Louis Mahoney obituary

Louis Mahoney, who has died aged 81, was one of the first black actors to appear regularly on British television, becoming a recognisable face during a successful 55-year career on the small screen. His charismatic, often zestful performances – although he was as capable of unflappable professionalism and quiet menace as he was of his natural avuncular charm – culminated earlier this year with a vivacious turn in the popular divorce drama The Split (2020) as a bungee-jumping priest with a bucket list.

He cropped up as a guest actor in almost every popular drama going, from Dixon of Dock Green (1965) to Holby City (2016) via three turns in Doctor Who (1973, 1975 and latterly a touching deathbed scene with Carey Mulligan in the acclaimed 2007 episode Blink).

In Fawlty Towers, his patient, professional doctor gives chase to a concussed and socially embarrassing Basil Fawlty in the the enduring and sometimes controversial episode The Germans (1975). He cemented his reputation as a reliable and versatile performer by playing recurring roles on popular series, including Delbert Wilkins’ Grandad Jake in The Lenny Henry Show (1987), Elvis in Harbour Lights (1999), and aged werewolf Leo in Being Human (2012-13).

He was also an ardent campaigner for the betterment of BAME actors, serving of the council of the actors’ union Equity, and eventually as its vice-president.

Born in Bathurst (now Banjul), in the Gambia, he was the eldest of six children of James Mahoney, headteacher of St Mary’s School of Gambia, and his wife, Princess (nee Danner). Louis himself was educated at the Methodist Boys’ high school before setting sail for Britain in 1957 to enrol at the University of London to study medicine. A childhood memory of the audience reaction and proud look on his parents’ faces as he performed in a school play eventually caused him to drop out and pursue a theatrical career, training at the Central School of Speech and Drama.

After graduation, he worked at Colchester repertory theatre (1963) and in 1967 became one of the first black actors to work with the Royal Shakespeare Company; he returned to the RSC exactly 30 years later. As well as being a founder member, in 1976, of the Black Theatre Workshop he worked with directors such as Richard Eyre, Rufus Norris and Matthew Dunster and at venues including the National theatre, the Royal Court, the Almeida and, in 2018, the Bridge (Alan Bennett’s Allelujah! for Nicholas Hytner).

His involvement with Equity politics began in the early 1970s when he successfully lobbied to have the union’s Coloured Actors Committee renamed the Afro-Asian Committee, and he was elected a council member in 1976. A fierce critic of apartheid he persuasively argued that members should not perform to segregated audiences in South Africa and for a boycott of TV programme sales to that country. He stepped down in 2002 with the industry, in no small part due to his dogged campaigning, far better for emerging black actors than it was when he had started. While acknowledging that there was still work to do, he was never bitter.

His big screen work echoed the subjects of his activism – he played the official who facilitates safe passage for Donald Woods in Cry Freedom (1987 – “that film did a lot to end apartheid,” he said) and in Shooting Dogs (2005) he was extremely moved to be working with crew members and extras who had been caught up in the Rwandan genocide depicted in the film. He also had roles in Hammer’s Plague of the Zombies (1966), Omen III: The Final Conflict (1981), White Mischief (1987) and Captain Phillips (with Tom Hanks, 2013).

He was fit – he used to talk, with a glint in his eye, about outrunning the National Front in Ilford in the early 60s, and a passionate cricketer. A fast bowler who had played at club level in the Gambia, he joined the Gentlemen of Hampstead and took part in charity matches (once bowling out Tom Graveney). He also did voluntary work for disadvantaged young black people.

He is survived by his daughter, Shoshola, from a 1971 marriage that ended in divorce, and three grandchildren, and by his sister, Cynthia.

• Louis Felix Danner Mahoney, actor, born 8 September 1938; died 28 June 2020