Perry Benson

Perry Benson:

Baby-faced and usually bespectacled cockney actor - almost like a junior Johnny Shannon -  often seen in comedy roles where he seems to make a virtue of a slightly wooden acting style to awkward comic effect. You might have seen him in a number of '80s alternative sitcoms, such as 'The Young Ones', Filthy Rich & Catflap', and 'Dream Stuffing', before he settled things down a little with 'The Black Adder', 'You Rang M'Lord', 'Oh Doctor Beeching!' and more recently 'Benidorm'.     

In the largely forgotten 1983 sitcom, 'Dream Stuffing'

You have been watching... 'Oh Doctor Beeching!'

As a contrast to the comedy has been a darker strain of film and TV dramas in which his flat London vowels have lent a banal gangster menace or fearful snivelling to the proceedings, see for example 'Scum' (1977), the harrowing Ray Winstone/Jude Law movie 'Final Cut' (1998),  'Mr In-Between' (2001), 'and 'Capital Punishment' (2003). Even bleaker was the relentlessly horrible 'Mum and Dad' (2008), a domestic psycho-gore horror set near Heathrow Airport.      

Scary in the grim suburban horror, 'Mum & Dad' (2008)

The '80s comedy and cult film connections are still there though, and he can be seen in interesting stuff like '15 Stories High' (as the neighbour with a horse in his flat), Shane Meadows's 'Somers Town' (2008) and his 'This Is England' (2006) and the TV series 'This Is England '86'. He also seems to appear in a lot of short movies, none of which I've seen, but which suggest that he is somehow involved at the grass roots of the industry.     

In the 1974 Play For Today, 'The Headmaster'

As 'Spaz' in the 'Young Ones' brief piss-take of 'Grange Hill',
with Ben Elton and our old friend Peter Greene     

He's also in the generally unconvincing punk movie 'Sid & Nancy' (1986) playing a chunky version of Sex Pistols drummer Paul Cook, although I think Graham Fletcher-Cook who plays pre-Pistols frontman Wally Hairstyle looks much more the part. My 2d worth, anyway.   

Perry Benson-imdb