Arnold Yarrow

 ( 1920 Births ) 

After a brief spell in Manchester, Yarrow moved back to London, winning Tavistock Rep's playwriting competition for his play Ripple in Texas. The production was professionally produced by Oldham Coliseum repertory theatre and later dramatised for the Home Service. In 1958, he made his West End debut with the Repertory Players at the Lyric, Shaftesbury Avenue, London.

In 1959, he won the ATV drama award, winning £500 and the broadcast of his play The Tip-Off, which was broadcast in 1960. In 1968, Yarrow became script editor for the series Softly, Softly. He then wrote episodes of from 1969 to 1976, Barlow at Large in 1971, and then Crown Court in 1974 and Warship in 1976 among others.

In front of the camera, Yarrow was also known to Doctor Who fans for his portrayal of diminutive Exxilon leader Bellal in the 1974 serial Death to the Daleks. He remains the longest lived person associated with the Whoniverse. In 1988, he appeared in EastEnders as Benny Bloom, a retired bricklayer and love interest to Ethel Skinner. Yarrow subsequently wrote ten episodes of the soap opera between 1992 and 1994.

His other television appearances included roles in Crane, Ghost Squad, Coronation Street, Dr. Finlay's Casebook, The Onedin Line and London's Burning, as well as a part in the 1993 film Son of the Pink Panther.

Yarrow also wrote radio plays including After Moscow in 1980 and His Master’s Voice in 1983. In 1984, he was part of a European tour of School for Scandal starring Donald Sinden and Dulcie Gray. For the remainder of the 1980s, Yarrow joined the Royal Shakespeare Company, taking parts such as Justice Shallow in The Merry Wives of Windsor to Verges in Much Ado About Nothing. In 1986, he performed a four-hour recital of all of Shakespeare’s sonnets to secure funding for his own play, Stitch, about an exploitative East End sweatshop.

As well as acting and scriptwriting, Yarrow wrote numerous books such as TV tie–ins like Softly Softly Casebook and Softly Softly Murder Casebook as well as his own novels Death is a Z and The Grease–Paint Monkey. DrWhoCastCrewGuide. x.com