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Karl Howman

Karl Howman

Acting

Biography

Karl Howman is a British actor best known for the films The Long Good Friday, Babylon, That'll Be The Day and Stardust, and for playing the charming painter and decorator Jacko in the classic 1980s sitcom Brush Strokes. Most recently, he has been a regular on EastEnders.

Known For

Casualty
6.2

Drama series about the staff and patients at Holby City Hospital's emergency department, charting the ups and downs in their personal and professional lives.

Casualty

1986
Play for Today
6.6

Play for Today is a British television anthology drama series, produced by the BBC and transmitted on BBC1 from 1970 to 1984. During the run, more than three hundred programmes, featuring original television plays, and adaptations of stage plays and novels, were transmitted. The individual episodes were between fifty and a hundred minutes in duration.

Play for Today

1970
Minder
7.1

Roguish comedy drama following the misadventures of small-time crook Arthur Daley.

Minder

1979
The Bill
6.8

The daily lives of the men and women at Sun Hill Police Station as they fight crime on the streets of London. From bomb threats to armed robbery and drug raids to the routine demands of policing this ground-breaking series focuses as much on crime as it does on the personal lives of its characters.

The Bill

1984
The Professionals
7.5

The lives of Bodie and Doyle, top agents for Britain's CI5 (Criminal Intelligence 5), and their controller, George Cowley. The mandate of CI5 was to fight terrorism and similar high-profile crimes. Cowley, a hard ex-MI5 operative, hand-picked each of his men. Bodie is a cynical ex-SAS paratrooper and mercenary whose nature ran to controlled violence, while his partner, Doyle, comes to CI5 from the regular police force, and is more of an open minded liberal. Their relationship is often contentious, but they are the top men in their field, and the ones to whom Cowley always assigned to the toughest cases.

The Professionals

1977
The Sweeney
8.0

Jack Regan, an unethical officer of the Flying Squad, uses unorthodox methods to pursue criminals with the help of his partner, George Carter.

The Sweeney

1975
Blake's 7
7.3

A group of convicts and outcasts fight a guerrilla war against the totalitarian Terran Federation from a highly advanced alien spaceship.

Blake's 7

1978
Van der Valk
6.2

Van der Valk is a British television series that was produced by Thames Television for the ITV network. It starred Barry Foster in the title role as Dutch detective Commissaris "Piet" van der Valk. Based on the characters and atmosphere of the novels of Nicolas Freeling, the first series was shown in 1972.

Van der Valk

1972
Public Eye
8.2

Public Eye is a British television drama broadcast from 1965 to 1975 on ITV1. Produced by ABC Television for three series, and Thames Television for a further four, the programme follows the investigations and cases handled by the unglamourous enquiry agent Frank Marker.

Public Eye

1965
Dempsey and Makepeace
6.5

Dempsey and Makepeace is a British television crime drama made by London Weekend Television for ITV, created and produced by Ranald Graham. The leading roles were played by Michael Brandon and Glynis Barber, who later married each other on 18 November 1989. The series combined elements of previous series such as the mis-matching of British and American crime-fighters from different classes as seen in The Persuaders! and the action of The Professionals.

Dempsey and Makepeace

1985
The Last Detective
7.8

"Dangerous" Davies always gets the cases no one else wants, and no one notices when he eventually succeeds. But his old-fashioned decency and dogged determination have won him legions of loyal fans.

The Last Detective

2003
Brush Strokes
5.8

Jacko is a painter and decorator with an eye for the ladies. He works with Eric, who's married to his sister Jean. The painting and decorating firm they work for is owned by Lionel Bainbridge.

Brush Strokes

1986
Man About the House
7.1

Man About the House is a British sitcom created and written by Brian Cooke and Johnnie Mortimer, and starring Paula Wilcox, Sally Thomsett, Richard O'Sullivan, Brian Murphy, and Yootha Joyce. Six series were broadcast on ITV from 15 August 1973 to 7 April 1976. It was considered daring at the time because it featured a man sharing a London flat with two single women. Single roommates Chrissy and Jo search for a third tenant to help pay the rent, they intend on finding another female. But then they encounter Robin Tripp... who's looking for a place to stay. Two spin-offs were produced: George and Mildred (1976–79) and Robin's Nest (1977–81). A film adaptation was released in 1974 and, in 1977, the series was remade for American audiences as Three's Company.

Man About the House

1973
Only When I Laugh
6.7

Only When I Laugh is an ITV1 sitcom broadcast from 29 October 1979 to 16 December 1982 for four series with seven episodes each, and a Christmas special in 1981. The title is the answer to the question, "Does it hurt?" A naïve middle-class man is admitted to an NHS hospital ward, shared with a working-class layabout and an upper-class hypochondriac. The trio never fail to cause a nuisance for the poor, unsuspecting staff.

Only When I Laugh

1979
The Canterbury Tales
6.1

Glimpses of Chaucer penning his famous work are sprinkled through this re-enactment of several of his stories.

The Canterbury Tales

1972
A Fine Romance
5.4

A Fine Romance is a British situation comedy starring husband-and-wife team Judi Dench and Michael Williams. Dench's sister was played by Susan Penhaligon. It was produced by London Weekend Television and written by Bob Larbey. It was first broadcast on 8 November 1981. It lasted for 26 episodes over four series; the final episode being broadcast on 17 February 1984. The series takes its name from a song in the 1936 film Swing Time, starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, which Dench recorded as the theme music. The series was nominated for nine BAFTA British Academy Television Awards and a winner of two, both for Dench's performance in 1982 and 1985.

A Fine Romance

1981
The Long Good Friday
7.2

In the late 1970s, Cockney crime boss Harold Shand, a gangster trying to become a legitimate property mogul, has big plans to get the American Mafia to bankroll his transformation of a derelict area of London into the possible venue for a future Olympic Games. However, a series of bombings targets his empire on the very weekend the Americans are in town. Shand is convinced there is a traitor in his organization, and sets out to eliminate the rat in typically ruthless fashion.

The Long Good Friday

1980
Exposé
4.9

A paranoid writer is unable to get started on his second novel. He hires a secretary and then his troubles really begin.

Exposé

1976
Get Some In!
6.8

Get Some In! is a British comedy series set in the 1950's that focused on the Royal Air Force National Service. The show was broadcast between 1975 and 1978 by Thames Television. Scripts were by John Esmonde and Bob Larbey, the team behind the BBC TV sitcom The Good Life. The programme drew its inspiration from late 1950s/early 1960s National Service situation-comedy The Army Game, and from nostalgic BBC TV sitcom Dad's Army, but the RAF setting gave it enough originality not to seem formulaic. Thirty-four half-hour episodes were made. The series has never been repeated in full on terrestrial TV, although the UKTV Gold cable channel has aired the episodes uncut.

Get Some In!

1975
Slinger's Day
5.8

Slinger's Day is a British sitcom created by Brian Cooke and produced by Thames Television for ITV. A continuation of Tripper's Day, which had come to a natural end due to a combination of star Leonard Rossiter's death and an overwhelmingly negative response, Bruce Forsyth plays a different character to Norman Tripper but fulfilling the same role, that of the manager of a Supafare supermarket with a team of incompetent eccentrics. Several cast members from Tripper's Day reprised their roles in the first series but departed in the second, allowing for new characters. Broadcast for two six-episode runs from 1986–87, Slinger's Day represented Forsyth's sole situation comedy acting role, and he remained more associated with stand-up and game shows.

Slinger's Day

1986