Gawn Grainger

Acting

Gawn Grainger

Born

1937-10-12 (89)

Place of birth

Glasgow, Scotland, UK

Known for

Acting

Credits

67 titles

Gawn Grainger is a Scottish actor. He has been married to Zoë Wanamaker since November 1994. He was previously married to Janet Key and Janet McIntire.

Known for

Midsomer Murders poster
7.5

The peacefulness of the Midsomer community is shattered by violent crimes, suspects are placed under suspicion, and it is up to a veteran DCI and his young sergeant to calmly and diligently eliminate the innocent and ruthlessly pursue the guilty.

Midsomer Murders

1997

Doctor Who poster
7.9

The adventures of The Doctor, a time-traveling humanoid alien known as a Time Lord. He explores the universe in his TARDIS, a sentient time-traveling spaceship. Its exterior appears as a blue British police box, which was a common sight in Britain in 1963 when the series first aired. Along with a succession of companions, The Doctor faces a variety of foes while working to save civilizations, help ordinary people, and right many wrongs.

Doctor Who

1963

Agatha Christie's Poirot poster
8.2

From England to Egypt, accompanied by his elegant and trustworthy sidekicks, the intelligent yet eccentrically-refined Belgian detective Hercule Poirot pits his wits against a collection of first class deceptions.

Agatha Christie's Poirot

1989

Crown Court poster
5.7

Crown Court is an afternoon television courtroom drama produced by Granada Television for the ITV network that ran from 1972, when the Crown Court system replaced Assize courts and Quarter sessions in the legal system of England and Wales, to 1984.

Crown Court

1972

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

The Wednesday Play poster
5.2

An anthology series of television plays which aired on BBC1 from October 1964 to May 1970. The plays were usually written for television, although adaptations from other sources also featured.

The Wednesday Play

1964

Film credits

1990s · 6 titles

A Christmas Carol poster
7.0

Miser Ebenezer Scrooge is awakened on Christmas Eve by spirits who reveal to him his own miserable existence, what opportunities he wasted in his youth, his current cruelties, and the dire fate that awaits him if he does not change his ways. Scrooge is faced with his own story of growing bitterness and meanness, and must decide what his own future will hold: death or redemption.

A Christmas Carol

1999

Janice Beard 45 WPM poster
5.2

Janice Beard is a dreamer who can't seem to quite make it big. She is working in an auto design company and falls for the mailboy, but he is hiding secrets.

Janice Beard 45 WPM

1999

Love and Death on Long Island poster
6.3

Curmudgeonly author Giles De'Ath, a widower with a marked distaste for modern popular culture, attempts to buy a ticket for a film adaptation of an E.M. Forster novel, but instead finds himself watching a tacky teen sex comedy. Yet when the beautiful Ronnie Bostock appears on the movie screen, Giles finds himself caught in a whirlwind of unanswered questions about both his own sexuality and his place in late 20th-century society.

Love and Death on Long Island

1998

August poster
4.3

Set in 1890s North Wales over a long, hot August weekend, the Victorian calm of a household is suddenly upset with the arrival of a London couple who impose their city ways and thoughts on the more rurally based family. An adaptation of Anton Chekhov's play, "Uncle Vanya."

August

1996

Misterioso poster
NR

On the death of her mother, a young woman in northern England learns that her father is actually her step-father. She embarks on a search for her birth father, finds him running a jazz club in London, and learns a lot of happy and sad things about her family that she didn't know before. The title of the film is the classic jazz piece, "Misterioso," by Thelonious Monk, which features prominently in it.

Misterioso

1991

Party Time poster
6.5

At a posh cocktail party, various plans are made, and a missing guest turns up late.

Party Time

1992

1980s · 11 titles

The Little Drummer Girl poster
5.6

An American actress with a penchant for lying is forceably recruited by Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, to trap a Palestinian bomber, by pretending to be the girlfriend of his dead brother.

The Little Drummer Girl

1984

The Raggedy Rawney poster
5.5

During WWII a youth deserts his country's army after a combat experience, but not before wounding his commanding officer with a knife in order to escape. The young man, now very emotionally distraught, dresses in women's clothes and eventually joins a passing gypsy caravan, who think him a young girl... as well as a kind of seer, or 'rawney'. In time, however, he regains some composure and becomes attracted to one of the gypsy girls, which only leads to problems within the gypsy band, especially when the wounded commanding officer finds him.

The Raggedy Rawney

1988

The Party poster
NR

10 May 1968. In Paris the barricades are about to burst into flames as students and police clash. In London the fashionable Left are having a dialogue.

The Party

1988

Red Monarch poster
5.7

British comedy satirising Stalin's inner circle as an absolute monarchs court. In the face of rampant abuse of power and poisonous distrust some still manage to keep faith with the Bolshevist creed until the very end. In front of the firing squad a stalwart bolshevist of the first hour exclaims: "Even in the best democracy errors are being made!"

Red Monarch

1983

When We Are Married poster
7.0

Three married couples discover that, through a legal technicality, they are, in fact, not actually married in the eyes of the law. This was the fifth television film version of this play by J.B. Priestley made by the BBC.

When We Are Married

1987

Marriage poster
NR

Councillor Podkolyossin has called on the services of Madame Fyokla, the matchmaker - decision he is already beginning to regret. Against his better judgment he finds himself competing for the hand of Miss Agafya.

Marriage

1981

Macbeth poster
6.4

Macbeth and his wife murder Duncan in order to gain his crown, but the bloodbath doesn't stop there, and things supernatural combine to bring the Macbeths down.

Macbeth

1983

Doctor Who: The Mark of the Rani poster
6.0

The Doctor discovers his old enemy the Master is intent on preventing Earth's industrial revolution in 19th century England. But the Rani, a second rogue Time Lord, has plans of her own...

Doctor Who: The Mark of the Rani

1985

The Beggar's Opera poster
5.5

A historical adaptation of John Gay's 18th Century ballad opera, exuberantly performed for BBC television.

The Beggar's Opera

1983

No artwork available
NR

The dynamic young headmaster of St Peter's Primary School decides to liven up a parents' fundraising social by hiring a Bavarian band.

Bavarian Night

1981

Elizabeth Alone poster
NR

"Guilty," pleads Elizabeth, "in marriage, in parenthood, in every close relationship. I have failed!" But should we condemn her as she condemns herself?

Elizabeth Alone

1981

1970s · 5 titles

Joseph Andrews poster
5.4

Lady Booby alias 'Belle', the lively wife of the fat landed squire Sir Thomas Booby, has a lusty eye on the attractive, intelligent villager Joseph Andrews, a Latin pupil and protégé of parson Adams, and makes him their footman. Joseph's heart belongs to a country girl, foundling Fanny Goodwill, but his masters take him on a fashionable trip to Bath, where the spoiled society comes mainly to see and be seen, but drowns in the famous Roman baths. When the all but grieving lady finds Joseph's Christian virtue and true love resist her lusting passes just as well as the many ladies who fancy her footman, she fires the boy. He's found and nursed by an innkeeper's maid, which stirs lusts there, again besides his honorable conduct, but is found by the good parson.

Joseph Andrews

1977

The Incredible Sarah poster
5.6

The legendary actress Sarah Bernhardt's unconventional life and career are examined in this biopic. At an audition in 1860, the teenage Bernhardt proclaims herself the greatest actress of her time. Her career blossoms, as does her private life. But art and life don't stay balanced, much to the frustration of her lovers. The eccentric Bernhardt eventually does marry another actor, but it's her life on stage that ultimately gives her the most satisfaction.

The Incredible Sarah

1976

Mastermind poster
4.8

Zero Mostel plays an inspector on the trail of criminals who have captured a robot called Chatze(sp?) played by Felix Silas. The inspector has delusions that he is a great Samurai warrior and the movie flashes back and forth between present day and ancient times.

Mastermind

1976

Three Piece Suite poster
6.0

Miniseries comprising short plays featuring Diana Rigg and guests.

Three Piece Suite

1977

No artwork available
7.0

Apparently a British answer to the Boys in the Band

Male Bait

1971

Series credits

Midsomer Murders poster
7.5

The peacefulness of the Midsomer community is shattered by violent crimes, suspects are placed under suspicion, and it is up to a veteran DCI and his young sergeant to calmly and diligently eliminate the innocent and ruthlessly pursue the guilty.

Midsomer Murders

1997

Doctor Who poster
7.9

The adventures of The Doctor, a time-traveling humanoid alien known as a Time Lord. He explores the universe in his TARDIS, a sentient time-traveling spaceship. Its exterior appears as a blue British police box, which was a common sight in Britain in 1963 when the series first aired. Along with a succession of companions, The Doctor faces a variety of foes while working to save civilizations, help ordinary people, and right many wrongs.

Doctor Who

1963

Agatha Christie's Poirot poster
8.2

From England to Egypt, accompanied by his elegant and trustworthy sidekicks, the intelligent yet eccentrically-refined Belgian detective Hercule Poirot pits his wits against a collection of first class deceptions.

Agatha Christie's Poirot

1989

Crown Court poster
5.7

Crown Court is an afternoon television courtroom drama produced by Granada Television for the ITV network that ran from 1972, when the Crown Court system replaced Assize courts and Quarter sessions in the legal system of England and Wales, to 1984.

Crown Court

1972

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

The Wednesday Play poster
5.2

An anthology series of television plays which aired on BBC1 from October 1964 to May 1970. The plays were usually written for television, although adaptations from other sources also featured.

The Wednesday Play

1964

The Bill poster
6.8

The daily lives of the men and women at Sun Hill Police Station as they fight crime on the streets of London. From bomb threats to armed robbery and drug raids to the routine demands of policing this ground-breaking series focuses as much on crime as it does on the personal lives of its characters.

The Bill

1984

The Bill poster
6.8

The daily lives of the men and women at Sun Hill Police Station as they fight crime on the streets of London. From bomb threats to armed robbery and drug raids to the routine demands of policing this ground-breaking series focuses as much on crime as it does on the personal lives of its characters.

The Bill

1984

Doc Martin poster
8.3

Doc Martin is a British television comedy drama series starring Martin Clunes in the title role. It was created by Dominic Minghella after the character of Dr. Martin Bamford in the 2000 comedy film Saving Grace. The show is set in the fictional seaside village of Portwenn and filmed on location in the village of Port Isaac, Cornwall, England, with most interior scenes shot in a converted local barn. Five series aired between 2004 and 2011, together with a feature-length special that aired on Christmas Day 2006. Series 6 began airing on ITV on 2 September 2013.

Doc Martin

2004

Theatre 625 poster
7.2

Theatre 625 is a British television drama anthology series, produced by the BBC and transmitted on BBC2 from 1964 to 1968. It was one of the first regular programmes in the line-up of the channel, and the title referred to its production and transmission being in the higher-definition 625-line format, which only BBC2 used at the time.

Theatre 625

1964

No Hiding Place poster
4.8

No Hiding Place is a British television series that was produced at Wembley Studios by Associated-Rediffusion for the ITV network between 16 September 1959 and 22 June 1967. It was the sequel to the series Murder Bag and Crime Sheet, all starring Raymond Francis as Detective Superintendent, later Detective Chief Superintendent Tom Lockhart.

No Hiding Place

1959

Playhouse poster
7.0

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

Playhouse

1974

Playhouse poster
7.0

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

Playhouse

1974

Foyle's War poster
7.9

As WW2 rages around the world, DCS Foyle fights his own war on the home-front as he investigates crimes on the south coast of England. Foyle's War opens in southern England in the year 1940. Later series sees the retired detective working as an MI5 agent operating in the aftermath of the war.

Foyle's War

2002

Dalziel and Pascoe poster
6.4

In the fictional Yorkshire town of Wetherton, the unlikely duo of politically incorrect elephant-in-a-China-shop-copper DS Andrew Dalziel (pronounced Dee-ell) and his more sensitive and university educated sidekick DS, later DI, Peter Pascoe is always on hand to solve the classic murder mystery, while maintaining down-to-Earth wit and humour.

Dalziel and Pascoe

1996

Taggart poster
6.6

Taggart is a Scottish detective television program. The series revolves around a group of detectives initially in the Maryhill CID of Strathclyde Police, though various storylines have happened in other parts of the Greater Glasgow area, and as of the most recent series the team have operated out of the fictional John Street police station across the street from the City Chambers.

Taggart

1983

Rumpole of the Bailey poster
7.1

Rumpole of the Bailey is a British television series created and written by the British writer and barrister John Mortimer. It stars Leo McKern as Horace Rumpole, an aging London barrister who defends any and all clients, and has been spun off into a series of short stories, novels, and radio programmes.

Rumpole of the Bailey

1975

The Onedin Line poster
7.0

The Onedin Line is a BBC television drama series which ran from 1971 to 1980. The series was created by Cyril Abraham. The series is set in Liverpool from 1860 to 1886 and deals with the rise of a shipping line, the Onedin Line, named after its owner James Onedin. Around this central theme are the lives of his family, most notably his brother and partner, shop owner Robert, and his sister Elizabeth, giving insight into the lifestyle and customs at the time, not only at sea, but also ashore. The series also illustrates some of the changes in business and shipping, such as from wooden to steel ships and from sailing ships to steam ships. It shows the role that ships played in affairs like international politics, uprisings and the slave trade.

The Onedin Line

1971

The Expert poster
9.0

The Expert is a British television series produced by the BBC between 1968 and 1976. The series starred Marius Goring as Dr. John Hardy, a pathologist working for the Home Office and was essentially a police procedural drama, with Hardy bringing his forensic knowledge to solve various cases. The Expert was created and produced by Gerard Glaister. The series was also one of the first BBC dramas to be made in colour, and throughout its four series had numerous high quality guest appearances by actors such as John Carson, Peter Copley, Rachel Kempson, Peter Vaughan, Clive Swift, Geoffrey Palmer, Peter Barkworth, Jean Marsh, Ray Brooks, George Sewell, Anthony Valentine, Bernard Lee, Lee Montague, Geoffrey Bayldon, Mike Pratt, Edward Fox, André Morell, Brian Blessed, Nigel Stock, Philip Madoc and Warren Clarke.

The Expert

1968

Hetty Wainthropp Investigates poster
7.3

Instead of spending her golden years lying down, the indomitable Hetty Wainthropp found her calling late in life. Combining common sense, her husband, and her pocketbook, this senior sleuth takes on all the cases the police deem too minor.

Hetty Wainthropp Investigates

1996

The Play on One poster
6.0

A series of television plays, some original, some based on pre-existing plays or novels.

The Play on One

1988

The Play on One poster
6.0

A series of television plays, some original, some based on pre-existing plays or novels.

The Play on One

1988

Centre Play poster
7.0

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

Centre Play

1973

Juliet Bravo poster
6.5

Juliet Bravo was a drama that focused on two female police inspectors, neither of whom were called Juliet Bravo! These two inspectors worked in the small fictional town of Hartley, Lancashire. Jean Darblay was on the scene first and had trouble with her sexist colleagues. However she soon managed to gain their trust and prove a woman could be a successful police officer and housewife. Jean's call sign was Juliet Bravo. When she was promoted and moved on she was replaced by Kate Longton who not only took over the patch but also the headaches that went with it.

Juliet Bravo

1980

The Darling Buds of May poster
7.9

An idyllic picture of 1950's rural England as seen through the lives of the Larkins, a farm family living in Kent. The show revolves around Pa Larkin, a man of a kind and mischievous nature with a penchant for getting into scrapes and talking his way out of them with equal equanimity; and his daughters, as they deal with growing up and discovering the joys and sorrows of young love.

The Darling Buds of May

1991

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

The Queen's Nose poster
7.2

Children's series about a magic coin that can grant wishes.

The Queen's Nose

1995

Theatre Night poster
NR

A series of dramas featuring staged theatre plays.

Theatre Night

1985

Travelling Man poster
6.5

After completing a two-year prison sentence for a bribe he didn't take, former DI Alan Lomax wants answers. With at least one luxury left - a narrowboat, and it's on the canals, among the day trippers and travellers, that he means to seek revenge. Not an easy task for an ex-detective isolated on the wrong side of the law.

Travelling Man

1984

Private Schulz poster
5.3

Private Schulz is a six-part 1981 television comedy-drama serial written by Jack Pulman and produced for BBC Two. It stars Michael Elphick in the title role, with Ian Richardson, Tony Caunter, Billie Whitelaw, Billy Murray, and Mark Wingett. Set primarily in Germany, during and immediately following World War II, fraudster and petty criminal Gerhard Schulz is forced to serve in the SS. In a story based on the real, though unrealised, plot by the Germans known as Operation Bernhard, Schulz tricks the Nazis into making counterfeit British £5 notes, millions of which will be used to destroy the British economy.

Private Schulz

1981

Big Deal poster
7.2

The ups and downs of small time London gambler Robby Box, and the effect that his poker addiction has on his long suffering girlfriend Jan Oliver and family.

Big Deal

1984

Shadow of the Noose poster
9.0

A look at the real cases and personal demons of Sir Edward Marshall Hall, Edwardian London's most celebrated barrister. Presiding over trials that made headlines and drew large crowds to the public gallery, the Old Bailey defence counsel was Britain's first legal celebrity. A champion of justice for all, Marshall Hall earns a reputation as The Great Defender as he pleads the innocence of clients other lawyers refuse to represent.

Shadow of the Noose

1989

The Glass poster
10.0

Jim Proctor, a middle-aged tycoon, decides to hand over his glass-making company to his young nephew Paul Duggan.

The Glass

2001

Worlds Beyond poster
5.8

Worlds Beyond is a British television anthology broadcast on ITV from 1986 to 1988, based on real-life supernatural experiences described in archival documents from the Society for Psychical Research. A book was also released to accompany the series.

Worlds Beyond

1986

Mitch poster
5.0

Mitch is a newspaper reporter with a difference, he cares about the people he reports.

Mitch

1984

Number 10 poster
7.0

Follows the private lives of seven British PMs who lived at Number 10 Downing Street between the 1780s and the 1920s: William Pitt the Younger, the Duke of Wellington (Arthur Wellesley), Benjamin Disraeli, William Ewart Gladstone, David Lloyd-George, Herbert Henry Asquith and James Ramsay MacDonald.

Number 10

1983

Crime Traveller poster
7.3

Detective Jeff Slade teams up with scientist Holly Turner, whose late father has created a time machine that can travel back several hours. Together they solve mysteries using the device. In the beginning of episodes (before they travel back in time), things happen because they DID travel back in time, and they are constantly working to avoid paradoxes. This approach to time-travel is unusual in sci-fi movies, and keeps the plot twisted.

Crime Traveller

1997

Strangers and Brothers poster
7.0

As World War II looms in Europe, an ambitious young English lawyer embarks on his tempestuous career, and even stormier romantic life. Based on the novel series of the same name by C.P. Snow.

Strangers and Brothers

1984

Three Piece Suite poster
5.5

A collection of distinct one-off plays, each showcasing the diverse talents of its cast and spotlighting Dame Diana Rigg’s versatility in a variety of roles.

Three Piece Suite

1977

Three Piece Suite poster
5.5

A collection of distinct one-off plays, each showcasing the diverse talents of its cast and spotlighting Dame Diana Rigg’s versatility in a variety of roles.

Three Piece Suite

1977

Behind the camera