 Born in Edinburgh on 30 November 1922, Graham Crowden is a dominant character player of mad-eyed eccentrics, shambling scholars, since the '60s in film, on stage since '40s walk-ons at Stratford, with National, RSC and Chichester seasons, and eight years at the Royal Court (1957-65). Here he met Lindsay Anderson in whose films, If... (1968), O, Lucky Man! (1973) and Britannia Hospital (1982, as a Frankenstein-type surgeon), he appeared. He could be imposingly tall and dignified, but there was always the enjoyable promise of hidden nuttiness: he could be aristocratic, or just crackers. He has also done masses of excellent TV work, including A Very Peculiar Practice (BBC, 1986/88), as the boozing head of an odd medical centre, and as the maverick inmate of a retirement home in Waiting for God (BBC, 1990-94). He married actress Phyllida Hewat. Brian McFarlane, Encyclopedia of British Film
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FILM & TV CREDITS
