The actor Peter Bowles, who starred in To the Manor Born, has died from cancer at the age of 85.
In a career spanning more than 60 years, Bowles appeared in hundreds of productions in film, TV and theatre. But he was best known for his role as Richard DeVere in the BBC sitcom, which aired from 1979 to 1981, starring alongside Dame Penelope Keith, with the pair reprising their roles in a 2007 special.
A statement to the PA news agency said: “The actor Peter Bowles has sadly passed away at the age of 85 from cancer.
“He worked consistently on stage and screen, becoming a household name on TV as the archetypal English gent in To the Manor Born, Only When I Laugh, The Bounder and Lytton’s Diary, which he devised himself.
“He leaves his wife of over 60 years, Sue, and their three children, Guy, Adam and Sasha.”
To the Manor Born catapulted Bowles to fame, with the series regularly attracting TV audiences of 20 million. He played the nouveau-riche businessman DeVere, a wholesale foods magnate of Czech descent, who purchases a grand English manor house from its original owner, Audrey fforbes-Hamilton (Keith), who is forced to sell her beloved Grantleigh estate and decamp to a tiny cottage on site, from where she views DeVere’s activities disapprovingly. The pair marry in the final episode. The chemistry and comedy that Bowles generated with Keith turned the show into one of the most watched programmes of the 1970s.
In 2013, Bowles told the Guardian in an interview about the sitcom: “The show cut across all classes and was watched by 20 million viewers at its peak. The day after the first episode, I walked out to get my morning paper and people stopped me in the street; when I went on stage that night there was a huge round of applause. Suddenly people wanted to talk to me.”
Bowles’s famous fans included Robin Ince, who described his turn as Archie Rice in The Entertainer as “utterly superb”, and cited him as a force behind the production of Gangster No 1 – a play Bowles would star in and which would go on to be turned into a film directed by Paul McGuigan.
I was fortunate to see Peter Bowles as Archie Rice in The Entertainer at the Shaftesbury Theatre. He was utterly superb and critics wrote that his was the finest Archie they'd seen. He also played an important part in the original production of Gangster No.1 - on and off stage.
— Robin Ince 💙 (@robinince) March 17, 2022
The Vikings: Valhalla actor David Oakes, who appeared with Bowles in the ITV series Victoria, said: “He was a true gentleman to work with, and took real class with him wherever he trod.”
Born in London in 1936, Bowles grew up in Nottingham and won a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (Rada) before cutting his teeth on stage with the Old Vic Company in 1956, eventually going on to star in 45 theatrical productions, ending at the age of 81 in The Exorcist at the Phoenix theatre.
He played villains in several TV series, including The Avengers and The Saint. His role as DeVere came in his 40s, after previously turning down a part in The Good Life, in which Keith also starred.
“I hadn’t worked in the theatre for over a decade. In desperation, I went to church and prayed for a role,” he told the Guardian. “The next day I was sent scripts for two plays and a sitcom called The Good Life, in which I was wanted to play the role of Jerry Leadbetter, Penelope Keith’s husband. I chose one of the plays and turned the sitcom down.”
When he was offered a second opportunity to play Keith’s onscreen spouse, he made sure he took the chance – having to overrule his agent, who had initially turned down the role due to a clash with his appearances in the ITV series Rumpole of the Bailey. “I was determined not to pass up a second chance of playing her husband,” he said, after having to personally convince TV executives that he could do both TV jobs.
Eventually, he would become so successful as a comic actor that it started to impact upon his theatre work. Speaking about his success in sitcoms in 2010, he said: “If you have a great popular TV success, particularly in comedy, people don’t think you can act on stage.
“People thought I was just a sitcom actor and the BBC told me I’d never work in drama again. I didn’t realise there were two worlds. It was new to me. I found it very odd and frustrating.”
Growing up, his parents were servants of nobility – his father was a valet and chauffeur to one of the sons of the Earl of Sandwich, his mother a nanny employed by the heir of the Duke of Argyll in Scotland.
During the second world war his father worked as an engineer at Rolls-Royce and when Bowles was six the family moved to one of the poorest working-class districts of Nottingham. Their house had an outside toilet and no bath.
“We were in a Coronation Street environment, but everyone was extremely friendly and there were lots of kids. It was terrific,” he said.
After appearing in amateur plays in Nottingham, when he won his Rada scholarship, he was thrown into a melting pot of talent with peers including Alan Bates, Peter O’Toole and Siân Phillips, and shared a flat with his fellow student Albert Finney.
He was reunited with Keith in a regional tour of Richard Sheridan’s The Rivals, directed by Sir Peter Hall, in 2010.
Throughout his career, he featured in many films including 1970’s Eyewitness, 1995’s The Steal, 2005’s Colour Me Kubrick, and 2008’s The Bank Job.
He also starred in the BBC Two series Murder in 2016, which delved into the psyches of everyone involved in a murder case through testimony delivered straight to camera by each character.
He recently starred alongside Jenna Coleman in Victoria, playing the role of the Duke of Wellington.
Bowles was married to the actor Susan Bennett.