John Bown

John Bown (1 July 1934 – 5 November 2017) was a British actor, film director, and screenwriter. He is best known for his role as Commander Neil Stafford in the final season of the television series Doomwatch.

Life and career

John Bown was born on 1 July 1934 in Corfe Mullen, Dorset and educated at Queen Elizabeth Grammar School in Wimborne Minster. He trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA) and some time after went into repertory in Salisbury and Birmingham. He played Jack Hunter in the British premiere of The Rose Tattoo, performed by the New Shakespeare Theatre Company under the direction of Sam Wanamaker in November 1958, and continued in the role when the company transferred the production to the New Theatre, London in 1959. His performance was described as "impressive" by one critic, with another saying "the love-scene between Miss Feller and Mr Bown, for all its wild abandon on her part and desperate abstentions on his, has a rare and tender radiance." Earlier the same year, he had appeared as Brick in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof with the same company. A critic wrote "One will not quickly forget ... that interminable second act showdown between the life-loving father (Leo McKern) and the wife-hating son (John Bown), each condemned to suffer in the way that hurts most." In 1960, his performance as Richard Rich in the premiere of A Man for All Seasons was described by a critic in The Stage as "notable".

In the 1960s, he directed and wrote the screenplay for the short (11-minute) film North West Confidential and the feature film Monique, which starred his wife Sibylla Kay in the title role; they had married in 1960. Afterwards, Bown was planning his next project titled Hey, You! but could not find the backing for it. He resumed acting.

From 1974 to 1975 he played Colonel Maurel in the play Grand Manoeuvres by A. E. Ellis at The Old Vic, London. Also in 1975, he appeared with the Oxford Playhouse Company in The Caretaker and Death of a Salesman, of which a critic wrote that Bown and Richard Durden "give passionate accounts of the sons. The blood pressure never drops." From 1976 to 1979 he was a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, appearing in 16 productions in seven major theatres. Among them was the play Half an hour please! which he wrote and acted in, with the production designed by Judi Dench. One reviewer described it as "a jewel of a piece [that] would lend itself superbly to television."

On television, he appeared in Dr. Who and the Daleks as Antodus (1965), in Doomwatch as Commander Neil Stafford (1972), and as the lead character Detective Inspector Tom Masefield in Margot Bennett's 1965 series The Big Spender. He also appeared in such television series as The Four Just Men, No Hiding Place, The Baron, The Champions and Blake's 7.

Bown had two children with his wife Sibylla. He died in Hampstead in 2017.

Selected stage performances

Filmography

Actor

• Asmodée (1959) as Harry Fanning
• Tunes of Glory (1960) as One of the Other Officers
• Out of the Fog (1962) as Herb Bailey
• Master Spy (1963) as John Baxter
• Dr. Who and the Daleks (1965) as Antodus
• The Big Spender by Margot Bennett (1965) as Detective Inspector Tom Masefield
• Quatermass and the Pit (1967) as TV Interviewer (uncredited)
• The Devil Rides Out (1968) as Receptionist (uncredited)
• Doomwatch (1972) as Commander Neil Stafford
• Vampire Circus (1972) as Schilt
• Fear in the Night (1972) as 1st Policeman
• Macbeth (1979) as Lennox
• Dark Corners (2006) as Old Man

Director and screenwriter

• North West Confidential (1969)
• Monique (1970)

External links

• at IMDb
• 2024-09-12 at the Wayback Machine at collections.shakespeare.org.uk
• at Theatricalia