RIP Timothy Bateson

It has been announced that actor Timothy Bateson passed away on Sep 16th 2009.

Bateson was born on April 3, 1926 in London, England and began his film career on the Ealing production of "Nicholas Nickleby" (1947) playing Lord Frederick Verisopht appearing some other popular films of the late 1940s and early 1950s including the Boulting Brothers' commentary on class "The Guinea Pig" (1948), The Pat Jackson directed NHS embracing feature "The White Corridors" (1951) and Olivier's "Richard III" (1955). He was a favourite of Pat Jackson'; later turning up in "What a Carve Up" (1961), the CFF film "Seventy Deadly Pills" (1964) and his episodes of "Man in a Suitcase" and "The Famous Five".

Film parts flagged in the late 1950s but he became more prominent in the comedies "The Mouse that Roared" (1959) and "The Crooked Man" (1960). His comedy parts in film began to shrink to bit parts in James Robertson-Justice/Leslie Phillips vehicles but he began racking a few appearances in Hammer horror features before embarking on a very prolific TV career appearing in almost every drama series filmed in the 1960s including "The Avengers", "Z Cars", "Gideon's Way" and "Out of the Unknown". He pretty much continued working solidly through the 1970s in television making a couple of film appearances. He became a regular in "Grange Hill" and "Don't Wait Up" in the 1980s as well as the revived "Zorro" TV series shot in Spain. He mostly appeared in television for the rest of his career as well as voice-over work that led to his being cast as the voice of Kreacher in "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix", his final film, but was not cast to voice the character in the next instalment of the series in which Kreacher appears.

Timothy Bateson played Padre Benites in six episodes of the 1991-1993 "New Zorro" TV series.