
Acting
Leonard Rossiter
Born — Died
1926-10-21 — 1984-10-05
Place of birth
Wavertree, Liverpool, England, UK
Known for
Acting
Credits
88 titles
Leonard Rossiter (21 October 1926 – 5 October 1984) was an English actor known for his roles as Rupert Rigsby, in the British comedy television series Rising Damp (1974–78), and Reginald Iolanthe Perrin, in The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin (1976–79). He also had a long and distinguished career in the theatre and gained some notoriety for a series of Cinzano commercials (1978–1983), with Joan Collins.
Known for
7.2Arena is a British television documentary series, made and broadcast by the BBC. Voted by leading TV executives in Broadcast as one of the top 50 most influential programmes of all time, it has run since 1 October 1975 with over five hundred episodes made, directed by the likes of Martin Scorsese, Alan Yentob, Roly Keating, Frederick Baker, Volker Schlondorff and Vikram Jayanti. Arena's subjects are a roll-call of the world's best known cultural figures from the 20th and 21st centuries, from singers Bob Dylan and Amy Winehouse to academics Edward Said and Eric Hobsbawm, from writers Jean Genet and V S Naipaul to artists Francis Bacon and Louise Bourgeois. The current series editor is Anthony Wall.
Arena
1975
6.6Play 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
5.2A 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
5.2An 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
8.0Humanity finds a mysterious object buried beneath the lunar surface and sets off to find its origins with the help of HAL 9000, the world's most advanced super computer.
2001: A Space Odyssey
1968
7.3Z-Cars or Z Cars is a British television drama series centred on the work of mobile uniformed police in the fictional town of Newtown, based on Kirkby, Merseyside. Produced by the BBC, it debuted in January 1962 and ran until September 1978.
Z-Cars
1962
Film credits
2000s · 2 titles
1990s · 1 titles
1980s · 11 titles
5.1The Pink Panther diamond is stolen once again from Lugash and the authorities call in Chief Inspector Clouseau from France. His plane disappears en-route. This time, famous French TV reporter Marie Jouvet sets out to solve the mystery and starts to interview everybody connected to Clouseau.
Trail of the Pink Panther
1982
6.2Britannia Hospital, an esteemed English institution, is marking its gala anniversary with a visit by the Queen Mother herself. But when investigative reporter Mick Travis arrives to cover the celebration, he finds the hospital under siege by striking workers, ruthless unions, violent demonstrators, racist aristocrats, an African cannibal dictator, and sinister human experiments.
Britannia Hospital
1982
6.1The British governor of a tiny island nation in the Caribbean Commonwealth finds his idyllic existence thrown into chaos when an American drilling company finds a huge source of natural mineral water there.
Water
1985
5.5Stingy landlord Rigsby manages to scam his lodgers John, an art student, and Philip, an African medical student, making both pay for a room they must share. However Rigsby's favorite lodger, Miss Jones, flirts with Philip rather than him, despite his pitiful attempts at seduction.
Rising Damp
1980
7.3The reign of England's King John is threatened by Philip of France who demands that John's nephew Arthur be placed on the throne. Pragmatic and decisive, King John moves to plactate the French, but there are others who seek disputre his authority.
The Life and Death of King John
1984
NRSkits from: "The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin"; "The Les Dawson Show"; "Yes Minister"; "Only Fools and Horses"; "Three of a Kind"; "Last of the Summer Wine"; "Sorry!"; "Butterflies"; "Smith and Jones"; and "Open All Hours".
The Funny Side of Christmas
1982
10.0A factory's workforce is dwindling as divisions between the workers and management widen.
The Factory
1981
NRAnglia Television's 5 episode TV miniseries adaption of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland was inspired and based upon an early production put on by the famous Da Silva Puppets group at the Norwich Puppet Theatre.
Alice in Wonderland
1985
NR46-year-old Reginald Iolanthe Perrin is suffering a midlife crisis and tries to escape his dreary life.
The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin
1983
NRA wily publisher of arts magazines tries to cope with ever-growing financial problems - and also his formidable German mother.
The Moon Over Soho
1985
NRA middle-aged man is feeling the strain of looking after his elderly grandfather, who is demanding and needs a lot of medical treatment. Then a neighbour suggests a painless way to be rid of him. This black comedy is set in the future, where euthanasia is lawful and increasingly common, but it should still, ideally, be voluntary.
Dog Ends
1984
1970s · 12 titles
6.9Charles Dreyfus, who has finally cracked over inspector Clouseau's antics, escapes from a mental institution and launches an elaborate plan to get rid of Clouseau once and for all.
The Pink Panther Strikes Again
1976
8.0An Irish rogue uses his cunning and wit to work his way up the social classes of 18th century England, transforming himself from the humble Redmond Barry into the noble Barry Lyndon.
Barry Lyndon
1975
6.0A luxury liner carries Jewish refugees from Hitler's Germany in a desperate fight for survival.
Voyage of the Damned
1976
6.0A 16th-century clergyman's view breaks the Catholic Church apart.
Luther
1974
6.0A 'machinegunner' (West Country slang for a debt-collector) turns amateur sleuth, but finds himself in hot water with local criminals.
Machinegunner
1976
7.0A junk dealer is caught in the middle of a tug-of-war between a woman, her husband and his mistress when they sell a piece of their furniture.
The Italian Table
1970
NR"The voice will make its effect. And it will, undoubtedly, be very touching. But, tell me: after his voice has broken, can you make anything of him then?" After the solo, after the chorus, after the applause?
After the Solo
1975
6.0The incredibly true story of the legendary French entertainer Joseph Pujol, who performed impersonations with his self-described 'elastic anus' and a surfeit of wind.
Le Petomane
1979
NRThe outrageous – and not entirely reliable – memoirs of Irish writer Frank Harris, sometime cowboy in the Old West, friend to the famous in the literary world, essayist and critic, and seducer of beautiful women.
Fearless Frank
1978
Set in a cemetery, the film tells the story of a young man whom a blind man wrongly imagines to be black, and explores the nature of human prejudice.
If There Weren't Any Blacks You'd Have to Invent Them
1974
A commuter's race to catch a rush-hour train, narrated in the style of a horse race.
The Waterloo Bridge Handicap
1978
Mickey Grant is the life and soul of the many coach trips he has taken. After his latest journey, he meets his travelling companions in a London station buffet and together they recall the journey from Loch Lomond.
After Loch Lomond
1973
1960s · 21 titles
8.0Humanity finds a mysterious object buried beneath the lunar surface and sets off to find its origins with the help of HAL 9000, the world's most advanced super computer.
2001: A Space Odyssey
1968
7.0Musical adaptation of Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist, a classic tale of an orphan who runs away from the workhouse and joins up with a group of boys headed by the Artful Dodger and trained to be pickpockets by master thief Fagin.
Oliver!
1968
7.1When Singapore surrendered to the Japanese in 1942, the Allied POWs, mostly British but including a few Americans, were incarcerated in Changi prison. Among the American prisoners is Cpl. King, a wheeler-dealer who has managed to establish a pretty good life for himself in the camp. King soon forms a friendship with an upper-class British officer who is fascinated with King's enthusiastic approach to life.
King Rat
1965
6.8A young Englishman dreams of escaping from his working class family and dead-end job as an undertaker's assistant. A number of indiscretions cause him to lie in order to avoid the penalties. His life turns into a mess and he has an opportunity to run away and leave it all behind.
Billy Liar
1963
6.1Moorish ruler El Mansuh is determined to locate a massive bell made of gold known as the "Mother of Voices." Viking explorer Rolfe also becomes intent on finding the mythical treasure, and sails with his crew from Scandinavia to Africa to track it down. Reluctantly working together, El Mansuh and Rolfe, along with their men, embark on a quest for the prized object, but only one leader will be able to claim the bell as his own — if it even exists at all.
The Long Ships
1964
5.2Influenced by concerns about overpopulation, the counterculture of the 1960s and the societal effects of television, the play depicts a world of the future where a small elite control the media, keeping the lower classes docile by serving them an endless diet of lowest common denominator programmes and pornography. The play concentrates on an idea the programme controllers have for a new programme which will follow the trials and tribulations of a group of people left to fend for themselves on a remote island. In this respect, the play is often cited as having anticipated the craze for reality television.
The Year of the Sex Olympics
1968
5.4Cat burglar Henry Clarke and his accomplices the Moreaus attempt to steal diamonds from the chateau of millionaire Salinas.
Deadfall
1968
7.0In early 1960s Northern England, Frank Machin is mean, tough and ambitious enough to become an immediate star in the rugby league team run by local employer Weaver.
This Sporting Life
1963
6.4In Victorian England, a fortune now depends on which of two brothers outlives the other—or can be made to have seemed to do so.
The Wrong Box
1966
5.8British agent Bulldog Drummond is assigned to stop a master criminal who uses beautiful women to do his killings.
Deadlier Than the Male
1967
6.0Monsieur Feydeau has writer's block and he needs a new play, so he takes an opportunity to observe his upper class neighbors of 1900 Paris. There is Monsieur Boniface with hard domineering wife Angelique; also, Monsieur Cotte with beautiful but neglected wife Marcelle. Henri Cotte traces architectural anomalies (mostly "ghost" sounds in the drain pipes) and plans a night at the Hotel Paradiso, which happens to be the chosen romantic rendezvous spot of Marcelle and Monsieur Boniface. One wife, two husbands, a nephew, and the perky Boniface maid, all at this 'by the hour' hotel and consummation of the affair is, to say the least, severely compromised (not the least by a police raid). All of this is under Feydeau's eye, and his play is the 'success fou' of the next season.
Hotel Paradiso
1966
7.1As Vic Brown vacillates between infatuation and disinterest for his co-worker Ingrid Rothwell, she finds out that she is pregnant and Vic has to reconcile how he thought his life would go with what life actually has in store for him.
A Kind of Loving
1962
6.0Following a nervous breakdown, Gwen takes up the job of head teacher in the small village of Haddaby. There she can benefit from the tranquillity and peace, enabling her to recover fully. But under the facade of idyllic country life she slowly unearths the frightening reality of village life in which the inhabitants are followers of a menacing satanic cult with the power to inflict indiscriminate evil and death if crossed.
The Witches
1966
6.3A petty crook finds himself mistaken for a murderer and a secret agent.
Otley
1969
6.2Swinging playboy Grand Duke Nicholas Goduno, a direct descendent of the Romanov family who were overthrown in the Russian Revolution of 1917, learns that his family's crown jewels will be exhibited at a London museum and plots to steal them. To this end, he gathers a crew of beautiful but dangerous women, led by Bridget Rafferty, to assist in his plot against Popov, the Soviet functionary in charge of the exhibit.
Diamonds for Breakfast
1968
The writer and philosopher Voltaire decides to take action when he hears of a case of a man being tortured after being accused of murdering his son.
The Fanatics
1968
5.0An English professor decides that there are too many useless people in the world and invents a gas that will kill them off. But first they'll at least have a good laugh.
A Jolly Bad Fellow
1964
10.0A liberal white man becomes a Muslim to promote racial harmony.
Drums Along The Avon
1967
6.5Margaret Ross is an impoverished old woman who lives alone in a seedy apartment and enjoys a rich fantasy life as an heiress. One day she discovers stolen money hidden by her son and believes her fantasy has come true.
The Whisperers
1967
In London, a traitor is selling information. In Moscow, a Yorkshire cloth salesman is approached by the KGB, who believe he has more to sell than cloth.
The Double Agent
1969
The discovery of mysterious egg-shaped objects at the sites of a series of disasters lead people to believe that we are being attacked by alien beings, but it is revealed to be a conspiracy.
The Devil's Eggshell
1966
Series credits
7.2Arena is a British television documentary series, made and broadcast by the BBC. Voted by leading TV executives in Broadcast as one of the top 50 most influential programmes of all time, it has run since 1 October 1975 with over five hundred episodes made, directed by the likes of Martin Scorsese, Alan Yentob, Roly Keating, Frederick Baker, Volker Schlondorff and Vikram Jayanti. Arena's subjects are a roll-call of the world's best known cultural figures from the 20th and 21st centuries, from singers Bob Dylan and Amy Winehouse to academics Edward Said and Eric Hobsbawm, from writers Jean Genet and V S Naipaul to artists Francis Bacon and Louise Bourgeois. The current series editor is Anthony Wall.
Arena
1975
6.6Play 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
6.6Play 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
5.2A 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
5.2A 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
5.2An 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
5.2An 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
7.3Z-Cars or Z Cars is a British television drama series centred on the work of mobile uniformed police in the fictional town of Newtown, based on Kirkby, Merseyside. Produced by the BBC, it debuted in January 1962 and ran until September 1978.
Z-Cars
1962
7.0ITV Playhouse is a British comedy-drama TV series that ran from 1967 to 1983, which featured contributions from playwrights such as Dennis Potter, Rhys Adrian and Alan Sharp. The series began in black and white, but was later shot in colour and was produced by various companies for the ITV network, a format that would inspire Dramarama. Actors appearing in the series included Leslie Anderson, Gwen Nelson, Ricky Alleyne, Pat Heywood, Michael Elphick, Ian Hendry, Edward Woodward, Margaret Lockwood, Jessie Matthews and Lloyd Peters.
ITV Playhouse
1967
7.0ITV Playhouse is a British comedy-drama TV series that ran from 1967 to 1983, which featured contributions from playwrights such as Dennis Potter, Rhys Adrian and Alan Sharp. The series began in black and white, but was later shot in colour and was produced by various companies for the ITV network, a format that would inspire Dramarama. Actors appearing in the series included Leslie Anderson, Gwen Nelson, Ricky Alleyne, Pat Heywood, Michael Elphick, Ian Hendry, Edward Woodward, Margaret Lockwood, Jessie Matthews and Lloyd Peters.
ITV Playhouse
1967
7.2Theatre 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
7.2Theatre 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
7.2Theatre 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
7.2Theatre 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
4.2An anthology of short plays shown on BBC Television between 1965 and 1973, used in part at least as a training ground for new writers, on account of its short length, and which therefore attracted many writers who later became well known.
Thirty-Minute Theatre
1965
4.2An anthology of short plays shown on BBC Television between 1965 and 1973, used in part at least as a training ground for new writers, on account of its short length, and which therefore attracted many writers who later became well known.
Thirty-Minute Theatre
1965
4.2An anthology of short plays shown on BBC Television between 1965 and 1973, used in part at least as a training ground for new writers, on account of its short length, and which therefore attracted many writers who later became well known.
Thirty-Minute Theatre
1965
7.0Anthology series of dramatic works.
ITV Saturday Night Theatre
1969
6.0The BBC Television Shakespeare is a series of British television adaptations of the plays of William Shakespeare, created by Cedric Messina and produced by BBC Television. It was transmitted in the UK from 3 December 1978 to 27 April 1985 and spanned seven series. Development of the series began in 1975 when Messina saw that Glamis Castle would make a perfect location for an adaptation of Shakespeare's play As You Like It. On returning to London, he envisioned an entire series devoted exclusively to the dramatic works of Shakespeare. After encountering numerous problems trying to produce the series, Messina eventually pitched the idea to the BBC’s departmental heads and the series was greenlighted. The series as a whole received generally negative reviews from critics.
The BBC Television Shakespeare
1978
7.0An 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
7.8A father and son who work as rag-and-bone men live together in Shepherd's Bush, London. While Albert is content with their way of life, Harold aspires to better himself and build a life of his own, but his attempts are repeatedly thwarted by his father, leading to frequent clashes between the two.
Steptoe and Son
1962
7.8A father and son who work as rag-and-bone men live together in Shepherd's Bush, London. While Albert is content with their way of life, Harold aspires to better himself and build a life of his own, but his attempts are repeatedly thwarted by his father, leading to frequent clashes between the two.
Steptoe and Son
1962
Thursday Theatre is a British television anthology programme produced by and aired on the BBC from 1964–1965. The productions ranged in duration from 75 to 95 minutes. Out of the 23 episodes, 13 are believed lost, and one is incomplete.
Thursday Theatre
1964
An anthology of single plays offering up adaptations of either of prominent stage plays or novels.
Festival
1963
8.0Redcap is a British television series produced by ABC Weekend Television for ITV. John Thaw stars as Sergeant John Mann, a member of the Special Investigation Branch of the Royal Military Police. It ran for 26 episodes over two series between 1964 and 1966, being about 50 minutes in a 60 minute time slot. Surprisingly for a 1960s ABC Weekend Television programme, 23 of the 26 episodes still exist.
Redcap
1964
7.518 short plays written especially for TV, an opportunity for up-and-coming directors such as floor manager Alan Clarke, who ended up doing 10 of the episodes. Some top ranking performers were attracted to the series.
Half Hour Story
1967
Studio 4 is an anthology drama series utilising BBC Television Centre's Studio Four, and running for two series in 1962 on BBC One. It was envisaged as a sequel to Storyboard, a similar anthology series which had been transmitted the previous year.
Studio 4
1962
8.0Disillusioned after a long career at Sunshine Desserts, Reginald Iolanthe Perrin endures a midlife crisis and fakes his own death. Returning in disguise after various attempts at finding a 'new life', Perrin gets his old job back and finds nothing has changed. He is eventually found out, and later finds success with a chain of junk shops. However, it becomes so successful that he feels he has created a monster and decides to destroy it.
The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin
1976
7.4Set in a seedy bedsit, the cowardly landlord Rigsby has his conceits debunked by his long suffering tenants.
Rising Damp
1974
NRA series of seven individual sitcom pilots from writers Ray Galton and Alan Simpson.
The Galton & Simpson Playhouse
1977
NRYou Can't Win was a 1966 British television series made by ITV as an adaptation of the novels Scenes from Provincial Life and Scenes from Married Life by William Cooper. It stars Ian McShane as protagonist Joe Lunn, an English provincial grammar school physics teacher in 1939 who later moves to London and into the English establishment.
You Can't Win
1966
5.5Follows the adventures of a group of four children, Wellington, Marlon, Maisie and Baby Grumpling. Plus their intellectual dog, Boot. The series is based on Maurice Dodd's long-running comic strip, The Perishers.
The Perishers
1979
5.5Tripper's Day is a British sitcom produced by Thames Television for ITV, starring Leonard Rossiter as a small London supermarket manager whose best intentions are constantly thwarted by the lazy, useless bunch of bums he employs. The programme is largely remembered for the negative reception, and primarily for the fact that it was Rossiter's final television work, the actor dying between the broadcast of the second and third episodes. The series was revived two years later with Bruce Forsyth in the lead role, under the new title Slinger's Day. In Canada and United States, it was remade as Check it Out!, whilst in Sweden, comical duo Stefan & Krister starred in Full Frys, a TV series largely based on both prior iterations.
Tripper's Day
1984
Series of short plays from different regions of the British Isles.
Out of Town Theatre
1966
10.0A six-part BBC2 drama about the Honourable Greville Carnforth, an aristocratic solicitor based in a small village community in the Lake District.
The Carnforth Practice
1974
NRAnglia Television's 5 episode adaption of Lewis Caroll's Alice in Wonderland was inspired and based upon an early production put on by the famous Da Silva Puppets group at the Norwich Puppet Theatre.
Alice in Wonderland
1985
Anthology series of plays based around the theme that "crime does not pay."
You Can't Win
1961
A television series consisting of five original plays, all set at parties.
Masquerade
1974
No synopsis available yet.
Death is a Good Living
1966
6.3The Losers is a British sitcom that aired on ITV in 1978. Written by Alan Coren, it stars Leonard Rossiter and Alfred Molina. The Losers was made for ITV by ATV and was produced and directed by Joe McGrath. In The Losers, Rossiter plays Sydney Foskett, a wrestling promoter who discovers a young new wrestler called "The Butcher", played by Molina, who Foskett ensures loses to get the public's love.
The Losers
1978



