My father, David Andrews, who has died aged 90, was an actor and director whose career in theatre, film and television spanned six decades.
As an actor he performed multiple roles in the BBC’s landmark 1958 television series An Age of Kings, and he originated the role of Private Whittaker in The Long and the Short and the Tall at the Royal Court theatre in 1959, alongside Peter O’Toole. His film work included Some People (1962), with Kenneth More, and A Place to Go (1963), with Rita Tushingham.
David’s directing work included Bubble Boy (1983) and Stookie (1985) for Scottish Television (STV), both recognised with silver medals at the New York International Film and Television festival, and after moving from STV in 1989 he continued directing on a freelance basis, acquiring credits that included Grange Hill, EastEnders, Jupiter Moon, The Biz and Strathblair. From 1996 he spent nearly a decade at Mersey Television directing Hollyoaks and Brookside.
Born in Sanderstead, Surrey, David was the son of Reginald, an accountant, and his wife, Freda (nee Stewart). He was educated in Croydon at Whitgift school, which was evacuated to Devon during the second world war. After national service with the RAF as a radio operator in Merseyside he decided to pursue a career in acting, training at the Central School of Speech and Drama in London, where one of his contemporaries was Judi Dench. He graduated in 1955 with the school’s gold medal.
Eventually drawn to the technical side of production, David retrained on the BBC directors’ course in 1965 and went on to work for the Central Office of Information, directing recruitment films for the armed forces.
Having spent a period of his early childhood in Pitlochry in Perthshire, he had a lifelong affection for Scotland that led him, in 1979, to take up a senior directing role at STV, settling in Fairlie, Ayrshire, for most of the rest of his life. He was at STV until 1989 before working as a freelance and then moving on to Mersey Television, where he directed more than 100 episodes of Hollyoaks.
In retirement from 2005 David took on cameo roles on television, as well as occasional voice parts. Otherwise he was a regular cinema goer and formed a folk band, Hazy Days (and Nights!), which mostly performed in pubs in Glasgow.
David was married and divorced twice – first to Tamara Hinchco and then to Anne Vels. He is survived by two children from his first marriage, Bronwen and Rowan, three from his second, James, Katherine and me, and 11 grandchildren.
