1. Eric Richard Porter was an English actor of stage, film and television.
11 Facts About Eric Porter
1. 2.
Eric Porter's parents hoped he would become an electrical engineer, so he was educated at the Technical College in Wimbledon, then worked for the Marconi Telegraph and Wireless company as a joint-solderer.
3.
Eric Porter made his stage debut at the Cambridge Arts Theatre in 1945 at the age of 17.
4.
In 1955, Eric Porter played the title role in Ben Jonson's Volpone at the Bristol Old Vic.
5.
Eric Porter won the London Evening Standard award in 1959 for his performance in Ibsen's Rosmersholm at the Royal Court Theatre.
6.
Eric Porter was seen as the tortured solicitor Soames Forsyte in the BBC drama The Forsyte Saga.
7.
Eric Porter was one of the guests on the Morecambe and Wise 1970 Christmas Special, performing "If They Could See Me Now" from Sweet Charity with the duo, revealing his song and dance skills with panache.
8.
Eric Porter played Count Bronowsky in The Jewel in the Crown; he was seen as Fagin in the 1985 BBC version of Oliver Twist; as Thomas Danforth in the 1980 BBC production of The Crucible; and as Professor Moriarty opposite Jeremy Brett's Sherlock Holmes in Granada Television's The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes stories The Red-Headed League and The Final Problem.
9.
Eric Porter played Polonius in a 1980 television production of Hamlet, made as part of the BBC Shakespeare series, and starring Derek Jacobi in the title role.
10.
Eric Porter continued to act on stage, again winning the Evening Standard Theatre Award for Best Actor in 1988 for his role in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.
11.
Eric Porter died of colon cancer in London in 1995, aged 67.