Mark Kingston, actor R.I.P.

[julian_craster]

Obituary: Mark Kingston




Daily Telegraph
26 Oct 2011
Mark Kingston - Telegraph


Mark Kingston, who has died aged 77, created many West End roles in his 50-odd years on stage — notably the lecturer, Frank, who taught Julie Walters in Educating Rita, by Willie Russell, and Reg in the Alan Ayckbourn trilogy The Norman Conquests .

Highly respected and much liked by his peers, Kingston also appeared in many parts on television, among them that of Danny South (based on Jimmy Greaves) in United, the BBC serial about the world of football.

Among his friends was Sir Alec Guinness, alongside whom he played eight roles (all the other parts) in the two-handed play Yahoo, about Jonathan Swift. He also appeared with Guinness in John Mortimer’s Voyage Round My Father.

Mark Kingston was born on April 18 1934 in Deptford, into a close-knit working-class family; his father was a blacksmith who helped with the construction of Mulberry harbours after D-Day; his mother packed biscuits for Peek Frean’s. Educated at Greenwich Central School, Mark claimed to have seldom opened a book; rather, he loved football and became a junior boxing champion.

At the age of 15, however, he met a teacher, Tom Love, who changed his life. Love taught literature through drama, and introduced him to plays, poetry and Shakespeare, leading Mark to discover a passion for acting. He became a clerk in a shipping office and went to evening classes at Toynbee Hall, studying acting. Dismayed by this turn of events, his father declared: “I’ve got a poof for a son.”

Following further study at Lamda (where he jettisoned his cockney accent), Kingston got his first professional job in 1952, in panto at the Boston Hippodrome. Playing the Emperor of China alongside Diana Dors as Aladdin, he found performing at the 2,000-seater arena “a terrifying experience”. He moved on to rep in Bridgwater, where one of the actors in the company, Kenneth Williams, advised and encouraged him.

Kingston’s next engagement was at Ryde, on the Isle of Wight, where he panicked during the dress rehearsal of his first major part in weekly rep, decamping from the theatre and boarding the ferry for the mainland. The ship did not sail on time, and Kingston returned to the theatre.

He was subsequently cast as Feste in Twelfth Night alongside Vivien Leigh at the Old Vic, which embarked on a world tour. Also in the company was Marigold Sharman, whom he had recently met at Birmingham rep. She played Maria in Twelfth Night, and they married when the company was in Brisbane, enjoying a honeymoon on the Great Barrier Reef. Kingston was named Australia’s Actor Of The Year for his performance as Feste.

Back in Britain, Peter Ustinov cast him as the sergeant major in his play The Unknown Soldier, at Chichester, after which Alec Guinness invited him to take the part of Peter Quilpe in TS Eliot’s The Cocktail Party.

Kingston’s career in the West End was now launched. He played the lead in The Mousetrap and The Woman In Black, and appeared in Clouds, by Michael Frayn, and in Dragon’s Tail, with Penelope Keith (both directed by Michael Rudman). His last major appearance was in David Hare’s Racing Demon at Chichester.

On television, besides Danny South, Kingston had prominent parts in Shine On Harvey Moon; Give My Regards To Broad Street; Beryl’s Lot; and No Job For A Lady (again with Penelope Keith). He also created a one-man show about Shakespeare, which he performed at Edinburgh.

Mark Kingston’s favourite pastime became golf. He was for many years a member of Richmond Golf Club and of The Stage Golfing Society, being its captain in 1994.

When his wife Marigold developed dementia he went into the actors’ home Denville Hall to be with her. She survives him.

Mark Kingston, born April 18 1934, died October 9 2011

[Elaine]

Oh no..not another. I know I have used this word a lot recently, but Mark Kingston was a stalwart of British tv. A valuble member of those thespians who make a firm backbone for our talented troupe of everyday actors. R.I.P. Mark

[Merton Park]

Seen him in so many things over the years. Really reliable solid actor. Never let you down and always watchable.

RIP

[Freddy]

A familiar face, never let the viewer down.

RIP

[Richard_in_wales]

Another good jobbing actor gone, R.I.P. sir.

[Nick Dando]

From the Guardian

Mark Kingston obituary | Stage | The Guardian

Nick

Mark Kingston obituary

Actor known for his stage role as Frank in Educating Rita

• Anthony Hayward
  
• guardian.co.uk, Sunday 11 December 2011 18.30 GMT

Mark Kingston in an episode of ITV's Boon.

Mark Kingston, who has died of cancer aged 77, was known as a generous actor who allowed others to shine. In the theatre, he exhibited this best in Willy Russell'sEducating Rita, as the university lecturer Frank, who earns extra money by tutoring a brash, earthy Open University student, Rita (played by Julie Walters); as she questions traditional attitudes to learning, Frank begins to reassess them himself. The play was commissioned by the Royal Shakespeare Company and first performed in 1980 at the Warehouse, in London, before it transferred to the Piccadilly theatre and won the Society of West End Theatre's award for best comedy.
When Educating Rita was turned into a film, Kingston suffered a frequent irritation for actors – being replaced by a "name" (Michael Caine), while Walters's big-screen career was launched after Russell managed to fight off the American backers'attempts to cast Dolly Parton. A decade later, in the television sitcom No Job for a Lady (1990-92), Kingston took the role of Geoff Price, the husband of a newly elected Labour politician (Penelope Keith). Geoff feels he is being neglected because of her political activities and that MP stands for "missing person". Nevertheless, he is seen providing moral support as his wife finds her cherished principles being severely tested and she battles against chauvinism, political scheming and parliament's uncivilised working hours.
Harold James Kingston was born in Greenwich, south London, the son of a boilermaker and a packer in a factory. He was brought up in Deptford and attended Greenwich central school, where he gained a passion for drama from an English teacher, Tom Love.
While working as a clerk in a shipping office, he took evening classes in acting at Toynbee Hall before deciding to turn professional, winning a scholarship to Lamda (1952-53) and changing his professional name to Mark. He concentrated on losing his cockney accent and, after being seen performing as a drag artist in a production there by the variety artist Wee Georgie Wood, was cast as the Emperor of China in an Aladdin pantomime (1953), starring Diana Dors, at the Boscombe Hippodrome, Bournemouth.
Kingston then joined the repertory company at Bridgwater, Somerset, as an assistant stage manager. He soon started taking small acting roles and credited Kenneth Williams, a member of the company, with being his mentor. After a spell in Ryde, on the Isle of Wight, Kingston then appeared with the Birmingham repertory company at the Old Vic theatre in London in the George Bernard Shaw play Caesar and Cleopatra (1956).
During a long run with that company in Birmingham, he met the actor Marigold Sharman. In 1961, while together on an Old Vic tour of Australia and South America – when Kingston's roles included Feste in Twelfth Night, alongside Vivien Leigh – the couple married in Brisbane. Kingston later appeared in the West End in The Mousetrap (Ambassadors theatre, 1962-63), The Norman Conquests (Globe, 1975), Clouds (Duke of York's, 1978), The Dragon's Tail (Apollo, 1985-86) and The Woman in Black (Fortune, 1989).
Although he made his screen debut in the children's series The Three Musketeers in 1954, Kingston did not find regular television work until the mid-1960s. He had his first extended exposure as the footballer Danny South, playing for the fictional Second Division club Brentwich, in the soap opera United! (1965-67), in which Sharman also appeared.
Then, Kingston took the roles of Tom Humphries, the milkman husband of the woman seeking to broaden her horizons with philosophy evening classes, in Beryl's Lot (1973-77); the charming, urbane Leo Brandon, who is caught cottaging in Shine on Harvey Moon (1984-85); and Bill Stanhope, the indiscreet company doctor, in Intimate Contact (1987), a groundbreaking drama about the repercussions when a businessman contracts Aids. He also starred as the luckless Ken Archer, who is made redundant on the same day that his wife leaves him, in the sitcom Time of My Life (1980). He popped up in one-off roles in The New Avengers (1977) and the sitcom Marjorie and Men (1985). His few film credits included Hitler: The Last Ten Days (1973).
Television kept Kingston in work until he retired in 2004, shortly after being diagnosed with the rare cancer Barrett's Oesophagus and undergoing successful photodynamic therapy treatment. In 2008, Kingston – who was an enthusiastic member of the Stage Golfing Society – moved with Marigold to the actors' home at Denville Hall, Northwood, Middlesex. She survives him.
• Mark Kingston (Harold James Kingston), actor, born 18 April 1934; died 9 October 2011