Ronald Radd was born on January 22nd 1929 in Ryhope, Sunderland and appeared in two fifty-minute episodes of Danger Man. In 'Sting in the Tail' Radd appeared as Alexandros the landlord of Drake's studio flat and is quite a character. He is best known to Prisoner fans as the Rook from the episode 'Checkmate'.
Radd starred in some 60 different TV shows between 1955 and 1976 including The Avengers, Danger Man, and Z-Cars. He also played the role of Pargiter in Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) in 1969 in the episode, Just for the Record, where he grew a lengthy beard so he would resemble Henry VIII.
He began as a stage actor in the Alexandra Theatre in Birmingham in the early 50s, along and by 1954, he had arrived in the West End, where, in two different productions at the Apollo Theatre in February 1956, The Buccaneer and The Boyfriend, both alongside Kenneth Williams. Later, he was again with Williams in a Winter Gardens revival of Feydeau's Hotel Paradiso.
Radd gradually lost interest in theatre and broke into television in Ordeal by Fire in 1957, a play centred around Joan of Arc, played by Elizabeth Sellars, with Peter Wyngarde and Patrick Troughton, whom he later starred in with in the BBC's 1958 production of A Tale Of Two Cities. Radd also made a number of appearances in the CBC production The Shari Lewis Show between 1960 and 1963, and in 1960 appeared in the production of Eugene O'Neill's The Iceman Cometh directed by Sidney Lumet, who also directed him in the 1968 feature film adaptation of The Sea Gull and in 1969 he appeared in John Huston's The Kremlin Letter.
Throughout his career in the States, Radd worked alongside many top actors, including a very young Robert Redford and Jason Robards and he also appeared in the NBC production of The Tempest playing Stefano, to Richard Burton's Caliban. In 1971 he was nominated for Broadway's Tony Award as Best Supporting or Featured Actor for his role in Abelard and Heloise.
Sadly, Ronald Radd died in Toronto, Canada of a brain haemorrhage on April 23rd 1976 aged just 47. |
