Michael Goodliffe
Acting
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Lawrence Michael Andrew Goodliffe (1 October 1914 – 20 March 1976) was an English actor best known for playing suave roles such as doctors, lawyers and army officers. He was also sometimes cast in working class parts. Goodliffe was born in Bebington, Cheshire (now Merseyside), the son of a vicar, and educated at St Edmund's School, Canterbury, and Keble College, Oxford. He started his career in repertory theatre in Liverpool before moving on to the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford upon Avon. He joined the British Army at the beginning of World War II, and received a commission as a Second Lieutenant in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment in February 1940. He was wounded in the leg and captured at the Battle of Dunkirk. Goodliffe was incorrectly listed as killed in action, and even had his obituary published in a newspaper. He was to spend the rest of the war a prisoner in Germany. Whilst in captivity he produced and acted in (and in some cases wrote) many plays and sketches to entertain fellow prisoners. These included two productions of William Shakespeare's Hamlet, one in Tittmoning and the other in Eichstätt, in which he played the title role. He also produced the first staging of Noel Coward's Post Mortem at Eichstätt. A full photographic record of these productions exists. After the war he resumed his professional acting career. As well as appearing in the theatre he worked in film and television. He appeared in The Wooden Horse in 1950 and in other POW films. His best known film was A Night to Remember (1958) in which he played Thomas Andrews, builder of the RMS Titanic. His best known television series was Sam (1973–75) in which he played an unemployed Yorkshire miner. He also appeared with John Thaw and James Bolam in the 1967 television series Inheritance. Suffering from depression, Goodliffe had a breakdown in 1976 during the period that he was rehearsing for a revival of Equus. He committed suicide a few days later by leaping from a hospital fire escape, whilst a patient at the Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon, London. Description above from the Wikipedia article Michael Goodliffe, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Known For
A quirky spy show of the adventures of eccentrically suave British Agent John Steed and his predominantly female partners. Jonathan Steed - an urbane, proper gentleman spy - teams with various assistants throughout the series' run, including Dr. David Keel, Cathy Gale, Emma Peel and Tara King, to repeatedly save the world from diabolical schemes plotted by equally diabolical evil-doers (among them robots and man-eating monsters).
The Avengers
Simon Templar is The Saint, a handsome, sophisticated, debonair, modern-day Robin Hood who recovers ill-gotten wealth and redistributes it to those in need.
The Saint
A BBC television anthology series featuring productions of classic and contemporary stage plays usually broadcast on BBC1. Each production featured a different work, often using prominent British stage actors in the leading roles. The series was transmitted from October 1965 to September 1983.
BBC Play of the Month
An anthology series of television plays which aired on BBC1 from October 1964 to May 1970. The plays were usually written for television, although adaptations from other sources also featured.
The Wednesday Play
Theatre 625 is a British television drama anthology series, produced by the BBC and transmitted on BBC2 from 1964 to 1968. It was one of the first regular programmes in the line-up of the channel, and the title referred to its production and transmission being in the higher-definition 625-line format, which only BBC2 used at the time.
Theatre 625
BBC series based on the novels by Georges Simenon which starred Rupert Davies as Inspector Maigret, a French police detective who preferred to watch and listen in order to solve crimes. The series ran from 1960-63 on British television.
Maigret
Sunday Night Theatre was a long-running series of televised live television plays screened by BBC Television from early 1950 until 1959. The productions for the first five years or so of the run were re-staged live the following Thursday, partly because of technical limitations in this era, and the theatrical basis of early television drama. Some of the earliest collaborations between Rudolph Cartier and Nigel Neale were produced for this series, including Arrow to the Heart and Nineteen Eighty-Four. The Sunday night drama slot was subsequently renamed The Sunday-Night Play which ran for four seasons between 1960 and 1963. ITV transmitted its own unrelated run of Sunday Night Theatre between 1971 and 1974.
Sunday Night Theatre
The Protectors is a British television series, an action thriller created by Gerry Anderson. It was Anderson's second TV series using live actors as opposed to electronic marionettes, and also his second to be firmly set in contemporary times. It was also the only Gerry Anderson produced television series that was not of the fantasy or science fiction genres. It was produced by Lew Grade's ITC Entertainment production company. Despite not featuring marionettes or any real science fiction elements, The Protectors became one of Anderson's most popular productions, easily winning a renewal for a second season. A third season was in the planning stages when the show's major sponsor pulled out, forcing its cancellation. The Protectors first aired in 1972 and 1973, and ran to 52 episodes over two series, each 25 minutes long - making it one of the last series of this type to be produced in a half-hour format. It starred Robert Vaughn as Harry Rule, Nyree Dawn Porter as the Contessa Caroline di Contini, and Tony Anholt as Paul Buchet. Episodes often featured prominent guest actors.
The Protectors
An anthology of short plays shown on BBC Television between 1965 and 1973, used in part at least as a training ground for new writers, on account of its short length, and which therefore attracted many writers who later became well known.
Thirty-Minute Theatre
Dixon of Dock Green was a BBC television series following the activities of police officers at a fictional Metropolitan Police station in the East End of London from 1955 to 1976. Some episodes were later remade as a BBC radio series in 2005 and 2006.
Dixon of Dock Green
Callan is the title of a British television series set in the murky world of espionage. Originally produced by ABC Weekend Television and later Thames Television, it was aired on the ITV network over four seasons spread out between 1967 and 1972. The series starred Edward Woodward as David Callan, a reluctant professional killer for a shadowy branch of the British Government's intelligence services known as 'the Section'.
Callan
The adventures of Interpol policemen Duval and Mornay as they fought against international drug-running, homicide, robbery and forgery.
Interpol Calling
When eccentric candy man Willy Wonka promises a lifetime supply of sweets and a tour of his chocolate factory to five lucky kids, penniless Charlie Bucket seeks the golden ticket that will make him a winner.
Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory
Accused of treason, a former U.S. intelligence officer based in London tries to clear his name, taking on freelance jobs around Europe as he searches for answers.
Man in a Suitcase
Cool government operative James Bond searches for a stolen invention that can turn the sun's heat into a destructive weapon. He soon crosses paths with the menacing Francisco Scaramanga, a hitman so skilled he has a seven-figure working fee. Bond then joins forces with the swimsuit-clad Mary Goodnight, and together they track Scaramanga to a Thai tropical isle hideout where the killer-for-hire lures the slick spy into a deadly maze for a final duel.
The Man with the Golden Gun
The Edgar Wallace Mysteries was a British second-feature film series, produced at Merton Park Studios for Anglo-Amalgamated. There were 46 films in the series, made between 1960 and 1965. The films were loose adaptations of Edgar Wallace's books and stories. Very few used his original titles, and there was no attempt to set them in the period in which Wallace wrote, probably to obviate the need for elaborate costumes and sets. A 1962 article in Scene magazine quotes £22,000 as the budget for an episode then in production.
Edgar Wallace Mysteries
Michael Strait is a world-renowned photographer whose assignments lead him into investigating mysterious goings-on amongst the rich and glamorous and intrigue from far-flung places as Iraq, French Indochina, and Algiers.
Man of the World
A half-hour (later 60 minute) drama anthology series based on the works of renowned English author William Somerset Maugham, who appears in the opening and closing of each episode.
Somerset Maugham Hour
The Power Game is an ITV drama spin-off from The Plane Makers (1963–65), created by Wilfred Greatorex. Broadcast for three 13-episode series, Patrick Wymark reprised his role as Sir John Wilder, who here ruthlessly pursues boardroom machinations and tangled relationships.
The Power Game
Sam is a drama set in the coalfields of Yorkshire in the inter-war period.