lovegod

Quote....
Barry Evans (Mulberrry Bush & Mind Your Language) springs to mind.


yes Barry Evans was the Neil Morrissey of his day

Dame Starry

Barry Evans is mentioned at the beginning of this thread (page 3 I believe).

YDSL x.

lovegod

Barry was in the movies, he was popular
in the 'Doctor series' and the 'Mind Your Language ' series in the late 70s
He had it all
where did it all go wrong ?

CaptainWaggett

To be fair, most of these actors didn't actually become 'destitute'; they just stopped working as actors and had to take the same sort of jobs as the rest of us. I've never understod why people are so suprised when someone moves out of show business - I'm sure plenty of us has had career changes or even downsized out finances without all our friends thinking us a complete failure or organising collections for us. Plenty of cab drivers (as Barry Evans became) do very well for themselves! The one certainty about acting is, that unless you happen to be William Roache, you don't have a job for life!

kelp

It really is difficult for actors that have been very famous. Having had adulation, and money and indeed most anything they want at anytime, to suddenly have it all stop!
Some, just cannot hack it in civvy street, they don't have any skills, and so the decline sets in.

BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR...YOU MAY GET IT!

stevie boy

But some do Captain Waggett, like Ronald Lewis,dead, with only a cheese sandwich and a five pound note for company, James Robertson Justice living in a friends cottage. The list is getting bigger, as for William Roache a clever man who knows what security is, hence his stay in the Street.

batman

Many 'jobbing' actors give up acting for different reasons (me included). However, the number of actors with 'high profile' careers who voluntarily call it a day appears to be quite small. Barry Evans only turned to taxi driving when the acting jobs dried up but was about to audtition for Eastenders when he died. Child actor Mark Lester became, I believe, an osteopath but only after years of failure as an adult actor while Kieron Moore became involved in religious publishing and conservation work. As kelp says, many others simply cannot cope when the work dries up and they slip into a decline. Patric Doonan (from The Blue Lamp among others) committed suicide when the offers disappeared. Ronald Lewis was financially and emotionally destroyed by his failure to start a Welsh National Theatre and also took his own life. Acting is a precarious career which requires not only talent but incredible fortitude to sustain it.

"Do you know why fattries are called fattries .... it's because they are big and people make things in them."

Windthrop

Bill Roache was ruined when a legal victory against The Sun (who called him boring) was overturned on appeal. He has had to continue working to make up his finances.

Thats the joke that killed the Music Hall !

lovegod

WHO was that actor who always played a detective
and commuted to london by train and boozed himself into
oblivion on the long train journeys ?

Mike Yarwood too was once a permanent fixture on the telly
but booze ended his career.
Drink seems too easily available in the acting profession and the
media in general.
Drinks are freely available in the green room and its all so tempting.

Drink probably cut 20 years off Ollie Reeds acting career
ditto Richard Burton.

stevie boy

I do not know whether to admire or have a go at William Roache. On the one hand he has earnt a very good living playing the same character but did he never wish to broaden his horizons?. He is a very boring actor, that's for sure.

Brooksey13

Don't know if this chap's been mentioned yet, but Gary Holton (Auf Weidersehen, Pet, the Knowledge, Minder, Shoestring) ended his days battling heroin, as well as Her Majesty's Gutter Press who hounded him re- his habit. Sad story. He died aged only 33. Lovely fella by all accounts.

Dame Starry

Gary Holton died of morphine and alcohol poisoning in 1985, but he wasn't destitute - and, at the time of his death, he still had a regular part in "Auf Wiedersehen, Pet".

YDSL x.

stevie boy

Hendry was a good actor and I thought he was great(and looked great)in Doppelganger

stevie boy

Jerry Desmonde who is briefly mentioned in this thread, I did not know that he committed suicide, what a sad end. There is not much info on him on the IMDB, has anyone any more to tell about this gentleman??

TimR

That's very sad - although it's nice that he had some true friends. I recognized his face immediately when I looked him up, although I must admit I didn't know his name. He was in so many films that I know. Apparently there is a new biography of him.

What happened to him? Was he ill?