm on his weekly show A Sunday Affair with Gerald Harper.
He became renowned for sending roses and champagne to listeners who were celebrating anniversaries or who had carried out notable good deeds, including the odd deserving celebrity such as Mrs Mary Whitehouse, who received her champagne with thanks.
He gave up the show after a decade, but later took it to Talksport as Champagne and Roses. From 1988 to 1991 he had a Saturday-afternoon show on Radio 2, although BBC budgets prevented him from sending out more than two or three bottles of champagne per programme. “Some people ask me why I don’t give away something worthy but champagne is useless, it’s ridiculous, it’s fun and has a certain style, and I quite like a certain style.”
On stage he was a consummate and versatile player of light
comedy or lounge-hall thrillers. His polished technique enabled him to switch
from melodrama (The Royal Baccarat Scandal, 1988; The Corsican Brothers, 1974)
to farce (The Little Hut, 1974; Boeing-Boeing, 1965) or detective drama
(Suddenly at Home, 1977; and as Sherlock Holmes in the Conan Doyle pastiche The
Crucifer of Blood, 1979).
He was not as light-minded as his most famous roles might
suggest. Behind the bland exterior of gentlemanly ease and imperturbable
integrity, there lurked a shifty streak in Harper’s characterisations. This
erupted forcibly in his Iago to Paul Rogers’s Othello (Bristol Old Vic, 1974).
He was also a thoughtful broadcaster, and although he listed as his favourite recreations “eating, riding and reading other people’s letters”, he did take the trouble to compile and perform a one-man show with himself as Rudyard Kipling, expounding the no-longer fashionable author’s writings, which he toured in Cornwall, took to Plymouth and brought to London for a season in 1984.
His dramatic forte, however, remained the unruffled rascal,
the sly lover, the smooth adulterer and the reckless seducer. He could light a
pretty lady’s cigarette with enough tenderness, grace and unfulfilled promise
to draw a sigh of envy from any matinee audience.
The son of Ernest Harper, a London stockbroker, and his wife
Mary, née Thomas, Gerald George Frederick Harper was born on February 15 1929.
He claimed he knew what he wanted to do from the moment he landed the role of a
pompous policeman in a play called The Magic Holly Bush at an Essex school at
the age of seven.
His father wanted him to become a doctor, however, and sent him away to board at Haileybury in Hertfordshire. Although he “hated it”, he admitted he was grateful for the public-school accent which helped him throughout his career.
After serving in the Royal Artillery as a second lieutenant for his National Service, he got a place at Rada. “A lot of people were lucky I didn’t become a doctor,” he observed. “I did far less harm as an actor.”
At Liverpool rep he cultivated his distinctive languor, even when he played “old men with cotton wool in their ears”, he said. He had his West End break in the farce Charley’s Aunt opposite Frankie Howerd (Globe, 1955) and in Julian Slade’s musical comedy Free as Air (Savoy, 1957).
After a brief stint in the classics – as Hippolytus’s tutor Theramenes in Racine’s Phèdre, with Margaret Rawlings in the title role; and as Sebastian in Michael Benthall’s Old Vic Twelfth Night, which toured the US in 1958-59 – he returned to earth in the West End as Dickinson opposite Alec Guinness in the title role in Terence Rattigan’s Ross (Haymarket, 1960).
By then, however, his confidence of making it in the
business had begun to “sag”. A book called Management by Objective, on how to
manage companies by setting firm targets, proved the catalyst he needed. “I
made my particular objective: ‘Get into television – and fast.’”
Changing his agent, within a week he had landed his first television part, albeit a small one, in an ITV play. His TV break was the spy series The Sleeper (1964), and Adam Adamant Lives! and Hadleigh followed, each making him a bigger star.
He enjoyed returning occasionally to the stage, but
typically, as in the 1981 Francis Durbridge thriller House Guest, it was to
play more suave aristocrats.
His film appearances included The Admirable Crichton, A Night to Remember, The Dam Busters, Tunes of Glory, The Young Ones and the 1979 The Lady Vanishes.
Without perhaps the pedigree, his real life was not so far removed from that of his acting image. He loved foxhunting, golf and tennis, high-class hotels and good restaurants. He said he “tried never to let a day go by without drinking champagne”. At the turn of the millennium he hit the headlines after embarking on a relationship with the comedy actress Sarah Alexander, some 40 years his junior.
In 2008 he came out of retirement in Spain to tour the UK as Mr Justice Wargrave in Bill Kenwright’s production of Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None.
His first marriage, to the actress Jane Downs, lasted 18
years and was dissolved in 1976. He divorced his second wife, Carla Rabaiotti,
a former Pan American air stewardess, in 1983. He is survived by a daughter
from his first marriage and a son from his second.
Actor
Mr Charity (2001)
Mr Charity
7.0
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Distinguished gentleman
2001
1 episode
The Craig Ferguson Story
8.1
TV Movie
Stage Doorman
1991
Elliott Gould, Angela Lansbury, Cybill Shepherd, Herbert
Lom, Jean Anderson, Ian Carmichael, Gerald Harper, Arthur Lowe, and Jenny
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The Lady Vanishes
6.0
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1979
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7.6
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1978
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Gerald Harper in Hadleigh (1969)
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7.7
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1969–1976
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1975
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Charles Dickens' World of Christmas
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1974
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1973
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The Avengers (1961)
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1968
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The Shoes of the Fisherman (1968)
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7.0
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1968
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7.9
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Lucius Vitellius
1968
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Gazette (1968)
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7.6
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1968
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1968
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1968
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1967
Dick Emery in The Dick Emery Show (1963)
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6.8
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1967
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Gerald Harper in Adam Adamant Lives! (1966)
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1966–1967
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1966
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Strangler's Web (1965)
Strangler's Web
6.6
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1965
Frank Ifield in Up Jumped a Swagman (1965)
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1965
ITV Play of the Week (1955)
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7.7
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1965
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A Man Called Harry Brent (1965)
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7.5
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1965
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Alfred Burke in Public Eye (1965)
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8.5
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1965
1 episode
Herbert Lom in The Human Jungle (1963)
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7.9
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1964
1 episode
Gideon C.I.D. (1964)
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1964
1 episode
The Sleeper (1964)
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1964
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1964
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1964
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John Gregson in First Night (1963)
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8.0
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1964
1 episode
The Protectors (1964)
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8.0
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Hon. Arthur Keir
1964
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Stolen Hours (1963)
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6.3
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1963
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BBC Sunday-Night Play
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1963
1 episode
Bud
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1963
1 episode
No Hiding Place (1959)
No Hiding Place
7.4
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Peter Gonzales
1963
1 episode
Donald Pleasence and Betsy Blair in Love Story (1963)
Love Story
7.1
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Clive
1963
1 episode
The Punch and Judy Man (1963)
The Punch and Judy Man
6.2
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1963
Reginald Marsh, Barbara Murray, and Patrick Wymark in The
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7.8
TV Series
Laurie Bamber
1963
1 episode
Hancock (1963)
Hancock
7.3
TV Series
Peter Penrose
1963
1 episode
Drama 61-67 (1961)
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7.6
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Editor's Secretary
1962
1 episode
Wendy Richard in Harpers West One (1961)
Harpers West One
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Rex Staple
1962
1 episode
Out of This World (1962)
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7.9
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1962
1 episode
Emergency-Ward 10 (1957)
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6.2
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1962
3 episodes
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Wonderful to Be Young!
5.8
Watts
1961
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1961
1 episode
Alec Guinness in Tunes of Glory (1960)
Tunes of Glory
7.5
Major Hugo Macmillan
1960
Richard Attenborough, Jack Hawkins, Roger Livesey, Nanette
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7.2
Captain Saunders
1960
Skyport (1959)
Skyport
5.9
TV Series
David Kinnerton
1959
3 episodes
The DuPont Show of the Month (1957)
The DuPont Show of the Month
7.2
TV Series
Guildenstern
1959
1 episode
A Night to Remember (1958)
A Night to Remember
7.9
3rd Officer - Carpathia
1958
O.S.S. (1957)
O.S.S.
7.4
TV Series
Lt. Patrick
1958
1 episode
On Stage - London
TV Series
1957
1 episode
Paradise Lagoon (1957)
Paradise Lagoon
7.1
Ernest
1957
ITV Television Playhouse (1955)
ITV Television Playhouse
8.1
TV Series
Dr. Herbert FaulknerRowley
1957
2 episodes
Stars in Your Eyes (1956)
Stars in Your Eyes
5.3
Dicky
1956
Tony Wright in Tiger in the Smoke (1956)
Tiger in the Smoke
6.2
Duds Morrison
1956
The Extra Day (1956)
The Extra Day
5.7
Police Constable
1956
The Dam Busters (1955)
The Dam Busters
7.4
Mocking RAF Officer (uncredited)
1955
Self
House on the Hill (2010)
House on the Hill
Video
Contributor
2010
The Lonely Man on the Hill (2009)
The Lonely Man on the Hill
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Self
2009
Verity Lambert: Drama Queen (2008)
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Self
2008
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The Cult of...
8.3
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Self
2006
1 episode
This Man Is the One
8.0
Video
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2006
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7.4
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2001
1 episode
Michael Aspel in This Is Your Life (1955)
This Is Your Life
6.5
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6 episodes
Noel Edmonds in Noel's Telly Years (1996)
Noel's Telly Years
5.2
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1997
1 episode
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World in Action
7.1
TV Series
Self - Narrator (voice)
1991
1 episode
Washes Whiter
6.5
TV Series
Self - Tabac commercial (c.1978)
1990
1 episode
Celebrity Shoot at Gleneagles 1988 Jackie Stewart Celebrity
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1988
Michael Aspel, Lionel Blair, and Una Stubbs in Give Us a
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7.0
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1983
1 episode
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7.0
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1983
1 episode
The Diana Dors Show
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1981
1 episode
Christopher Lee in International Pro-Celebrity Golf (1975)
International Pro-Celebrity Golf
8.2
TV Series
Self
1979
1 episode
Bruce Forsyth in The Generation Game (1971)
The Generation Game
6.5
TV Series
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1978
1 episode
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1978
1 episode
Princely Toys: The Private Kingdon of Jack Donovan
5.5
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1976
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1976
1 episode
Patsy Rowlands in Those Wonderful TV Times (1976)
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1976
1 episode
It's a Knockout (1966)
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7.7
TV Series
Self
1975
1 episode
Cilla Black in Cilla (1968)
Cilla
6.9
TV Series
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1974
3 episodes
Call My Bluff (1965)
Call My Bluff
7.0
TV Series
Self
1974
2 episodes
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5.6
TV Series
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1973
1 episode
Gracie Fields in Stars on Sunday (1969)
Stars on Sunday
3.6
TV Series
SelfSelf - Guest
1971
2 episodes
Star Choice - The Stars of BBC Series Pick Their Favourite
Episodes
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Self - Introduces
1969
1 episode
Helen Atkinson Wood, Nell Campbell, Simon Hickson, Brian
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Juke Box Jury
7.6
TV Series
Self - Panellist
1967
1 episode
Archive Footage
Funny Turns
7.4
TV Series
James Hadleigh (archive footage)
2000
1 episode
