Derek Fowlds

Derek James Fowlds (2 September 1937 – 17 January 2020) was an English actor. He was best known for his appearances as "Mr Derek" in The Basil Brush Show (1969–1973), as Bernard Woolley in the sitcom Yes Minister (1980–1984) and its sequel, Yes, Prime Minister (1986–1988), and as Oscar Blaketon in Heartbeat (1992–2010).

Derek Fowlds
Fowlds in 1974
Born	Derek James Fowlds (1937-09-02)2 September 1937 Wandsworth, London, England
Died	17 January 2020(2020-01-17) (aged 82) Bath, Somerset, England
Occupation(s)	Actor, presenter
Years active	1962–2020
Spouse(s)	Wendy Tory ​ ​ (m. 1963; div. 1973)​ Lesley Judd ​ ​ (m. 1974; div. 1978)​
Partner	Jo Lindsay (1976–2012; her death)
Children	2

Early life

Derek James Fowlds was born on 2 September 1937 in Wandsworth, London, the son of Ketha Muriel (née Treacher) and James Witney Fowlds, a salesman. In early life he and his mother and sister went to live in Berkhamsted in Hertfordshire, at the home of his maternal grandmother. There Fowlds attended Ashlyns School, a Secondary Modern School. After leaving school aged 15, Fowlds worked at a printer's firm as an apprentice and also, as his National Service, spent two years in the RAF as a wireless operator.

Career

After success in amateur acting, his teacher encouraged him to take it up as a career and Fowlds won a scholarship to RADA in 1958.

He made his debut on the West End stage in The Miracle Worker. He appeared in various film roles, including Tamahine (1963), East of Sudan (1964), Hotel Paradiso (1966), Frankenstein Created Woman (1967), The Smashing Bird I Used to Know (1969), Tower of Evil (1972) and Mistress Pamela (1974), prior to becoming familiar to British television child viewers as "Mr. Derek" in the popular British children's series The Basil Brush Show for four series, replacing Rodney Bewes as presenter.

He played the role of Lord Randolph Churchill in the ATV series Edward the Seventh (1975). In Yes Minister and its sequel Yes, Prime Minister he played the naïve and callow Bernard Woolley alongside Paul Eddington's Jim Hacker and Nigel Hawthorne's Sir Humphrey Appleby.

From 1983 to 1985, Fowlds played the lead role in the sitcom Affairs of the Heart. He featured in a more sinister role in the 1990 political thriller Die Kinder. Fowlds then played old and curmudgeonly Oscar Blaketon in the long-running Yorkshire Television police drama nostalgia series Heartbeat set in the sixties for its entire eighteen-year run beginning in 1992. The character first appeared as the local police sergeant, then retired from the force and ran the post office before becoming a publican.

Personal life and death

Fowlds married, and later divorced, Wendy Tory. He later married Lesley Judd the Blue Peter presenter and dancer. They divorced in 1978. His partner of 36 years, Jo Lindsay, died in 2012. He was the father of two sons, including the actor Jeremy Fowlds. His autobiography, A Part Worth Playing, was published in 2015.

He died at Royal United Hospital in Bath on 17 January 2020 aged 82 from complications of heart failure and sepsis, which had followed pneumonia. His funeral was held at St Katharine's Church in Holt, Wiltshire, on 17 February 2020.

Filmography

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1962	The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner	Borstal Inmate	Uncredited
1962	We Joined the Navy	The Midshipman / Carson
1963	Doctor in Distress	Medical Student Gillibrand
1963	Tamahine	Bash
1964	Hot Enough for June	Sun Bathing Man
1964	East of Sudan	Murchison
1965	Gideon's Way	Tim Coles	Episode 26: "The Nightlifers"
1966	Hotel Paradiso	Maxime
1966	Take a Pair of Private Eyes	Ambrose Frayne	6 episodes
1967	Frankenstein Created Woman	Johann
1967	The Solarnauts	Tempo	Pilot: "Cloud of Death"
1969	The Smashing Bird I Used to Know	Geoffrey
1969–1973	The Basil Brush Show	Mr Derek	64 episodes
1972	Tower of Evil	Dan
1973	Mistress Pamela	Sir Percy
1974	Thriller	Dicky	Series 3, Episode 3: "Death to Sister Mary"
1975	Edward the Seventh	Lord Randolph Churchill	Episode: "Dearest Prince"
1975	The Doll	Max Lerner	Three episodes
1976	The Copter Kids	Captain Peters
1978	Robin's Nest	Ricky Hart	Series 2, Episode 2: "The Candidate"
1979	My Son, My Son	Newbiggen	1 episode
1980–1984	Yes Minister	Bernard Woolley	22 episodes
1982	Minder	Meadhurst	Episode: "Dead Men Do Tell Tales"
1983–1985	Affairs of the Heart	Peter Bonamy	7 episodes
1986–1988	Yes, Prime Minister	Bernard Woolley	16 episodes
1988	Inspector Morse	Kurt Friedman / Michael Robson	Episode: "The Settling of the Sun"
1990	Die Kinder	Crombie	6 episodes
1992	Over the Hill	Dutch
1992–1994	Firm Friends	John Gutteridge	8 episodes
1992–2010	Heartbeat	Sgt. Oscar Blaketon	342 episodes
2001	Lily Savage's Blankety Blank	Himself	1 episode
2012	Run for Your Wife	Man in hat

External links

• Derek Fowlds at the British Film Institute
• Derek Fowlds at IMDb
• Derek Fowlds as Oscar Blaketon in 'Heartbeat' Archived 10 September 2019 at the Wayback Machine