Malcolm Storry

 

Malcolm Storry:  

Craggy 6'2" actor Malcolm Storry is something of a stayer. Since the '70s he has loomed over the cast of an impressive collection of popular TV shows and appeared on the big screen in some big films, yet his is another of those names you might find harder to recall.   

With Lynn Redgrave in the 1985 BBC
drama 'Death Of A Son'

His height makes him an imposing casting for a policeman, and he has played them in a wide range of settings; from the gas-lit streets of the Jeremy Brett 'Return Of Sherlock Holmes', to the more recent cases of 'Rumpole Of The Bailey'. 'The Singing Detective',  'The Chief' (with Tim Piggott-Smith), 'Inspector Morse', and the Bill Murray spy-comedy film, 'The Man Who Knew Too Little (1997).  

As the comically ruthless Peterson in the 
excellent 1987 series 'The Biederbecke Tapes' 

His comedy performances are also splendidly varied. He crops up in various roles in the David Jason vehicle 'A Sharp Intake Of Breath', and is the conventionally intimidating agent Peterson in 'The Biederbecke Tapes', failing to intimidate the show's cynical teacher duo. There was also the David Nobbs farce 'Dogfood Dan & The Carmarthen Cowboy' about truck driving pals unknowingly having affairs with each other's wives.    

With Peter Blake in 'Dogfood Dan & The
Carmarthen Cowboy' 

In the world of drama, he impresses in 'The Death Of A Son', 'Bread Or Blood', 'The Shadow Line', and is memorable in green wig and beard in the 1991 'Gawain & The Green Knight'. A lot of decent middle-brow stuff is also in there: 'Wycliffe' and 'Doc Martin' for example, depending on your tastes, and a ton of popular/populist shows from 'Pie In The Sky', 'Ruth Rendell Mysteries' and 'Midsomer Murders' to 'Boon' and 'The Professionals'. On the whole it's all quality stuff, recent primetime hits having included 'Father Brown' and 'Doc Martin'     

In 'Father Brown'

The big box office films he's been in: 'The Princess Bride' (1987), 'Last Of The Mohicans' (1992) and 'Firefox' (1987), and 'The Scarlet Letter' (1995) are probably not the best benchmarks of his career, in my opinion, but a wander through some of his TV outings cannot fail to entertain.     

Malcolm Storry-imdb

Ian McNeice

Ian McNeice:

 

Over the years, Ian McNeice has physically expanded to something like Fred Emney proportions, but his cold, regarding eyes have kept him well supplied with roles on the slightly sinister side of the street. Graduating from LAMDA and joining the RSC in the early '70s, he made a breakthrough into TV with the newly-created Channel 4's star-studded 'Nicholas Nickleby'. There followed a role in the also ambitious, but now horribly dated 1983 mini-series 'The Cleopatras'.      

 

As Harcourt in  'Edge Of Darkness'

The mid-'80s saw him hit the big screen, in comedies like 'Top Secret!' (1984), 'Personal Services' (1987), and 'Whoops Apocalypse' (1988), but also in dramas such as '84 Charing Cross Road' (1987), Cry Freedom' (1987) and with Bob Hoskins in 'The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne' (1987) and 'The Raggedy Rawney' (1988).

 

   

As an antique dealer, straight from central casting in 'Lovejoy'

Television also beckoned, with light everyday fare ranging from 'Bergerac' and 'CATS Eyes' to 'Lovejoy' and 'Minder'. There's also a fair bit of detective doings, including 'Cadfael', 'Midsomer Murders', 'Murder Rooms: The Casebook Of The Real Sherlock Holmes' and Jonathan Creek. Perhaps more impressively, there was the memorable double act with Charles Kay in the acclaimed conspiracy drama 'Edge Of Darkness'.

 

In the Play For Today 'Miss Pym's Day Out' from 1991

The '90s and early '00s saw an increased demand from the cinema, both home-grown and in Hollywood, with roles in 'The Englishman Who Went Up A Hill And Came Down A Mountain (1995), 'Ace Ventura:When Nature Calls' (1995), 'From Hell' (2000), The Fourth Angel (2001), 'Town & Country' (2001), and 'Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason' (2004).  

 

He appears as Winston Churchill in several Matt Smith-era
'Doctor Who' episodes, including 'Victory Of The Daleks'

As the '00s and '10s have rolled on, there have been good parts in popular TV movies and shows including 'Longitude', the BBC/HBO series 'Rome', 'Doctor Who' - reprising his characterisation of Churchill - and the regular looming presence of Bert Large in 'Doc Martin'. 

Ian McNeice-imdb

Selina Cadell

Selina Cadell:

The sister of the late Simon Cadell, who played the endearingly shy and anxious Mr Fairbrother in 'Hi-De-Hi!', Selina Cadell has similarly made a number of popular comedy roles her own. Most recently, she has been playing the infatuated pharmacist Mrs Tishell in 'Doc Martin', constantly mooning over Martin Clunes' insensitive doctor.     

As the lovelorn Mrs Tishell in 'Doc Martin'

Other comedy roles include: 'French & Saunders', 'Victoria Wood', 'This Is David Lander', 'Birds of a Feather', 'A Bit of Fry & Laurie', 'Jeeves & Wooster', 'Bremner Bird & Fortune', 'The Catherine Tate Show' and a leading role in the curious laboratory sitcom 'Lab Rats'. She seems also to have been much in demand for kids' shows in the '80s and '90s, cropping up in 'Just William', 'Bodger & Badger' (as the nice hippy teacher Miss Moon), 'T-Bag', and 'The World of Peter Rabbit'.  

Brother and fellow actor Simon Cadell, who sadly died in 1993.  

In 'Prick Up Your Ears' (1987) pictured with her
fellow outraged librarian, played by Charles McKeown

Light television drama is another of her strengths, as evidenced by roles in 'Lovejoy', 'Miss Marple', 'Midsomer Murders', 'Jonathan Creek', 'Kavanagh QC', etc. She has also appeared in quite a few feature films, including 'Prick Up Your Ears' (1987), 'Mrs Caldicott's Cabbage War' (2002), Clint Eastwood's 'Hereafter' (2010), the Vanessa Redgrave film version of 'Mrs Dalloway' (1997), and a couple of Martin Freeman's less well-regarded films, 'Confetti' (2006) and "Nativity!' (2009).

BBC publicity shot for 'Lab Rats'

Trivia: From a theatrical family, she is also the cousin of actor Guy Siner, Lieutenant Gruber from 'Allo Allo', and she's apparently best pals with Sigourney Weaver.  

Selina Cadell - imdb