Norman Painting
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Norman Painting OBE | |
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Born | Norman George Painting 23 April 1924 Leamington Spa, Warwickshire, England |
Died | 29 October 2009 , England | (aged 85)
Occupation(s) | Actor, broadcaster, writer |
Norman George Painting
Early life
Painting was born in
Radio career
He began to appear on
Painting had worked as a performer, interviewer, writer and producer for the BBC before he first appeared as Philip in The Archers in 1950. He became a script writer for the series in 1966, following in the footsteps of Edward J. Mason, Geoffrey Webb, David Turner and John Keir Cross. He wrote in his memoir of the programme, Forever Ambridge (named after Ambridge, the fictional West Midlands village in which the programme is set), that he believed that Geoffrey Webb, who had died some time before, was guiding his hand as he wrote. He wrote about 1,200 episodes under the pseudonym Bruno Milna. Artistic disagreements with a then editor, plus a general disillusionment with the BBC management, led him to retire from writing scripts in 1982 and to stick to just performing them.
The character of Phil Archer developed from the lusty young romantic lead of the early episodes, working on the neighbouring Fairbrother estate, into a father and grandfather, replacing
Awards and honours
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/77/Birmingham_Walk_of_Stars_Norman_Painting.jpg/220px-Birmingham_Walk_of_Stars_Norman_Painting.jpg)
He was appointed OBE in 1976, for services to broadcasting. He published two books on the Archers entitled Forever Ambridge (1975 and 1980, for the programme's 25th and 30th anniversaries), and a personal memoir, Reluctant Archer (1982). He was the subject of a programme in the TV series This Is Your Life in 1991. On 12 September 2008, along with The Archers, Painting was inducted into the Birmingham Walk of Stars, becoming the sixth person to do so.
Later life
Painting suffered from poor health in later life, with several heart attacks in 1982 and later pancreatitis, a retinal detachment, and prostate surgery. In 2000, he stated he was suffering from bladder cancer.[2]
He remained a bachelor, and lived alone at Warmington in Warwickshire. His body was found in his home in October 2009, shortly after he had died from heart failure.[3] His ashes were scattered at Painting's Plantation in Leamington Spa, with a memorial service at St Martin-in-the-Fields in May 2010.
He left his recordings, scripts, books, papers and letters to the University of Birmingham, and they are currently held at the Cadbury Research Library.[4][5]
References
- ^ Gillian Reynolds, 'Painting, Norman George (1924–2009)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Jan 2013 accessed 29 April 2013
- ^ Voice of Phil Archer dies aged 85 BBC. Retrieved 29 October 2009.
- ^ Anita Singh, Norman Painting, star of The Archers, dies aged 85 The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 30 October 2009.
- ^ "UoB Calmview5: Search results". calmview.bham.ac.uk. Retrieved 18 March 2021.
- ^ "Fingerprint for the future" (PDF). University of Birmingham. Retrieved 20 August 2017.
External links
- BBC Obituary
- Norman Painting at IMDb
- Norman Painting – The Daily Telegraph obituary