Michael Gothard's career: overview
Title: Herostratus
Medium: Film
Genre: Experimental drama
Filmed: 1964
Location: London
First shown: June 1967
Character: Max, a young poet
Role: Starring role. Max sells the chance to film his suicide to an advertising executive.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Max survives, traumatised by having accidentally caused someone else’s death.
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Title: The Machine Stops
Medium: TV: part of the BBC series - Out of the Unknown
Genre: Science fiction
Filmed: 1966
Location: UK
First shown: 6 October 1966
Character: Kuno, a young man living in a future society, underground.
Role: Starring role. Kuno, tries to escape the tyranny of the Machine by going out unprotected onto the surface of the Earth.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Kuno dies, along with his mother Vashti, and their whole underground civilisation, when the Machine breaks down, because no one knows how to repair it.
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Title: The Excavation
Medium: Television: part of the BBC series - Thirty Minute Theatre
Genres: Crime, psychological drama
Filmed: 1966
Location: UK, but set in the USA
First shown: 31 October 1966
Character: Grady, an ex-convict
Role: Starring role. Grady and his partner have perjured themselves at a murder trial; they are questioned by a wealthy civil rights lawyer, trying to get the truth.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Grady is thought to have survived; the couple are not thought to have officially changed their testimony. 1
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Title: The Further Adventures of the Musketeers
Medium: TV serial, in 16 parts
Genres: Historical drama, swashbuckler
Filmed: 1966/7
Location: UK, but set in France
First shown: May - September 1967
Character: Mordaunt, formerly John Francis de Winter
Role: Mordaunt is the son of Milady de Winter: an enemy of the Musketeers, who was executed many years before. He appears in 10 episodes.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Mordaunt was stabbed and drowned by the Musketeers.
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Title: Up the Junction
Medium: Film
Genres: Drama, slice of life
Filmed: 1967
Location: London
First shown: 13 March 1968
Character: Terry: a young Londoner
Role: Terry is a friend of the hero. He is upset when his girlfriend Rube has an abortion, but nevertheless gets engaged to her.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Terry is killed, when his motorbike hits a lorry.
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Title: More
Medium: Film
Genres: Drama, French New Wave
Filmed: 1968/9
Location: Ibiza
First shown: 1969
Character: Man at party
Role: Though Michael has been credited for this film by the BFI, they may have been mistaken. An actor who closely resembles Michael appears in a scene at a party where the main characters are arguing. He takes a drag from a pipe that is being passed round, and later snatches at the air, evidently seeing things that aren't there. Doubts have been expressed as to whether it is actually him or someone else.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): The character survives his short scene.
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Title: The Storyteller
Medium: TV: part of the ITV series - Armchair Theatre
Genre: Drama
Filmed: 1968/9
Location: UK
First shown: March 1969
Character: Brian, a strange young man
Role: Starring role. Brian gate-crashes a party, and asks telling questions of another of the guests.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): According to the filming script, Brian gets knocked unconscious, but survives.
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Title: Michael Kohlhaas - Der Rebel/Man on Horseback
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, historical drama, political, war
Filmed: 1968
Locations: Bavaria, (Germany), Bratislava, (Slovakia), and Moravia, (Czech Republic)
First shown: 11 April 1969
Character: John, a mercenary
Role: John is one of Michael Kohlhaas’ band of rebels on the rampage; he joins enthusiastically in acts of violence and sexual conquest.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): At Kohlhaas’ behest, John is hanged, after admitting to a rape.
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Title: Run for Your Money
Medium: Television: part of the ITV series - Fraud Squad
Genre: Detective
Filmed: 1969
Location: England - set in the Midlands
First shown: 10 June 1969
Character: Jacky Joyce, a fraudster
Role: Guest star. Small-time criminal Jacky Joyce is one of three con-artists trying to defraud people who are desperate to find accommodation. He is messenger boy, and lover, to the trio’s mastermind, Kay Pilgrim.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): The group’s plan is thwarted by the police, but Joyce survives.
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Title: Les Fleurs du Mal
Medium: Television: part of the ITV series - Department S
Genre: Detective, espionage
Filmed: 1969
Location: Elstree Studios, England, but set in France
First shown: 22 October 1959
Character: Weber: a master criminal
Role: Guest star: villain of the week. Weber obtains and cracks the clue to the whereabouts of some stolen loot.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Weber is thwarted at the last moment by Department S, and is arrested.
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Title: Scream and Scream Again
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, detective, horror, science fiction
Filmed: 1969
Location: London, and Chertsey (Surrey)
First shown: January 1970
Character: Keith, an artificially created vampire.
Role: Created in a lab, Keith is an experiment that went wrong, and is now out of control. He brutally murders girls he has picked up in a nightclub, and is pursued by the police.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): At the end of a long chase, Keith jumps into a tank of acid to avoid capture.
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Title: When the Spirit Moves You
Medium: Television: part of the ITV series - Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased)
Genres: Comedy, detective, fantasy
Filmed: 1969
Location: Elstree Studios, England
First shown: 2 January 1970
Character: Perrin, a henchman
Role: Guest star. Perrin works for criminal Miklos Corri; his job mainly consists of surveillance, threatening behaviour, and collecting pay-offs.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Perrin and his employer are thwarted by Jeff Randall and Marty Hopkirk, and arrested.
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Title: Games People Play
Medium: Television: part of the BBC series - Paul Temple.
Genre: Detective
Filmed: 1969/70
Location: Malta
First shown: 19 April 1970
Character: Ivan, an actor
Role: Guest star. Ivan is the protégé of an older actor, Mark. He is one of a number of Mark’s friends who ultimately betray him, in pursuit of “The Game.”
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Ivan survives, but his friendship with Mark is over.
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Title: Nine Bean Rows
Medium: Television: part of the BBC series - Menace
Genre: Thriller
Filmed: 1970
Location: UK, but set in Ireland
First shown: 1 December 1970
Character: Pip, a young heir
Role: Pip gets caught up in a struggle between his brother and his new stepfather, over an inheritance.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Pip is thought to have died by strangulation.1
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Title: The Last Valley
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, historical drama, political, war
Filmed: 1969
Location: Halliford Studios, Shepperton, England, and Trins, Tirol, Austria.
First shown: 28 January 1971
Character: Hansen, a mercenary
Role: One of a band of mercenaries during the Hundred Years War, Hansen refuses to live by new rules agreed by his commander, The Captain, as a condition of over-wintering peaceably in a prosperous village. He tries to rape one of the village girls, makes his escape, forms his own war-band, and tries to wrest the village from The Captain.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Hansen’s horse is shot from under him; a child soldier then cripples him with a blow to the spine from a flail, and though this is not explicitly stated, the filming implies that Hansen’s sentence for the attempted rape - public castration - is carried out. In any case, Hansen clearly does not survive.
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Title: The Devils
Medium: Film
Genres: Historical drama, horror, political
Filmed: 1970
Location: Pinewood Studios, England, but set in France - mainly Loudun
First shown: July 1971
Character: Father Barré, a Professional Witch-hunter and Exorcist. Father Barré is a historical figure.
Role: Starring role. Father Barré is called to Loudun, to prove that Grandier, the leader of the City, has corrupted the nuns from a local convent, in particular, Sister Jeanne. Barré sets about trying to exorcise their demons, and tortures and executes Grandier, bringing about the town’s destruction.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Father Barré survives to continue his work.
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Title: Whoever Slew Auntie Roo?/Gingerbread House
Medium: Film
Genres: Horror, mystery, thriller
Filmed: 1971
Location: Middlesex, and Shepperton Studios, Surrey, England
First shown: 15 March 1972
Character: Albie, a butler
Role: Along with the housemaid, Clarine, Albie milks the gullible Auntie Roo of cash at every opportunity, organising fake séances, and taking a cut when paying her household bills. When he realises that Auntie Roo has trapped two children from the local orphanage in her house, in the hope of keeping them, he demands £2000 for his silence.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Albie makes off with the money and Clarine.
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Title: La vallée/The Valley (Obscured by Clouds)
Medium: Film
Genres: Adventure, French New Wave, road movie
Filmed: 1971
Location: Papua New Guinea
First shown: 6 July 1972
Character: Olivier, a seeker
Role: Starring role. Olivier is one of a band of hippies, who take a bourgeois young woman along with them on their trek to find a mysterious hidden valley.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Olivier and all his party perish in the attempt to reach the valley.
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Title: Arthur of the Britons
Medium: TV series, in 24 parts
Genres: Action, adventure, children’s TV, historical drama
Filmed: 1972
Location: Woodchester, Woollard and other locations near Bristol
First shown: 6 December 1972
Character: Kai, a Saxon brought up by the Celts: based on the Arthurian Sir Kay.
Role: Starring role. As Arthur’s adopted brother, right-hand man, and friend, Kai is a partner in Arthur’s struggle to unite the warring Celtic tribes against the invading Saxons.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Kai survives to carry on the fight at Arthur’s side.
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Title: The Three Musketeers/The Queen’s Diamonds
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, comedy, historical drama, romance, swashbuckler
Filmed: 1973
Location: Estudios Cinematografica Roma S.A., Madrid, and Castilla-La Mancha, Spain.
First shown: 11 December 1973
Character: Felton, a Puritan. Felton is a historical figure.
Role: Felton appears in a few brief scenes, as an attendant to the Duke of Buckingham.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Felton survives this film unscathed.
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Title: The Four Musketeers/The Revenge of Milady
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, comedy, historical drama, romance, swashbuckler
Filmed: 1973
Location: Estudios Cinematografica Roma S.A., Madrid, and Castilla-La Mancha, Spain.
First shown: 31 October 1974
Character: Felton, a Puritan. Felton is a historical figure.
Role: Charged by the Duke of Buckingham with custody of Milady de Winter, Felton is seduced, and persuaded that that the Duke is a Catholic, and a traitor to the Crown. He helps Milady escape, stabs the Duke, and is arrested.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): John Felton is arrested; as a traitor, his execution is inevitable, though not shown. The real John Felton was hanged.
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Title: Warrior Queen
Medium: TV serial, in 6 parts
Genres: Children’s TV, historical drama, political
Filmed: 1977
Location: Surrey, England
First shown: 20 February 1978
Character: Volthan, a Druid priest
Role: Co-starring role. Volthan is Queen Boudicca’s religious and political advisor in her struggle to free the Iceni from the Romans.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Volthan survives the final battle in which Boudicca is defeated.
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Title: Warlords of Atlantis/Warlords of the Deep
Medium: Film
Genre: Adventure, fantasy, science fiction
Filmed: 1977/8
Location: Malta, Gozo Island, and Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire,
First shown: May 1978
Character: Atmir, an alien dignitary
Role: Atmir is spokesperson for a race of alien Nazis from Mars, who are manipulating the human race from their undersea city of Atlantis.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Atmir survives, but his captives escape, and wreak destruction on Atlantis.
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Title: Stopover
Medium: Television: part of the ITV series - The Professionals
Genres: Action, detective, espionage
Filmed: 1979
Location: North Finchley in London, Northwood in Middlesex, White Waltham Airfield in Berkshire
First shown: 10 November 1979
Character: Kodai, a KGB agent
Role: Guest star. Kodai is an old adversary of the head of CI5, George Cowley, and has been sent to try to kill him.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Kodai is shot by Bodie, following a car chase.
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Title: A Tale of Two Cities: episodes 2 and 3
Medium: TV serial, in 8 parts
Genres: Children’s TV, historical drama, political
Filmed: 1980
Location: Elizabeth Castle and Trinity Manor, Jersey - but set in France
First shown: 5 October 1980 (first episode)
Character: Gaspard, a revolutionary
Role: Gaspard appears briefly in episode 2. In episode 3, his little daughter is killed by a carriage belonging to the Marquis St. Evremonde. Gaspard goes to the Marquis’ country estate, and kills him.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): In the fourth episode, a group of the revolutionaries describe how Gaspard escaped capture for some time, but was eventually caught and hanged.
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Title: The Mayfly Dance
Medium: Television: part of the BBC series - Shoestring
Genre: Detective
Filmed: 1980
Location: Possibly Bristol or Cardiff
First shown: 26 October 1980
Character: Harry, rock star turned farmer
Role: Harry was once in the same band as missing singer, Jody Brent. He gives Eddie Shoestring an idea of where Jody can be found, so that the truth about a death can be revealed.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Harry survives his short scene.
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Title: The Perfect House
Medium: Television: part of the series - ITV Playhouse
Genres: Thriller, political
Filmed: 1979
Location: UK
First shown: 17 March 1981
Character: Dieter
Role: Dieter is working with an Argentinian terrorist group; they use an innocent woman’s home as a safe house.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Dieter and his comrades leave the house, and go on their way.
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Title: For Your Eyes Only
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, espionage, romance, thriller
Filmed: From September 1980
Location: Corfu, Greece, Italy and Pinewood studios (England)
First shown: 24 June 1981
Character: Emile Leopold Locque, career criminal and assassin
Role: Bond Villain. Locque appears to be the cause of most of Bond’s troubles; he pursues Bond and Melina Havelock, directs a team trying to assassinate Bond, runs down Bond’s lover, Countess Lisl, and kills Bond’s contact, Ferrara. Locque is on the scene when Bond and Columbo raid Kristatos' warehouse; he plants a bomb, before making off.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Bond shoots Locque several times, causing him to crash his car, then gives the vehicle a final push off a cliff top.
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Title: Ivanhoe
Medium: TV mini-series/film
Genres: Adventure, historical drama, romance, swashbuckler
Filmed: 1981
Location: Bamburgh Castle, Alnwick Castle, and Pinewood Studios, England
First shown: 23 February 1982
Character: Athelstane, a Saxon noble
Role: Athelstane’s uncle Cedric wants his nephew to reclaim the throne of England from the Normans, and marry his ward Rowena, and Athelstane, despite his lack of ambition, gets dragged into the intrigues involving King Richard and Prince John. Athelstane is mostly a comedic figure, but when Rowena’s life is under threat, he faces down the Norman lords who have captured his party.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): After the ensuing battle, Athelstane is assumed to be dead. He reappears, stands up to Cedric, renounces his claim on Rowena so she may marry the insipid hero, Ivanhoe, and survives to enjoy the bachelor life.
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Title: The Sweet Scent of Death
Medium: Television: part of the series - Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense/Fox Mystery Theatre.
Genres: Detective, horror, mystery, thriller
Filmed: 1984
Location: UK
First shown: September 1984
Character: Terry Marvin, an apparently sinister florist.
Role: Ann Denver once successfully defended the man who murdered Terry Marvin’s girlfriend. Her husband Greg, planning to kill her, persuades her to move to the village where Marvin lives, so that he can frame Marvin for the crime.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): In saving Ann’s life, Terry Marvin receives a gunshot wound, but survives.
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Title: Our Man in Tegernsee
Medium: Television: part of the series - Scarecrow and Mrs King
Genres: Adventure, detective, espionage
Filmed: 1984
Location: Tegernsee, near Munich
First shown: 19 November 1984
Character: Karl Portillo, a neo-Nazi from Paraguay
Role: Guest star. Karl Portillo plots to undermine the US currency, by flooding the market with fake dollars, thereby bringing his neo-Nazi friends in Paraguay to power.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Out-gunned by Scarecrow and the German police at an old saw-mill, Portillo gives himself up.
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Title: Daddy’s Girls
Medium: Television: part of the BBC series - Lytton’s Diary
Genre: Fleet Street drama
Filmed: UK
Location: UK
First shown: 16 January 1985
Character: Jake Cutler, record producer
Role: Guest star. Jake Cutler is dating a young rich girl, Belinda Phillips. But it is Belinda’s father whom Lytton ends up investigating.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Jake survives unscathed.
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Title: Lifeforce
Medium: Film
Genres: Fantasy, horror, science fiction
Filmed: 1984/5
Location: Elstree Studios, and other locations in England
First shown: 21 June 1985
Character: Dr Bukovsky, Director of the European Space Agency
Role: Dr Bukovsky directs investigations into three caskets found on the remains of a space shuttle. In trying to rescue a security guard from a newly-awakened female alien, he is also attacked.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Dr Bukovsky continues to assist the investigation, but never really recovers. His death is not shown, but he is later said to have died as a result of the Space Vampires’ infection.
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Title: From Fulham, With Love
Medium: Television: part of the ITV series - Minder
Genres: Comedy, crime
Filmed: 1985
Location: London
First shown: 2 October 1975
Character: Sergei, a Russian seaman
Role: Guest star. Sergei wants to buy tee-shirts from Arthur Daley and sell them in the USSR for a profit. But while spending the day drinking with Ernie, Sergei decides he’d like to defect.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): The ship’s KGB Officer persuades Sergei to return home for the sake of his family.
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Title: Going Undercover/Yellow Pages
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, comedy, detective
Filmed: 1984
Location: Denmark
First shown: 17 June 1988
Character: Strett, a henchman
Role: Strett is assisting Maxine De La Hunt, in her plot to kidnap her step-daughter Marigold, and steal her husband’s secret formula.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): While chasing Marigold around the Tivoli Gardens, Strett has a fatal accident on the roller-coaster.
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Title: Jack the Ripper
Medium: TV mini-series/film
Genres: Detective, historical drama, horror
Filmed: 1988
Location: Pinewood Studios, England
First shown: 11 October 1988
Character: George Lusk, leader of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee. Lusk is a historical figure.
Role: Lusk - as portrayed in this film - is a violent rabble-rouser. In a bid for power, he stirs up the Whitechapel residents against the police investigating the Whitechapel Murders, telling them that the police don’t care about the common people. Lusk is one of Inspector Abberline’s suspects.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Lusk - one of a number of ‘red herrings’ - survives unscathed.
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Title: Massacre Play
Medium: Film
Genre: Drama
Filmed: 1988/9
Location: Italy
First shown: 1989
Character: Michael Zabo, an actor
Role: Zabo is one of film director Theo Steiner’s friends, staying at Steiner’s villa. All the guests are bit part players in the drama Steiner has engineered between himself and old friend and rival, Clem Da Silva.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Zabo is saddened to learn that his friend is dying.
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Title: Twelve Degrees Capricorn
Medium: Television: part of the Thames TV series - Capital City
Genre: Drama
Filmed: 1989
Location: England
First shown: 5 December 1989
Character: Stefan, a Swiss Trade Commission representative
Role: Guest star. Stefan meets financier, Sirrka at a bar; she pretends to be a prostitute, and charges him for sex. He still wants to see her again after he finds out the truth.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Stefan survives Sirrka’s rejection.
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Title: Destroying Angel/Sleep Well My Love
Medium: Film
Genre: Drama
Filmed: 1987
Location: Yugoslavia
First shown: 1990 (video premiere)
Character: Ennio Volpe, a hitman
Role: A wealthy divorcé hires Volpe to rid him of his ex-wife, who is blackmailing him, having seen him abusing their daughter Siska. Siska tricks Volpe into killing her father as well. Volpe then despatches her mother’s boyfriend for good measure.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Volpe survives unscathed.
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Title: The Serpent of Death/Out of Time
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, thriller
Filmed: 1989
Location: Greece and Egypt
First shown: 6 December 1990
Character: Xaros, a hitman
Role: Supposedly working for Omar, a dealer in antiquities, Xaros pursues archaeology student Jake Bonner, trying to steal the clues to the whereabouts of Alexander’s treasure. Xaros kills anyone who gets in his way.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Having been fatally bitten by a poisonous snake, Xaros steps on an old land mine, and is blown up.
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Title: Christopher Columbus: The Discovery
Medium: Film
Genres: Adventure, historical drama
Filmed: 1991/2
Location: UK and Spain
First shown: 20 August 1992
Character: The Inquisitor’s Spy
Role: The Inquisitor’s Spy alerts Torquemada to Cristobal Colon’s plans, and assists in his interrogation, in an attempt to stop his voyage of discovery.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): The religious establishment is thwarted, but the Inquisitor’s Spy survives.
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Title: Frankenstein
Medium: Film
Genres: Adventure, fantasy, horror, science fiction
Filmed: 1992
Location: Pinewood, England
First shown: 29 December 1992
Character: The Bosun
Role: On a ship is trapped in the arctic ice, Dr Frankenstein recounts his horrifying tale to the ship’s Captain, and the final part of the drama plays out. The Captain relies on the Bosun to keep him, informed, and his motley crew, in line.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): The Bosun survives to return home.
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~~
1 In an interview in the Marvel magazine that accompanied ‘For Your Eyes Only’, Michael Gothard says: "I've been killed in so many different ways on both the large and small screens. I've been hanged, stabbed, strangled, shot, immersed in an acid bath, crashed on a motorcycle, killed by a 10-year-old boy by a vicious blow to the spine, drowned and - on one memorable occasion - stabbed and drowned simultaneously."
Spoilers follow (highlight to read):
Some of these on-screen deaths are ones we know about:
As Mordaunt, in The Further Adventures of the Musketeers, he was stabbed and drowned.
As John, in Michael Kolhlhaas, he was hanged.
As Kodai, in Stopover, he was shot.
As Keith, in Scream and Scream Again, he was immersed in an acid bath.
As Terry, in Up the Junction, he crashed on a motorcycle.
As Hansen, in The Last Valley, he was killed (or at least maimed) by a 10-year-old boy inflicting a vicious blow to the spine.
That leaves three deaths unaccounted for: stabbed, strangled, and drowned.
If, as Michael says, these deaths were on film or TV, this is rather puzzling. There are only two known productions no longer extant in which these deaths could have occurred:
- the Thirty Minute Theatre play, The Excavation, in which he played Grady, a witness who has committed perjury, but in which he almost certainly didn't die.
- the episode of Menace, Nine Bean Rows, in which he played Pip, the younger brother of a returning mercenary.
It seems likely that the - apparently missing - stabbing and drowning actually refer to that of Mordaunt, in The Further Adventures of the Musketeers, and should only have been listed once. This would mean that Pip, in "Nine Bean Rows", was the victim of strangulation.
Medium: Film
Genre: Experimental drama
Filmed: 1964
Location: London
First shown: June 1967
Character: Max, a young poet
Role: Starring role. Max sells the chance to film his suicide to an advertising executive.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Max survives, traumatised by having accidentally caused someone else’s death.
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Title: The Machine Stops
Medium: TV: part of the BBC series - Out of the Unknown
Genre: Science fiction
Filmed: 1966
Location: UK
First shown: 6 October 1966
Character: Kuno, a young man living in a future society, underground.
Role: Starring role. Kuno, tries to escape the tyranny of the Machine by going out unprotected onto the surface of the Earth.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Kuno dies, along with his mother Vashti, and their whole underground civilisation, when the Machine breaks down, because no one knows how to repair it.
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Title: The Excavation
Medium: Television: part of the BBC series - Thirty Minute Theatre
Genres: Crime, psychological drama
Filmed: 1966
Location: UK, but set in the USA
First shown: 31 October 1966
Character: Grady, an ex-convict
Role: Starring role. Grady and his partner have perjured themselves at a murder trial; they are questioned by a wealthy civil rights lawyer, trying to get the truth.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Grady is thought to have survived; the couple are not thought to have officially changed their testimony. 1
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Title: The Further Adventures of the Musketeers
Medium: TV serial, in 16 parts
Genres: Historical drama, swashbuckler
Filmed: 1966/7
Location: UK, but set in France
First shown: May - September 1967
Character: Mordaunt, formerly John Francis de Winter
Role: Mordaunt is the son of Milady de Winter: an enemy of the Musketeers, who was executed many years before. He appears in 10 episodes.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Mordaunt was stabbed and drowned by the Musketeers.
Link to entries on this archive
Title: Up the Junction
Medium: Film
Genres: Drama, slice of life
Filmed: 1967
Location: London
First shown: 13 March 1968
Character: Terry: a young Londoner
Role: Terry is a friend of the hero. He is upset when his girlfriend Rube has an abortion, but nevertheless gets engaged to her.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Terry is killed, when his motorbike hits a lorry.
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Title: More
Medium: Film
Genres: Drama, French New Wave
Filmed: 1968/9
Location: Ibiza
First shown: 1969
Character: Man at party
Role: Though Michael has been credited for this film by the BFI, they may have been mistaken. An actor who closely resembles Michael appears in a scene at a party where the main characters are arguing. He takes a drag from a pipe that is being passed round, and later snatches at the air, evidently seeing things that aren't there. Doubts have been expressed as to whether it is actually him or someone else.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): The character survives his short scene.
Link to entries on this archive
Title: The Storyteller
Medium: TV: part of the ITV series - Armchair Theatre
Genre: Drama
Filmed: 1968/9
Location: UK
First shown: March 1969
Character: Brian, a strange young man
Role: Starring role. Brian gate-crashes a party, and asks telling questions of another of the guests.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): According to the filming script, Brian gets knocked unconscious, but survives.
Link to entry on this archive
Title: Michael Kohlhaas - Der Rebel/Man on Horseback
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, historical drama, political, war
Filmed: 1968
Locations: Bavaria, (Germany), Bratislava, (Slovakia), and Moravia, (Czech Republic)
First shown: 11 April 1969
Character: John, a mercenary
Role: John is one of Michael Kohlhaas’ band of rebels on the rampage; he joins enthusiastically in acts of violence and sexual conquest.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): At Kohlhaas’ behest, John is hanged, after admitting to a rape.
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Title: Run for Your Money
Medium: Television: part of the ITV series - Fraud Squad
Genre: Detective
Filmed: 1969
Location: England - set in the Midlands
First shown: 10 June 1969
Character: Jacky Joyce, a fraudster
Role: Guest star. Small-time criminal Jacky Joyce is one of three con-artists trying to defraud people who are desperate to find accommodation. He is messenger boy, and lover, to the trio’s mastermind, Kay Pilgrim.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): The group’s plan is thwarted by the police, but Joyce survives.
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Title: Les Fleurs du Mal
Medium: Television: part of the ITV series - Department S
Genre: Detective, espionage
Filmed: 1969
Location: Elstree Studios, England, but set in France
First shown: 22 October 1959
Character: Weber: a master criminal
Role: Guest star: villain of the week. Weber obtains and cracks the clue to the whereabouts of some stolen loot.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Weber is thwarted at the last moment by Department S, and is arrested.
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Title: Scream and Scream Again
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, detective, horror, science fiction
Filmed: 1969
Location: London, and Chertsey (Surrey)
First shown: January 1970
Character: Keith, an artificially created vampire.
Role: Created in a lab, Keith is an experiment that went wrong, and is now out of control. He brutally murders girls he has picked up in a nightclub, and is pursued by the police.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): At the end of a long chase, Keith jumps into a tank of acid to avoid capture.
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Title: When the Spirit Moves You
Medium: Television: part of the ITV series - Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased)
Genres: Comedy, detective, fantasy
Filmed: 1969
Location: Elstree Studios, England
First shown: 2 January 1970
Character: Perrin, a henchman
Role: Guest star. Perrin works for criminal Miklos Corri; his job mainly consists of surveillance, threatening behaviour, and collecting pay-offs.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Perrin and his employer are thwarted by Jeff Randall and Marty Hopkirk, and arrested.
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Title: Games People Play
Medium: Television: part of the BBC series - Paul Temple.
Genre: Detective
Filmed: 1969/70
Location: Malta
First shown: 19 April 1970
Character: Ivan, an actor
Role: Guest star. Ivan is the protégé of an older actor, Mark. He is one of a number of Mark’s friends who ultimately betray him, in pursuit of “The Game.”
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Ivan survives, but his friendship with Mark is over.
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Title: Nine Bean Rows
Medium: Television: part of the BBC series - Menace
Genre: Thriller
Filmed: 1970
Location: UK, but set in Ireland
First shown: 1 December 1970
Character: Pip, a young heir
Role: Pip gets caught up in a struggle between his brother and his new stepfather, over an inheritance.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Pip is thought to have died by strangulation.1
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Title: The Last Valley
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, historical drama, political, war
Filmed: 1969
Location: Halliford Studios, Shepperton, England, and Trins, Tirol, Austria.
First shown: 28 January 1971
Character: Hansen, a mercenary
Role: One of a band of mercenaries during the Hundred Years War, Hansen refuses to live by new rules agreed by his commander, The Captain, as a condition of over-wintering peaceably in a prosperous village. He tries to rape one of the village girls, makes his escape, forms his own war-band, and tries to wrest the village from The Captain.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Hansen’s horse is shot from under him; a child soldier then cripples him with a blow to the spine from a flail, and though this is not explicitly stated, the filming implies that Hansen’s sentence for the attempted rape - public castration - is carried out. In any case, Hansen clearly does not survive.
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Title: The Devils
Medium: Film
Genres: Historical drama, horror, political
Filmed: 1970
Location: Pinewood Studios, England, but set in France - mainly Loudun
First shown: July 1971
Character: Father Barré, a Professional Witch-hunter and Exorcist. Father Barré is a historical figure.
Role: Starring role. Father Barré is called to Loudun, to prove that Grandier, the leader of the City, has corrupted the nuns from a local convent, in particular, Sister Jeanne. Barré sets about trying to exorcise their demons, and tortures and executes Grandier, bringing about the town’s destruction.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Father Barré survives to continue his work.
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Title: Whoever Slew Auntie Roo?/Gingerbread House
Medium: Film
Genres: Horror, mystery, thriller
Filmed: 1971
Location: Middlesex, and Shepperton Studios, Surrey, England
First shown: 15 March 1972
Character: Albie, a butler
Role: Along with the housemaid, Clarine, Albie milks the gullible Auntie Roo of cash at every opportunity, organising fake séances, and taking a cut when paying her household bills. When he realises that Auntie Roo has trapped two children from the local orphanage in her house, in the hope of keeping them, he demands £2000 for his silence.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Albie makes off with the money and Clarine.
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Title: La vallée/The Valley (Obscured by Clouds)
Medium: Film
Genres: Adventure, French New Wave, road movie
Filmed: 1971
Location: Papua New Guinea
First shown: 6 July 1972
Character: Olivier, a seeker
Role: Starring role. Olivier is one of a band of hippies, who take a bourgeois young woman along with them on their trek to find a mysterious hidden valley.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Olivier and all his party perish in the attempt to reach the valley.
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Title: Arthur of the Britons
Medium: TV series, in 24 parts
Genres: Action, adventure, children’s TV, historical drama
Filmed: 1972
Location: Woodchester, Woollard and other locations near Bristol
First shown: 6 December 1972
Character: Kai, a Saxon brought up by the Celts: based on the Arthurian Sir Kay.
Role: Starring role. As Arthur’s adopted brother, right-hand man, and friend, Kai is a partner in Arthur’s struggle to unite the warring Celtic tribes against the invading Saxons.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Kai survives to carry on the fight at Arthur’s side.
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Title: The Three Musketeers/The Queen’s Diamonds
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, comedy, historical drama, romance, swashbuckler
Filmed: 1973
Location: Estudios Cinematografica Roma S.A., Madrid, and Castilla-La Mancha, Spain.
First shown: 11 December 1973
Character: Felton, a Puritan. Felton is a historical figure.
Role: Felton appears in a few brief scenes, as an attendant to the Duke of Buckingham.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Felton survives this film unscathed.
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Title: The Four Musketeers/The Revenge of Milady
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, comedy, historical drama, romance, swashbuckler
Filmed: 1973
Location: Estudios Cinematografica Roma S.A., Madrid, and Castilla-La Mancha, Spain.
First shown: 31 October 1974
Character: Felton, a Puritan. Felton is a historical figure.
Role: Charged by the Duke of Buckingham with custody of Milady de Winter, Felton is seduced, and persuaded that that the Duke is a Catholic, and a traitor to the Crown. He helps Milady escape, stabs the Duke, and is arrested.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): John Felton is arrested; as a traitor, his execution is inevitable, though not shown. The real John Felton was hanged.
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Title: Warrior Queen
Medium: TV serial, in 6 parts
Genres: Children’s TV, historical drama, political
Filmed: 1977
Location: Surrey, England
First shown: 20 February 1978
Character: Volthan, a Druid priest
Role: Co-starring role. Volthan is Queen Boudicca’s religious and political advisor in her struggle to free the Iceni from the Romans.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Volthan survives the final battle in which Boudicca is defeated.
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Title: Warlords of Atlantis/Warlords of the Deep
Medium: Film
Genre: Adventure, fantasy, science fiction
Filmed: 1977/8
Location: Malta, Gozo Island, and Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire,
First shown: May 1978
Character: Atmir, an alien dignitary
Role: Atmir is spokesperson for a race of alien Nazis from Mars, who are manipulating the human race from their undersea city of Atlantis.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Atmir survives, but his captives escape, and wreak destruction on Atlantis.
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Title: Stopover
Medium: Television: part of the ITV series - The Professionals
Genres: Action, detective, espionage
Filmed: 1979
Location: North Finchley in London, Northwood in Middlesex, White Waltham Airfield in Berkshire
First shown: 10 November 1979
Character: Kodai, a KGB agent
Role: Guest star. Kodai is an old adversary of the head of CI5, George Cowley, and has been sent to try to kill him.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Kodai is shot by Bodie, following a car chase.
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Title: A Tale of Two Cities: episodes 2 and 3
Medium: TV serial, in 8 parts
Genres: Children’s TV, historical drama, political
Filmed: 1980
Location: Elizabeth Castle and Trinity Manor, Jersey - but set in France
First shown: 5 October 1980 (first episode)
Character: Gaspard, a revolutionary
Role: Gaspard appears briefly in episode 2. In episode 3, his little daughter is killed by a carriage belonging to the Marquis St. Evremonde. Gaspard goes to the Marquis’ country estate, and kills him.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): In the fourth episode, a group of the revolutionaries describe how Gaspard escaped capture for some time, but was eventually caught and hanged.
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Title: The Mayfly Dance
Medium: Television: part of the BBC series - Shoestring
Genre: Detective
Filmed: 1980
Location: Possibly Bristol or Cardiff
First shown: 26 October 1980
Character: Harry, rock star turned farmer
Role: Harry was once in the same band as missing singer, Jody Brent. He gives Eddie Shoestring an idea of where Jody can be found, so that the truth about a death can be revealed.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Harry survives his short scene.
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Title: The Perfect House
Medium: Television: part of the series - ITV Playhouse
Genres: Thriller, political
Filmed: 1979
Location: UK
First shown: 17 March 1981
Character: Dieter
Role: Dieter is working with an Argentinian terrorist group; they use an innocent woman’s home as a safe house.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Dieter and his comrades leave the house, and go on their way.
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Title: For Your Eyes Only
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, espionage, romance, thriller
Filmed: From September 1980
Location: Corfu, Greece, Italy and Pinewood studios (England)
First shown: 24 June 1981
Character: Emile Leopold Locque, career criminal and assassin
Role: Bond Villain. Locque appears to be the cause of most of Bond’s troubles; he pursues Bond and Melina Havelock, directs a team trying to assassinate Bond, runs down Bond’s lover, Countess Lisl, and kills Bond’s contact, Ferrara. Locque is on the scene when Bond and Columbo raid Kristatos' warehouse; he plants a bomb, before making off.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Bond shoots Locque several times, causing him to crash his car, then gives the vehicle a final push off a cliff top.
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Title: Ivanhoe
Medium: TV mini-series/film
Genres: Adventure, historical drama, romance, swashbuckler
Filmed: 1981
Location: Bamburgh Castle, Alnwick Castle, and Pinewood Studios, England
First shown: 23 February 1982
Character: Athelstane, a Saxon noble
Role: Athelstane’s uncle Cedric wants his nephew to reclaim the throne of England from the Normans, and marry his ward Rowena, and Athelstane, despite his lack of ambition, gets dragged into the intrigues involving King Richard and Prince John. Athelstane is mostly a comedic figure, but when Rowena’s life is under threat, he faces down the Norman lords who have captured his party.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): After the ensuing battle, Athelstane is assumed to be dead. He reappears, stands up to Cedric, renounces his claim on Rowena so she may marry the insipid hero, Ivanhoe, and survives to enjoy the bachelor life.
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Title: The Sweet Scent of Death
Medium: Television: part of the series - Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense/Fox Mystery Theatre.
Genres: Detective, horror, mystery, thriller
Filmed: 1984
Location: UK
First shown: September 1984
Character: Terry Marvin, an apparently sinister florist.
Role: Ann Denver once successfully defended the man who murdered Terry Marvin’s girlfriend. Her husband Greg, planning to kill her, persuades her to move to the village where Marvin lives, so that he can frame Marvin for the crime.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): In saving Ann’s life, Terry Marvin receives a gunshot wound, but survives.
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Title: Our Man in Tegernsee
Medium: Television: part of the series - Scarecrow and Mrs King
Genres: Adventure, detective, espionage
Filmed: 1984
Location: Tegernsee, near Munich
First shown: 19 November 1984
Character: Karl Portillo, a neo-Nazi from Paraguay
Role: Guest star. Karl Portillo plots to undermine the US currency, by flooding the market with fake dollars, thereby bringing his neo-Nazi friends in Paraguay to power.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Out-gunned by Scarecrow and the German police at an old saw-mill, Portillo gives himself up.
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Title: Daddy’s Girls
Medium: Television: part of the BBC series - Lytton’s Diary
Genre: Fleet Street drama
Filmed: UK
Location: UK
First shown: 16 January 1985
Character: Jake Cutler, record producer
Role: Guest star. Jake Cutler is dating a young rich girl, Belinda Phillips. But it is Belinda’s father whom Lytton ends up investigating.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Jake survives unscathed.
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Title: Lifeforce
Medium: Film
Genres: Fantasy, horror, science fiction
Filmed: 1984/5
Location: Elstree Studios, and other locations in England
First shown: 21 June 1985
Character: Dr Bukovsky, Director of the European Space Agency
Role: Dr Bukovsky directs investigations into three caskets found on the remains of a space shuttle. In trying to rescue a security guard from a newly-awakened female alien, he is also attacked.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Dr Bukovsky continues to assist the investigation, but never really recovers. His death is not shown, but he is later said to have died as a result of the Space Vampires’ infection.
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Title: From Fulham, With Love
Medium: Television: part of the ITV series - Minder
Genres: Comedy, crime
Filmed: 1985
Location: London
First shown: 2 October 1975
Character: Sergei, a Russian seaman
Role: Guest star. Sergei wants to buy tee-shirts from Arthur Daley and sell them in the USSR for a profit. But while spending the day drinking with Ernie, Sergei decides he’d like to defect.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): The ship’s KGB Officer persuades Sergei to return home for the sake of his family.
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Title: Going Undercover/Yellow Pages
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, comedy, detective
Filmed: 1984
Location: Denmark
First shown: 17 June 1988
Character: Strett, a henchman
Role: Strett is assisting Maxine De La Hunt, in her plot to kidnap her step-daughter Marigold, and steal her husband’s secret formula.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): While chasing Marigold around the Tivoli Gardens, Strett has a fatal accident on the roller-coaster.
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Title: Jack the Ripper
Medium: TV mini-series/film
Genres: Detective, historical drama, horror
Filmed: 1988
Location: Pinewood Studios, England
First shown: 11 October 1988
Character: George Lusk, leader of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee. Lusk is a historical figure.
Role: Lusk - as portrayed in this film - is a violent rabble-rouser. In a bid for power, he stirs up the Whitechapel residents against the police investigating the Whitechapel Murders, telling them that the police don’t care about the common people. Lusk is one of Inspector Abberline’s suspects.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Lusk - one of a number of ‘red herrings’ - survives unscathed.
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Title: Massacre Play
Medium: Film
Genre: Drama
Filmed: 1988/9
Location: Italy
First shown: 1989
Character: Michael Zabo, an actor
Role: Zabo is one of film director Theo Steiner’s friends, staying at Steiner’s villa. All the guests are bit part players in the drama Steiner has engineered between himself and old friend and rival, Clem Da Silva.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Zabo is saddened to learn that his friend is dying.
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Title: Twelve Degrees Capricorn
Medium: Television: part of the Thames TV series - Capital City
Genre: Drama
Filmed: 1989
Location: England
First shown: 5 December 1989
Character: Stefan, a Swiss Trade Commission representative
Role: Guest star. Stefan meets financier, Sirrka at a bar; she pretends to be a prostitute, and charges him for sex. He still wants to see her again after he finds out the truth.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Stefan survives Sirrka’s rejection.
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Title: Destroying Angel/Sleep Well My Love
Medium: Film
Genre: Drama
Filmed: 1987
Location: Yugoslavia
First shown: 1990 (video premiere)
Character: Ennio Volpe, a hitman
Role: A wealthy divorcé hires Volpe to rid him of his ex-wife, who is blackmailing him, having seen him abusing their daughter Siska. Siska tricks Volpe into killing her father as well. Volpe then despatches her mother’s boyfriend for good measure.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Volpe survives unscathed.
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Title: The Serpent of Death/Out of Time
Medium: Film
Genres: Action, adventure, thriller
Filmed: 1989
Location: Greece and Egypt
First shown: 6 December 1990
Character: Xaros, a hitman
Role: Supposedly working for Omar, a dealer in antiquities, Xaros pursues archaeology student Jake Bonner, trying to steal the clues to the whereabouts of Alexander’s treasure. Xaros kills anyone who gets in his way.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): Having been fatally bitten by a poisonous snake, Xaros steps on an old land mine, and is blown up.
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Title: Christopher Columbus: The Discovery
Medium: Film
Genres: Adventure, historical drama
Filmed: 1991/2
Location: UK and Spain
First shown: 20 August 1992
Character: The Inquisitor’s Spy
Role: The Inquisitor’s Spy alerts Torquemada to Cristobal Colon’s plans, and assists in his interrogation, in an attempt to stop his voyage of discovery.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): The religious establishment is thwarted, but the Inquisitor’s Spy survives.
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Title: Frankenstein
Medium: Film
Genres: Adventure, fantasy, horror, science fiction
Filmed: 1992
Location: Pinewood, England
First shown: 29 December 1992
Character: The Bosun
Role: On a ship is trapped in the arctic ice, Dr Frankenstein recounts his horrifying tale to the ship’s Captain, and the final part of the drama plays out. The Captain relies on the Bosun to keep him, informed, and his motley crew, in line.
Character’s fate (highlight to read): The Bosun survives to return home.
Link to entries on this archive
~~
1 In an interview in the Marvel magazine that accompanied ‘For Your Eyes Only’, Michael Gothard says: "I've been killed in so many different ways on both the large and small screens. I've been hanged, stabbed, strangled, shot, immersed in an acid bath, crashed on a motorcycle, killed by a 10-year-old boy by a vicious blow to the spine, drowned and - on one memorable occasion - stabbed and drowned simultaneously."
Spoilers follow (highlight to read):
Some of these on-screen deaths are ones we know about:
As Mordaunt, in The Further Adventures of the Musketeers, he was stabbed and drowned.
As John, in Michael Kolhlhaas, he was hanged.
As Kodai, in Stopover, he was shot.
As Keith, in Scream and Scream Again, he was immersed in an acid bath.
As Terry, in Up the Junction, he crashed on a motorcycle.
As Hansen, in The Last Valley, he was killed (or at least maimed) by a 10-year-old boy inflicting a vicious blow to the spine.
That leaves three deaths unaccounted for: stabbed, strangled, and drowned.
If, as Michael says, these deaths were on film or TV, this is rather puzzling. There are only two known productions no longer extant in which these deaths could have occurred:
- the Thirty Minute Theatre play, The Excavation, in which he played Grady, a witness who has committed perjury, but in which he almost certainly didn't die.
- the episode of Menace, Nine Bean Rows, in which he played Pip, the younger brother of a returning mercenary.
It seems likely that the - apparently missing - stabbing and drowning actually refer to that of Mordaunt, in The Further Adventures of the Musketeers, and should only have been listed once. This would mean that Pip, in "Nine Bean Rows", was the victim of strangulation.