Anton Rodgers

Anthony Rodgers

He appeared on stage from the age of 14. He was known for his television performances, specifically his long-running roles in the television sitcoms Fresh Fields in the 1980s and May to December from 1989 to 1994.

He also had a long career both on stage and in film. His stage roles ranged from contemporary comedy and satirical farce to Restoration comedy,

He narrated three programmes for the railway video production company Video 125[8]

Personal life

Rodgers married Morna Watson, a ballet dancer, in Kensington in 1959,^[9] having a son and a daughter and later divorcing.^[7] Rodgers's second wife was the actress Elizabeth Garvie; they frequently appeared on stage together and toured giving readings from the works of Jane Austen^[10] and Robert Browning, among others.

He was a patron of the Angles Theatre, Wisbech.

Rodgers died in Reading, Berkshire on 1 December 2007, aged 74.^[11] At the time of his death, he was a resident of Whitchurch-on-Thames, Oxfordshire.^[1]

Credits

Theatre

Rodgers made his first West End appearance in 1947, aged 14, in

.

Returning to London in November 1957 he joined the cast of The Boy Friend at Wyndham's Theatre. Thereafter his credits include:

• Fingers in The Crooked Mile, Cambridge Theatre, September 1959
• Appeared in the revue And Another Thing, Fortune Theatre, October 1960
• Appeared in the revue Twists,
  Edinburgh Festival
  , August 1962
• Withers and Tim in John Osborne's double-bill, Plays for England, Royal Court, July 1962
• He was a member of the original cast of the musical
  46th Street Theatre
  , October 1965
• Felix in
  The Owl and the Pussycat, Criterion Theatre
  , February 1966
• Chichester Festival season 1967: Francis Archer in
  Labiche farce An Italian Straw Hat
• Title role in Henry V, Belgrade Theatre, Coventry, March 1968
• Vladimir in Waiting for Godot, University Theatre, Manchester, 1968
• Directed A Piece of Cake and Grass Roots at Leatherhead, 1968
• Devised and co-directed We Who Are About To... with
  Comedy Theatre
  , April 1969
• Dr Stockman in An Enemy of the People, Harrogate, August 1969
• Directed The Fantasticks, Hampstead, May 1970, and took this production and The Rainmaker to the Ibiza Festival
• Directed The Roses of Eyam and The Taming of the Shrew at the Northcott Theatre, Exeter, 1970
• Gerald in The Formation Dancers, Hampstead Theatre, January 1971
• Frank in Forget-Me-Not Lane (Peter Nichols), Greenwich Theatre, then Apollo Theatre, April 1971
• Macheath in The Threepenny Opera, Stratford Festival, Ontario. 1972
• Dr Rank in A Doll's House, Criterion Theatre, February 1973
• Hildy Johnson in The Front Page. National Theatre production touring Australia, 1974
• Lord Henry Wotton in The Picture of Dorian Gray, Greenwich Theatre, February 1975
• Directed Death of a Salesman, Oxford Playhouse, October 1975
• Astrov in Uncle Vanya, Oxford Playhouse, December 1975
• Jack Manningham in
  Gaslight
  , Criterion Theatre, March 1976
• Directed Are You Now or Have You Ever Been...?, Bush Theatre, June 1977
• Directed Flashpoint,
  May Fair Theatre
  , February 1979
• Leading role in the 'musical entertainment' Songbook, Globe Theatre, July 1979
• Songbook was at the Angles Theatre, Wisbech, Cambridgeshire for a single performance on a Sunday to raise funds for restoring this Georgian theatre.
• Jim in
  Passion (Peter Nichols), RSC Aldwych Theatre
  , January 1981
• Walter Burns in Windy City, Victoria Palace, July 1982
• Richard de Beauchamp in Saint Joan (George Bernard Shaw), National Theatre Olivier, February 1984
• Tudor Phillips in Some Singing Blood, Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, March 1992
• Gerry Stratton in Time of My Life (Alan Ayckbourn), Vaudeville Theatre, August 1993
• Dr Feldman in Duet for One revival (Tom Kempinski), Riverside Studios. May 1996
• Etienne in
  Comedy Theatre
  . February 2001
• Grandpa Potts in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, London Palladium, April 2002

Selected filmography

• Vice Versa (1948) - Pupil (uncredited)
• The Browning Version (1951) - Pupil (uncredited)
• Operation Stogie (1959)
• Crash Drive (1959) - Tomson
• Night Train for Inverness (1960) - Scottish Doctor (uncredited)
• The Spider's Web (1960) - Sgt. Jones
• On the Fiddle (1960) - Soldier in NAAFI Canteen (uncredited)
• Tarnished Heroes (1961) - Don Conyers
• Part-Time Wife (1961) - Tom Briggs
• Petticoat Pirates (1961) - Alec
• Girl on Approval (1961) - Snooty Bowler-hatted Neighbour (uncredited)
• Carry On Cruising (1962) - Young Man
• The Traitors
  (1962)
• The Iron Maiden (1962) - Concierge
• This Sporting Life (1963) - Restaurant Customer (uncredited)
• Carry On Jack (1964) - Hardy
• Comedy Workshop: Love and Maud Carver (1964) - P.R.O. / Window Dresser
• Rotten to the Core (1965) - The Duke
• To Chase a Million (1967) - Max Stein
• The Man Who Haunted Himself (1970) - Tony Alexander
• Scrooge (1970) - Tom Jenkins
• The Day of the Jackal (1973) - Jules Bernard
• Intimate Reflections (1975) - Michael White
• East of Elephant Rock (1977) - Mackintosh
• The Fourth Protocol (1987) - George Berenson
• Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988) - Inspector Andre
• Impromptu (1991) - Duke D'Antan
• Son of the Pink Panther (1993) - Chief Lazar
• Secret Passage
  (2004) - Foscari
• The Merchant of Venice (2004) - The Duke
• The Last Drop (2006) - Churchill (uncredited)
• Go Go Tales (2007) - Barfly

Television

• Brambly Hedge as Lord Woodmouse (voice)
• Maigret, as Radek in episode "Death in Mind" (1962)
• Narrator
  , Old Bear, Bramwell Brown, Little Bear, Rabbit and many others (voices)
• The Old Curiosity Shop as Dick Swiveller
• The Sentimental Agent, as Mr Fripp in the episode 'The Height of Fashion' (1963). NB: Billed as 'Anton Rogers'.
• The Champions, as Jules in the episode 'Reply Box No 666' (1967).
• Danger Man as Attala
• Man in a Suitcase as Max Stein
• Gideon's Way as Peter in the episode, "The Nightlifers." (1966)
• Number Two
  .
• The Saint episode "A Double in Diamonds" (1967) as Pierre
• Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) episode 16 "When the Spirit Moves You" as Calvin Bream
• The Elusive Pimpernel (1969) as Sir Percy Blakeney
• The Paz Show as Pappy (voice)
• Upstairs, Downstairs "The Mistress and the Maids" (1972) as Scone
• The Protectors (1972 TV series) episode "King Con" as Alan Sutherland
• Thomas & Sarah (1979) episode "Love Into Three Won't Go" as Richard DeBrassey
• Play for Today episode "Coming Out" as Lewis Duncan / Zippy Grimes
• Jason King as Philippe de Brion
• The Duchess of Duke Street "A Test of Love" as Newdigate
• Something in Disguise (1982) as John Cole
• Murder Most English (1982) as Detective Inspector Purbright
• Rumpole of the Bailey: Rumpole and the Honourable Member as Ken Aspen
• Lillie as Edward Langtry
• Fresh Fields as William Fields
• French Fields as William Fields
• Noah's Ark
  as Noah Kirby
• Disraeli as Bentinck
• Zodiac as David Gradley
• After the War as Samuel Jordan
• May to December as Alec Callender
• Midsomer Murders "Market for Murder" as Lord James Chetwood
• William Whitelaw
• C. S. Lewis: Beyond Narnia (2005) as C. S. Lewis
• You Can Choose Your Friends (2007) as Ken Snell
• Richard the Lionheart as Sir Kenneth
• Wide-Eye as Wide-Eye, Great Grandma Toad and Father Natterjack (voices)

^[12]

Further reading

• Ian Herbert, Christine Baxter and Robert E. Finlay, ed. (1981). Who's Who in the Theatre (17th ed.). Detroit: Gale.
  ISBN 978-0-8103-0234-1
  .
• Theatre Record and its annual Indexes

References

1. ^ ^{a b} "Mr. Anton Rodgers". Reading Post. Legacy.com. 6 December 2007. Retrieved 4 July 2022.
2. ^ "Anton Rodgers". Ftvdb.bfi.org.uk. Archived from the original on 15 January 2009.
3. ^ "Anton Rodgers". telegraph.co.uk. 3 December 2007. Archived from the original on 3 December 2007. Retrieved 3 December 2007.
4. ^ "Actor Anton Rodgers dies aged 74". BBC News Online. 4 December 2007. Archived from the original on 6 December 2007. Retrieved 4 December 2007.
5. ^ ^{a b} Goodman, Sheila. "Actor had a special bond with town". Archived from the original on 27 September 2015.
6. ^ ^{a b} Who's Who in the Theatre: A Biographical Record of the contemporary stage, seventeenth edition, ed. Ian Herbert, Gale Research Co., 1981, p. 582
7. ^ ^{a b} Barker, Dennis (4 December 2007). "Obituary: Anton Rodgers". The Guardian. Retrieved 15 December 2020.
8. ^ "Cornish Branches".
9. ^ "WATSON Morna E / RODGERS Anton / Kensington 5c 2281" in General Index to Marriages in England and Wales, 1959
10. ^ Daniel Lombard (2 February 2007). "Anton Rodgers in Monmouth". Southwalesargus.co.uk. Retrieved 3 November 2017.
11. ^ Strachan, Alan (4 December 2007). "Anton Rodgers: Versatile actor best known for his middle-class heroes in the sitcoms 'Fresh Fields' and 'May to December'". The Independent. Retrieved 4 July 2022.
12. ^ "LGBTQ+ Timeline". www.bbc.com. Retrieved 14 February 2021.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Anton Rodgers.

• Anton Rodgers at
  IMDb
• Anton Rodgers at the Internet Broadway Database
• Obituary in The Times, 4 December 2007
• Newley, Patrick (3 December 2007). "Actor Anton Rodgers dies". The Stage. Retrieved 3 December 2007.