Victor Spinetti

 ( 1929 Births ) 

One of Spinetti's most challenging theatre roles was as the principal male character in Jane Arden's radical feminist play Vagina Rex and the Gas Oven, which played to packed houses for six weeks at the Arts Lab on Drury Lane in 1969. In 1980, he directed The Biograph Girl, a musical about the silent film era, at the Phoenix Theatre. In 1986, he appeared as Fagin in the musical Oliver!, which was the last professional production to use Sean Kenny's original stage design. He appeared on Broadway in The Hostage and The Philanthropist, and also acted in 1995 with the Royal Shakespeare Company, in such roles as Lord Foppington in The Relapse and the Archbishop in Richard III, at Stratford-upon-Avon, although this was not a happy experience for him.

Spinetti co-authored In His Own Write, the play adapted from a book by John Lennon with the Beatle which he also directed at the National Theatre, premiering on 18 June 1968, at the Old Vic. Spinetti and Lennon appeared together in June 1968 on BBC2's Release. During the interview, Spinetti said of the play, that "it's not really John's childhood, it's all of ours really, isn't it John?" to which Lennon replied, assuming a camp voice, "It is, we're all one Victor, we're all one aren't we. I mean 'what's going on?'" Spinetti described the play as being "about the growing up of any of us; the things that helped us to be more aware".

He also directed Jesus Christ Superstar and Hair, including productions staged in Europe. His many television appearances on British TV, include Take My Wife in which he played a London-based booking agent and schemer who was forever promising his comedian client that fame was just around the corner, and the sitcom An Actor's Life For Me.

In 1999, Victor Spinetti played in a Jim Davidson Adult Pantomime of Babes in the Wood (Boobs in the Wood) plays as Friar Tuck who had been taking weed. He had been told by The Sheriff of Nottingham (Jim Davidson) to kill his niece and nephew, who were escaped convicts (one of them played by Kenny Baker).

In September 2008, Spinetti reprised his one-man show, A Very Private Diary, touring the UK, as A Very Private Diary ... Revisited!, telling his life story. Entertainer Spinetti to tour life story. The Stage. (30 August 2013). Retrieved 3 September 2013.

In the 1970s, Spinetti appeared in a series of television advertisements for McVities' (now United Biscuits) Jaffa Cakes, as "The Mad Jaffa Cake Eater", a turbaned, Middle-Eastern style character who rode a bicycle and surreptitiously stole and ate other people's Jaffa Cakes, prompting the catchphrase "There's Orangey!" He hosted Victor's Party for Granada. In 1979, he voiced Mr. Tumnus in the USA dubbed version of the 1979 animated adaptation of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as well as voice directing for the film. (Spinetti was also the voice of Shift the ape in the Focus on the Family Radio Theatre adaptation of The Last Battle.) Later he voiced arch villain Texas Pete in the popular S4C animated TV series SuperTed (1982–84) and narrated several Fireman Sam audiobooks. In 1988 he appeared alongside Paul Scofield and Mary Steenburgen in , a World War Two drama about Anne Frank. In 1992, he voiced the King of the Rats in the British children's animated programme Tales of the Tooth Fairies (in the episode The Stolen Present) on BBC, produced by Welsh animation company Calon, formerly Siriol Productions. In 1995, he appeared in the "Finger" episode of the comedy series Bottom, with Rik Mayall and Ade Edmondson, as Audrey the Maître d'hôtel. He also starred in the 1999 DVD film Boobs in the Wood with Jim Davidson.

From 2000 to 2002, Spinetti played Max, the 'man of a thousand faces', in the children's TV programme Harry and the Wrinklies, which also starred Nick Robinson in the title role.

• Spinetti appears in This Is Your Life.
• 1985: The "All I Need Is a Miracle" music video by Mike and the Mechanics as the club owner.