British actor (born 1959)
Neil John Pearson
(born 27 April 1959) is a British actor, known for his work on television. He was nominated for the 1994
BAFTA TV Award for Best Actor
for
Between the Lines
(1992?1994). His other television roles include
Drop the Dead Donkey
(1990?1998),
All the Small Things
(2009),
Waterloo Road
(2014?2015), and
In the Club
(2014?2016). His film appearances include all three of the
Bridget Jones
films. He is also an
antiquarian
book dealer who specialises in the
expatriate
literary movement of
Paris
between the World Wars
.
Early life
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Pearson grew up in
Battersea
and
Balham
, London. His father, a
panel beater
, left home when he was five; his mother was a legal secretary. He was a boarder at
Woolverstone Hall School
near
Ipswich
,
Suffolk
where he first learned to act. He attended the
Central School of Speech and Drama
from 1977 to 1980.
[1]
Stage, television and film work
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One of Pearson's early appearances was in 1984 alongside
Leonard Rossiter
in
Joe Orton
's play
Loot
at the
Lyric Theatre
in London; Rossiter died in his dressing-room during a later performance.
[2]
He won a part in
Hat Trick Productions
'
sitcom
Chelmsford 123
and also appeared with Hat Trick executive
Jimmy Mulville
in
That's Love
. Pearson narrated Colin Wyatt's animated series
The Poddington Peas
in 1986.
It was in the roles of
associate editor
and office lothario and gambling addict, Dave Charnley, in the sitcom
Drop the Dead Donkey
- another Hat Trick show - and of Detective Superintendent Tony Clark in the thriller
Between the Lines
(1992?94), that he made his greatest impact on the viewing public.
Since then he has appeared in such varied roles as
Dr Jameson
in
Rhodes
(1996), Jack Green in the children's serial
The Magician's House
(1999), Trevor Heslop in
Trevor's World of Sport
(2003) and
John Diamond
in
A Lump in My Throat
(2003). He has also been in several films, including
The Secret Rapture
(1993),
Fever Pitch
(1997) and
Bridget Jones's Diary
(2001). He played Major Steve Arnold, the American interrogator, in
Taking Sides
at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre in 2003. He played Rob in
The Booze Cruise
(2003), and then also in the second and third sequels in 2005 and 2006. He appeared in the 2006 Radio Four series
Vent
as Ben. He played the choirmaster Michael Caddick in the
BBC
drama
All the Small Things
in 2009. He also appeared in episodes of
Midsomer Murders
and
Lewis
- in the former, appearing alongside
Drop the Dead Donkey
co-star
Jeff Rawle
; and in the latter, again playing a gambling addict alongside
Haydn Gwynne
, another star of
Drop the Dead Donkey
- and played Doug Anderson in an episode of
Death in Paradise
in 2013.
[3]
In the
Inspector George Gently
episode
Goodbye to China
(2011), Pearson acts as a former Sergeant of DCI Gently, who now has risen in rank above his former master. In 2014 Pearson became a series regular in
Waterloo Road
as new headteacher Vaughan Fitzgerald.
Pearson was a judge on Channel 4's
The Play's the Thing
, which sought to find a play written by an unknown writer for a run in the West End. The winning play, written by Kate Betts, was called
On the Third Day
and opened at the
New Ambassadors Theatre
in London in June 2006. Pearson appeared in a touring revival of
Sir Peter Hall
's production of
Harold Pinter
's
Old Times
in 2006, and in a production of
Tom Stoppard
's play
Arcadia
at the
Duke of York's Theatre
, London, in 2009.
After obtaining a collection of original
Hancock's Half Hour
radio scripts and realising that some of the corresponding recordings no longer existed, he conceived and subsequently co-produced
The Missing Hancocks
, a series of re-creations of selected
wiped
episodes for BBC Radio 4, which debuted in October 2014.
In 2020, he was in season 8, episode 4 of
Father Brown
. He also appeared as
Eric Morley
in an episode of
The Reckoning
(2023), a miniseries about the life of
Jimmy Savile
.
Pearson has acted in several BBC Radio Dramas including the black comedy series
Vent
as comatose writer Ben Smith, adaptations of the
Martin Beck
novels playing Beck's sidekick Detective Lennart Kollberg, and
House of Ghosts: A Case for Inspector Morse
where he played the late
Colin Dexter
's iconic fictional detective
Inspector Morse
.
Antiquarian book business
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Pearson is the author of a book on the publisher
Jack Kahane
,
Obelisk: A History of Jack Kahane and the
Obelisk Press
.
[4]
He is a collector of rare drama scripts and in 2011 he opened an online bookshop specialising in theatrical material.
[5]
He has a special interest in the
expatriate
literary movement of Paris between the wars.
[6]
Personal interests
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He strongly identifies with the
British Left
- having made a
party election broadcast
for the
Labour Party
for the
1994 European Elections
, though he later supported
Ken Livingstone
when Livingstone ran as an
independent
candidate for
Mayor of London
in
2000
. For many years he has also supported the
National Council for One Parent Families
, having written about his family background for the organisation, and also raised £32,000 for the charity on a celebrity edition of
Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?
.
[7]
He is a keen
Texas hold 'em
poker
player and participated in the 2007 World Series of Poker Europe event in London.
[8]
[9]
Pearson is also a fan of
Tottenham Hotspur
and regularly attends home games. In 2007 he assisted with fundraising to renovate the
Bristol Old Vic
Theatre.
[10]
References
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External links
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