Ian Carmichael

Early life

Carmichael was born in Hull, in the East Riding of Yorkshire. The son of an optician, he was educated at Scarborough College and Bromsgrove School, before training as an actor at RADA. He made his stage debut as a robot at the People's Palace in Mile End, East London in 1939. With the outbreak of the Second World War his acting career was interrupted by service with the Royal Armoured Corps as a commissioned officer in the 22nd Dragoons. He served in the Normandy campaign, losing the tip of one finger in an accident with the turret hatch of a Valentine tank, and reached the rank of major before returning to civilian life in 1947.

Career

Before the war, the young actor left his family business in Hull to attend the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts and to sing in talent contests at the Hammersmith Palais de Danse.

In the years which followed his demob from the British Army in 1947, Carmichael worked mostly on stage. In 1949 he toured for seven months in The Lilac Domino, in which he was half of a comedy double act with Leo Franklyn. He played the part of Otto Bergmann in a West End revival of Wild Violets, then appeared in several revues. One which began at the Lyric, Hammersmith, in 1951, moved into the West End as The Globe Revue of 1952, and later that year Carmichael was the song-and-dance star of High Spirits at the Hippodrome Theatre. Further revues followed.

After minor film roles, Carmichael portrayed serious characters on screen in Betrayed (1954), starring Clark Gable and Lana Turner, and in The Colditz Story (1955). He had greater success, however, performing in a series of comedy films for the Boulting brothers, including Private's Progress (1956), Brothers in Law (1957), and I'm All Right Jack (1959). He appeared in similar films for other producers such as School for Scoundrels (1960) and in the "Pride" segment of The Magnificent Seven Deadly Sins (1971).

During the 1960s and 1970s, he worked in television, including the sitcom, Bachelor Father, based on the story of a real-life bachelor who took on several foster children. For the BBC he was Bertie Wooster, opposite Dennis Price as Jeeves, in several series of The World of Wooster, based on the works of P.G. Wodehouse. In later years, he was heard on BBC radio as Galahad Threepwood, another Wodehouse creation. In the 1970s and 1980s, he played Lord Peter Wimsey in several radio and television series based on the mystery novels by Dorothy L. Sayers.

Carmichael continued to act until shortly before he died. In 1999, he appeared in the BBC serial Wives and Daughters. In the ITV series Heartbeat, and its spin-off The Royal, he played the Hospital Secretary T.J. Middleditch (2003–07 and 2009 ). He also spent much time in recording audio books: Three Men in a Boat and Three Men on the Bummel by Jerome K. Jerome, and most of the Lord Peter Wimsey books by Dorothy L. Sayers.

He was appointed an OBE in the 2003 Queen's Birthday Honours List.

Personal life

Ian Carmichael was married twice: firstly to Jean Pyman (Pym) McLean, from 1943 until her death in 1983 (they had two daughters, Lee and Sally) and then to the novelist Kate Fenton, from 1992 until his death in 2010. Ian Carmichael died of natural causes at the age of 89, at his home in Grosmont, North Yorkshire, on the North York Moors on 5 February 2010. He had five grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. His autobiography, Will the Real Ian Carmichael... was published in 1979.