Allan Surtees

Acting

Allan Surtees

Born — Died

1924-12-31 — 2000-11-01

Place of birth

Liverpool, England

Known for

Acting

Credits

50 titles

Liverpool born actor Allan Surtees was a regular presence on British television with many credits over a thirty year period.

Known for

Casualty poster
6.2

Drama series about the staff and patients at Holby City Hospital's emergency department, charting the ups and downs in their personal and professional lives.

Casualty

1986

Play for Today poster
6.6

Play for Today is a British television anthology drama series, produced by the BBC and transmitted on BBC1 from 1970 to 1984. During the run, more than three hundred programmes, featuring original television plays, and adaptations of stage plays and novels, were transmitted. The individual episodes were between fifty and a hundred minutes in duration.

Play for Today

1970

BBC Play of the Month poster
5.2

A BBC television anthology series featuring productions of classic and contemporary stage plays usually broadcast on BBC1. Each production featured a different work, often using prominent British stage actors in the leading roles. The series was transmitted from October 1965 to September 1983.

BBC Play of the Month

1965

Minder poster
7.2

Roguish comedy drama following the misadventures of small-time crook Arthur Daley.

Minder

1979

Peak Practice poster
6.5

Peak Practice is a British drama series about a GP surgery in Cardale — a small fictional town in the Derbyshire Peak District — and the doctors who worked there. It ran on ITV from 10 May 1993 to 30 January 2002 and was one of their most successful series at the time. It originally starred Kevin Whately as Dr Jack Kerruish, Amanda Burton as Dr Beth Glover and Simon Shepherd as Dr Will Preston, though the roster of doctors would change many times over the course of the series. Cardale was based on the Staffordshire village of Longnor for the final series, but was previously based in the Derbyshire village of Crich, although certain scenes were filmed at other nearby Derbyshire towns and villages, most notably Matlock, Belper and Ashover.

Peak Practice

1993

The Professionals poster
7.6

The lives of Bodie and Doyle, top agents for Britain's CI5 (Criminal Intelligence 5), and their controller, George Cowley. The mandate of CI5 was to fight terrorism and similar high-profile crimes. Cowley, a hard ex-MI5 operative, hand-picked each of his men. Bodie is a cynical ex-SAS paratrooper and mercenary whose nature ran to controlled violence, while his partner, Doyle, comes to CI5 from the regular police force, and is more of an open minded liberal. Their relationship is often contentious, but they are the top men in their field, and the ones to whom Cowley always assigned to the toughest cases.

The Professionals

1977

Film credits

1980s · 6 titles

1970s · 8 titles

Get Carter poster
6.9

Jack Carter is a small-time hood working in London. When word reaches him of his brother's death, he travels to Newcastle to attend the funeral. Refusing to accept the police report of suicide, Carter seeks out his brother’s friends and acquaintances to learn who murdered his sibling and why.

Get Carter

1971

Brassneck poster
9.0

Through the story of a single family, Brassneck traces a history that parallels the Labour Party's advent to power in 1945 through to the property speculation of the 1960s and the disillusionment with the Labour government in the early 1970s. Like most of the early work of the writers, David Hare and Howard Brenton, committed radical (if not revolutionary) socialists throughout the 1970s, it is a satirical attack on capitalist greed and corruption, full of savage, and often disturbing, humour.

Brassneck

1975

The Love-Girl and the Innocent poster
5.6

The prisoner Nemov is an honest man serving ten years for violations of Article 58. Nemov falls in love with Lyuba, who is having sex with the camp doctor Mereshchun, in exchange for better food and living conditions.

The Love-Girl and the Innocent

1973

The Reckoning poster
7.5

Michael Marler, a successful businessman in London, is about to make his way to the top. After 37 years, the death of his father brings him back to his hometown of Liverpool, where he’s confronted with his lost Irish roots. He finds out that his father died in a fight with some Anglo-Saxon teddy boys. It becomes a matter of honour for him to take his revenge without involving the police.

The Reckoning

1970

Black Island poster
8.0

Joe and Michael, 13-year-old Brits, become separated from their class outing, stranded on a small island, and captured by armed men.

Black Island

1979

No artwork available
NR

A group of friends and relations gather at a country estate to see the first performance of an experimental play written and staged by the young man of the house, Konstantin, an aspiring writer who dreams of bringing new forms to the theatre.

The Seagull

1978

The O'Hooligan File poster
NR

' He's wasted his life and yours, Olive, on this sort of idiocy. He could have been a headmaster by now, if he'd stuck to teaching.' Jack Dunn is determined to beat the system with pen and postage stamp.

The O'Hooligan File

1978

Funny Farm poster
6.2

Alan Wellbeck is a nurse in a mental hospital. His day-to-day struggles with personal feelings and troubled patients provide humour and pathos against the backdrop of a public institution.

Funny Farm

1975

1960s · 3 titles

Series credits

Casualty poster
6.2

Drama series about the staff and patients at Holby City Hospital's emergency department, charting the ups and downs in their personal and professional lives.

Casualty

1986

Play for Today poster
6.6

Play for Today is a British television anthology drama series, produced by the BBC and transmitted on BBC1 from 1970 to 1984. During the run, more than three hundred programmes, featuring original television plays, and adaptations of stage plays and novels, were transmitted. The individual episodes were between fifty and a hundred minutes in duration.

Play for Today

1970

Play for Today poster
6.6

Play for Today is a British television anthology drama series, produced by the BBC and transmitted on BBC1 from 1970 to 1984. During the run, more than three hundred programmes, featuring original television plays, and adaptations of stage plays and novels, were transmitted. The individual episodes were between fifty and a hundred minutes in duration.

Play for Today

1970

BBC Play of the Month poster
5.2

A BBC television anthology series featuring productions of classic and contemporary stage plays usually broadcast on BBC1. Each production featured a different work, often using prominent British stage actors in the leading roles. The series was transmitted from October 1965 to September 1983.

BBC Play of the Month

1965

BBC Play of the Month poster
5.2

A BBC television anthology series featuring productions of classic and contemporary stage plays usually broadcast on BBC1. Each production featured a different work, often using prominent British stage actors in the leading roles. The series was transmitted from October 1965 to September 1983.

BBC Play of the Month

1965

BBC Play of the Month poster
5.2

A BBC television anthology series featuring productions of classic and contemporary stage plays usually broadcast on BBC1. Each production featured a different work, often using prominent British stage actors in the leading roles. The series was transmitted from October 1965 to September 1983.

BBC Play of the Month

1965

Minder poster
7.2

Roguish comedy drama following the misadventures of small-time crook Arthur Daley.

Minder

1979

Peak Practice poster
6.5

Peak Practice is a British drama series about a GP surgery in Cardale — a small fictional town in the Derbyshire Peak District — and the doctors who worked there. It ran on ITV from 10 May 1993 to 30 January 2002 and was one of their most successful series at the time. It originally starred Kevin Whately as Dr Jack Kerruish, Amanda Burton as Dr Beth Glover and Simon Shepherd as Dr Will Preston, though the roster of doctors would change many times over the course of the series. Cardale was based on the Staffordshire village of Longnor for the final series, but was previously based in the Derbyshire village of Crich, although certain scenes were filmed at other nearby Derbyshire towns and villages, most notably Matlock, Belper and Ashover.

Peak Practice

1993

The Professionals poster
7.6

The lives of Bodie and Doyle, top agents for Britain's CI5 (Criminal Intelligence 5), and their controller, George Cowley. The mandate of CI5 was to fight terrorism and similar high-profile crimes. Cowley, a hard ex-MI5 operative, hand-picked each of his men. Bodie is a cynical ex-SAS paratrooper and mercenary whose nature ran to controlled violence, while his partner, Doyle, comes to CI5 from the regular police force, and is more of an open minded liberal. Their relationship is often contentious, but they are the top men in their field, and the ones to whom Cowley always assigned to the toughest cases.

The Professionals

1977

The Professionals poster
7.6

The lives of Bodie and Doyle, top agents for Britain's CI5 (Criminal Intelligence 5), and their controller, George Cowley. The mandate of CI5 was to fight terrorism and similar high-profile crimes. Cowley, a hard ex-MI5 operative, hand-picked each of his men. Bodie is a cynical ex-SAS paratrooper and mercenary whose nature ran to controlled violence, while his partner, Doyle, comes to CI5 from the regular police force, and is more of an open minded liberal. Their relationship is often contentious, but they are the top men in their field, and the ones to whom Cowley always assigned to the toughest cases.

The Professionals

1977

Playhouse poster
7.0

A one-hour anthology television series of one-off contemporary and classic dramas produced by the BBC.

Playhouse

1974

Wycliffe poster
6.8

Wycliffe is a British television series, based on W. J. Burley's novels about Detective Superintendent Charles Wycliffe. It was produced by HTV and broadcast on the ITV Network, following a pilot episode on 7 August 1993, between 24 July 1994 and 5 July 1998. The series was filmed in Cornwall, with a production office in Truro. Music for the series was composed by Nigel Hess and was awarded the Royal Television Society award for the best television theme. Wycliffe is played by Jack Shepherd, assisted by DI Doug Kersey and DI Lucy Lane. Each episode deals with a murder investigation. In the early series, the stories are adapted from Burley's books and are in classic whodunit style, often with quirky characters and plot elements. In later seasons, the tone becomes more naturalistic and there is more emphasis on internal politics within the police.

Wycliffe

1994

Pie in the Sky poster
8.3

Pie in the Sky is a British offbeat police comedy drama programme starring Richard Griffiths and Maggie Steed, created by Andrew Payne and first broadcast in five series on BBC1 between 13 March 1994 and 17 August 1997 as well as being syndicated on other channels in other countries, including the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. The series departs slightly from other police dramas in that the protagonist, Henry Crabbe, while still being an on-duty policeman, is also the head chef of the title restaurant set in the fictional town of Middleton and county of Westershire.

Pie in the Sky

1994

Lovejoy poster
7.4

The adventures of the eponymous Lovejoy, a likeable but roguish antiques dealer based in East Anglia. Within the trade, he has a reputation as a “divvie”, a person with an almost supernatural powers for recognising exceptional items as well as distinguishing genuine antique from clever fakes or forgeries.

Lovejoy

1986

BBC2 Play of the Week poster
7.0

An anthology of plays and novels adapted into feature length TV movies, broadcast on BBC2 from September 1977 to April 1979.

BBC2 Play of the Week

1977

New Scotland Yard poster
6.3

New Scotland Yard is a police drama series produced by London Weekend Television for ITV from 1972 and 1974. It features the activities of two officers from the Criminal Investigations Department in the Metropolitan Police force headquarters at New Scotland Yard, as they dealt with the assorted villains of the day.

New Scotland Yard

1972

The Chief poster
7.0

The Chief is a British crime drama transmitted on ITV from 20 April 1990 to 16 June 1995. Produced by Anglia Television, it centred on the politics at the top of a typical English police force in its continual battle to solve the problems the times, in this case the fictional Eastland of East Anglia.

The Chief

1990

Centre Play poster
7.0

Anthology series of half hour plays produced in BBC's Television Centre's studios.

Centre Play

1973

Justice poster
7.3

Justice is a British drama television series which originally aired on ITV in 39 hour-long episodes between 8 August 1971 and 16 October 1974. Margaret Lockwood stars as Harriet Peterson a female barrister in the North of England. It was made by Yorkshire Television and was based loosely on Justice Is a Woman, an episode of ITV Playhouse broadcast in 1969 in which Lockwood had previously also played a barrister. The theme music was Crown Imperial by William Walton.

Justice

1971

Softly Softly: Task Force poster
6.0

Softly, Softly: Task Force is a police based drama series which ran on BBC 1 from 1969 to 1976. It was a revamp of Softly, Softly, itself a spin-off from Z-Cars. The change was made partly to coincide with the coming of colour broadcasting to the BBC's main channel BBC1. The programme was due to be called simply Task Force, but reluctant to sacrifice a much-loved brand the BBC compromised this so it became Softly, Softly: Task Force.

Softly Softly: Task Force

1969

Out of the Blue poster
8.0

Ambitious DS Franky Drinkall's life is turned upside down when he is diagnosed with epilepsy. His refusal to accept his condition leads him into a downward spiral and ultimately to his demise. DS Rebecca Bennett gives an ever-present emotional charge as she finds herself the subject of both PC Holder's and DC Allen's affections.

Out of the Blue

1995

Bill Brand poster
7.2

Following the death of the sitting Labour Party Member of Parliament, Bill Brand is selected as Labour candidate for a Lancashire textile constituency.

Bill Brand

1976

An Unsuitable Job for a Woman poster
7.5

Cordelia Gray inherits a struggling detective agency after her boss's suicide. Her assistant Edith Sparshott aids her as she navigates the dark underbelly of crime, uncovering clues in complex cases.

An Unsuitable Job for a Woman

1997

Vanity Fair poster
NR

In early 19th century England, ambitious and ruthless orphan Rebecca Sharp advances from the position of governess to the heights of British society.

Vanity Fair

1987

The Brothers McGregor poster
5.7

Black and white half-brothers Wesley and Cyril McGregor run an extremely dodgy secondhand car business out of Liverpool. A comedic spin-off from ITV's soap opera Coronation Street, the producers were unable to get Tony Osoba and Carl Chase to reprise the roles, so Paul Barber and Philip Whitchurch were cast instead. For two characters who appeared in a single May 1982 episode, The Brothers McGregor was very popular, running for four series.

The Brothers McGregor

1985

Rosie poster
6.7

Rosie is a British situation-comedy television series, written by Roy Clarke that was broadcast between 1977 and 1981. It was filmed and set in Scarborough in North Yorkshire. The central character was PC Penrose, the titular "Rosie", a young and inexperienced police officer, played by Paul Greenwood. For the first series of seven episodes, broadcast in 1975, it was called The Growing Pains of PC Penrose, but it underwent a revamp with a new title, setting and signature tune.

Rosie

1977

Sleepers poster
7.2

Amidst the thaw of glasnost, the Kremlin discovers that two Soviet agents, sent to England under deep cover in 1965, have been "lost." A beautiful and ambitious Russian agent, sent to London to track them down, becomes embroiled in a tangle of CIA, KGB and MI-5 plots and counter-plots as the two lost agents, now utterly assimilated, try to avoid detection.

Sleepers

1991

No artwork available
NR

Anthology show based off Playhouse

Weekend Playhouse

1984

Nice Work poster
6.7

Dr Robyn Penrose is a lecturer in English at Rummidge University. Vic Wilcox is the Managing Director of Pringle's, an engineering firm in Rummidge. They meet when Robyn is told by her Head of Department to "shadow" Vic as part of Industry Year. They are initially hostile to each other but gradually come to understand each other's point of view. Based on the novel by David Lodge.

Nice Work

1989

No artwork available
6.7

When big-hearted Joe Thompson discovers the pain infertility is causing his brother Paul, he suggests to Paul's wife that he act as secret sperm donor.

Nice Town

1992

No artwork available
9.0

Di Dorkins, aka 'Big D', runs a large textile company called Garsley Garments and also manages of the local rugby league team. Always at the bottom of the league, she renames the team Frilly Things and sets about reviving their fortunes.

All Our Saturdays

1973