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Tom Bell

Published Monday 23 October 2006 at 12:00 by Jeremy Austin

Tom Bell was considered one of Britain’s finest actors, despite his career not mirroring those of his kitchen sink contemporaries Albert Finney, Alan Bates and Tom Courtenay.

Certainly, his early promise was hindered by an incident during an awards ceremony when, somewhat inebriated, he heckled the Duke of Edinburgh, shouting: “Make us laugh, tell us a joke.”

While Prince Phillip took the interruption in good humour, responding “If you want jokes, you should get a comedian”, Bell’s table mates, the producer and director of his breakthrough film The L-Shaped Room Richard Attenborough and Brian Forbes, were less than amused.

It certainly did not curtail a career that spanned 50 years, beginning when he appeared on stage aged just 15 in 1948. He became a familiar face to television viewers as Sergeant Otley in the first three series of Prime Suspect, appearing once again in the most recent series, the seventh.

He is also remembered by many as Walter Morel in Trevor Griffiths’ television adaptation of DH Lawrence’s Sons and Lovers in 1981, and most of all for his internationally acclaimed performance as Albert Eichmann in the Emmy Award-winning series The Holocaust.

Born Thomas George Bell in Liverpool on August 2, 1933, he was soon evacuated to Morecambe. He was a pupil at Euston Road secondary modern school and earned holiday money working as a photographer on the seaside town’s famous pier.

His became involved with acting under the tutelage of the esteemed Esme Church in Bradford, learning alongside Robert Stephens and Billie Whitelaw.

Inevitably this led to him working rep, with him eventually coming to prominence as the perfect portrayer of the kitchen sink movement’s angry young man, first in the film of Arnold Wesker’s The Kitchen, and then in Attenborough and Forbes’ The L-Shaped Room.

But while his contemporaries embarked on successful Hollywood careers, Bell moved into television following a brief, unhappy dalliance with American movies. British films suited him better and he featured in memorable roles in The Krays, Prospero’s Books and Swing.

While he appeared occasionally in theatre - most notably as Horst to Ian McKellen’s Max in the original production of Martin Sherman’s Bent - he said of the stage: “I’d rather think in terms of films. I photograph quite well.”

He is survived by his son Aran, from an earlier marriage, and by his partner of 30 years Frances Tempest, a costume designer with whom he has a daughter, Polly, and a step-daughter, Nellie. He died on October 4, aged 73.

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