Bill Maynard, who has died at the age of 89, was best known as the loveable rogue Claude Jeremiah Greengrass, in the police drama Heartbeat.
But he had a long and sometimes difficult career that took him from variety shows to cinema and network television
In real life Maynard shared many similarities with his best known character, a predilection for racehorses, greyhounds and booze.
At one stage he was the best paid TV comic in Britain but he squandered his earnings. Maynard then embarked on a career as a stage actor, before returning to the screen in a number of successful television series.
Unpaid taxes
He was born Walter Frederick George Williams on 8 October 1928 in the village of Heath End in Surrey.
At the age of eight he was performing in Working Men's Clubs, doing George Formby impressions.
He later dabbled with the idea of becoming a professional footballer, apprenticed aged 15 to Leicester City and Notts County, but was eventually forced back to the stage by a knee injury.
He returned to show business as a band singer, struggling to get a break at the Windmill Theatre. His luck changed after encountering another stand-up comic, Terry Scott.
By this time he had changed his stage name to Maynard - a name, as he later revealed in a BBC interview, that he saw a on poster for Maynard's wine gums.
Image captionGreat Scott! It's Maynard
He and Scott became TV stars in the 1950s with their own show, Great Scott, It's Maynard. The partnership ended when Maynard decided to embark on a career as a serious actor.
But he was not paying enough attention to his finances and the Inland Revenue took his money, his home and his cars for unpaid taxes.
Maynard spent several years in obscurity, forced to take bit-parts in repertory companies, and making small appearances in programmes like Coronation Street.
Heartbeat
He slowly rebuilt his career His role in the TV adaptation of Dennis Potter's play, Paper Roses, won him critical acclaim.
He subsequently went on to enjoy success with such comedy shows as Oh No, It's Selwyn Froggitt and The Gaffer.
Image captionA role in Dalziel & Pascoe in 2002
In the 1970s he recorded a song in tribute to the sport of Stock Car racing released, to very little acclaim, on the appropriately named Crash Records.
He also appeared in a number of Carry On films, although he professed to be baffled by their popularity.
In 1984, he stood as an Independent Labour candidate against Tony Benn in Chesterfield. He said he had only done it to try and keep Benn out of Parliament and it was his only venture into politics.
He subsequently went on to take his most popular role, that of Greengrass, in the TV series Heartbeat.
It was a part that seemed to have been specifically created for him and Maynard worked with the scriptwriters to develop the character's idiosyncrasies.
At its peak in 1997, Heartbeat attracted more than 60% of the Sunday night audience, earning Maynard a reputed £600,000 a year.
His character was written out in 2000 after he had suffered several strokes, but returned in 2003 in a spin-off series set in a hospital entitled, The Royal.
Away from acting he ran his own video production company and was a long serving presenter on BBC Radio Leicester
His first wife Muriel died from cancer just as he was tasting his second round of success, leaving Maynard to care for their two young children.
He went on to marry speed ace Donald Campbell's widow Tonia.
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionSir Roger Moore has died at the age of 89 following "a short but brave battle with cancer"
Sir Roger Moore, who has died aged 89, brought a lighter touch to the role of James Bond, the role for which he was most famous.
Out went the harder, crueller edge of Sean Connery's 007 to be succeeded by sardonic humour and the inevitable raised eyebrow.
He eventually became the longest-serving actor in the role, his seven Bond films becoming the most commercially successful of the franchise.
His tenure in the role also showcased an array of implausible gadgets and a host of new characters, designed to flesh out Ian Fleming's original plots.
Roger George Moore was born in Stockwell, south London on 14 October 1927, the son of a policeman.
At 15, he entered art college, and later became an apprentice at an animation studio, where it seems much fun was had at his expense.
"I was probably the lowliest in the entire building," he said. "They sent me on errands for things like tins of sprocket holes, and the guy in stores would say he didn't have any - and would rainbow paint do instead?"
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionThe actor made something of a name as a male model in the 1950s
Sir Roger was sacked for incompetence, but soon had a stroke of luck. His father, by now a detective sergeant, was called to investigate a robbery at the home of the film director, Brian Desmond Hurst.
DS Moore managed to effect an introduction that led to his son being hired as an extra for the epic, Caesar and Cleopatra.
Hurst paid for Sir Roger to study at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, before a spell of National Service with the Army where he rose to the rank of captain.
On his return to the theatre, he found acting roles hard to come by but his well-toned physique meant he was in demand as a model. One of his engagements was playing the doctor in Woman's Own medical features.
Dashing hero
He also appeared, suitably attired in a sweater, on a number of knitting patterns, prompting at least one wag to christen him the Big Knit.
And in 1953, his looks and his minor roles in theatre and television plays impressed an MGM talent scout and Sir Roger set off for America.
Married at 17 to a fellow Rada student, Doorn Van Steyn, he was by now living with the singer Dorothy Squires, 12 years his senior, who soon became his second wife at a ceremony in New Jersey.
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionIvanhoe brought Sir Roger to a wider audience
While Squires was popular in Britain, Sir Roger was rubbing shoulders with stars in the States, making his film debut with Elizabeth Taylor in The Last Time I Saw Paris and playing Lana Turner's leading man in Diane.
But it was through television that he first made his mark, as the dashing hero Ivanhoe in a 1950s series that had only a tentative connection with Sir Walter Scott's original novel.
He followed that with the lead role in an American TV series The Alaskans. It was not a great success. Despite being set in Alaska, it was filmed on a hot Hollywood set with the cast dressed up in furs. Moore found the filming difficult and an affair with actress Dorothy Provine did nothing to relieve the pressure.
Wise-cracking
He also appeared in the successful Western series Maverick, where he had the role of Beau Maverick, supposedly the English cousin of the lead character Brett, played by James Garner.
Ironically Sir Sean Connery had also tested for the part but turned it down.
Sir Roger's big breakthrough came in 1962 when the impresario Lew Grade cast him as the dashing Simon Templar aka The Saint, in a television adaptation of the Leslie Charteris stories.
The series, which ran for seven years, made Sir Roger a star on both sides of the Atlantic. Many of the Saint's characteristics, the easygoing manner, mocking eyebrow and ability to successfully charm every passing female, would later be incorporated into his role as James Bond.
Image copyrightREX FEATURESImage captionSir Roger's suave character in The Persuaders contrasted with Tony Curtis's rough diamond
In 1971 he teamed up with Tony Curtis in the TV series The Persuaders, as one of two wise-cracking millionaire playboys who floated around the fleshpots of the globe as a pair of freelance secret agents.
The success of the series owed a lot to the contrast of the rough-hewn New Yorker Danny Wilde, played by Curtis, and Sir Roger's suave Lord Brett Sinclair.
Sir Roger always denied that he had been considered as James Bond when the franchise launched in 1962 and was only aware of interest in him when Sir Sean announced, in 1966, that he would no longer play the role.
There was a long wait. George Lazenby was cast in the 1969 film On Her Majesty's Secret Service and Sir Sean was tempted back with an offer of £1.5m, a huge sum in those days, to make Diamonds Are Forever.
Headlines
It really was the last appearance for Sir Sean and Sir Roger finally picked up the Walther PPK in 1973 for Live and Let Die.
He went on to make six more films, including The Spy Who Loved Me and Octopussy, before bowing out of the role at the age of 57 with A View to a Kill. It was his last film appearance for five years.
Sir Roger had some success in films such as Shout at the Devil, The Wild Geese and North Sea Hijack, but many of the newspaper headlines after he retired as Bond were about his life off screen.
Image copyrightRONALD GRANTImage captionHe brought a lighter touch to the role of James Bond
In 1963, he became a father, when his partner, Luisa Mattioli, had a daughter, but it was to be another five years before Dorothy Squires agreed to give Sir Roger a divorce.
He married Luisa and they had two sons, but after 38 years, Sir Roger left her and they were divorced. He married his fourth wife, Kiki Tholstrup, in March 2002.
Sir Roger recovered from an operation for prostate cancer in 1993 and said he had led "an extraordinarily lucky, charmed life".
Achievements
He had homes in Switzerland and Monte Carlo, but devoted much of his time to travelling the globe as a roving ambassador for the United Nations children's organisation Unicef, a role prompted by the scenes of child poverty he had witnessed in India while filming Octopussy.
He took up the position at the request of his friend and predecessor, Audrey Hepburn. His work was recognised by a CBE in 1998 and he was knighted in 2003.
Throughout his life Sir Roger cut a suave figure, always immaculately dressed. In 2015 he was awarded the accolade of one of GQ magazine's best-dressed men.
Image copyrightPAImage captionHe would also remain associated with James Bond
He was a lifelong supporter of the Conservative Party, giving his backing to David Cameron in 2011 when the prime minister faced criticism over his policy on the EU.
Despite his other work and achievements, Roger Moore never managed to quite shrug off the mantle of 007.
"Of course I do not regret the Bond days," he once remarked. "I regret that sadly heroes in general are depicted with guns in their hands, and to tell the truth I have always hated guns and what they represent."
Helmut Kohl earned his place in history by securing the successful reunification of Germany after the collapse of communism.
His 16 years in office made him the longest-serving German chancellor since Bismarck and he was once described as the greatest European leader in the second half of the 20th Century.
He was a passionate supporter of greater European integration and was one of the main architects of the Maastricht Treaty.
Yet the end of his career was marred by economic problems in the old East Germany and a financial scandal within his own CDU party.
Helmut Josef Michael Kohl was born on 3 April 1930 into a conservative, Catholic family,
His political outlook was shaped by his experiences in his hometown of Ludwigshafen in the Rhineland during World War Two.
Because of its huge chemical works, the town was heavily bombed and, at the age of 12, the young Helmut found himself helping to recover the charred bodies of his neighbours from the rubble. What he once described as "the blessing of a late birth" freed him from any taints of Nazism.
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionHe became the youngest minister-president in 1969
After studying politics and law at Heidelberg University, Kohl entered politics in the German federal system where, in the Rhineland Palatinate, he rose to become the youngest Land [federal state] minister-president at the age of 39.
He built up a large network of political allies and forced through important changes, among them the law that outlawed denominational schools unless 80% of the parents approved.
Three years later, Kohl became national chairman of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the dominant post-war West German political party.
He was the CDU's candidate for chancellor in the 1976 election, but was defeated by the Social Democrat/Free Democrat coalition of Helmut Schmidt.
Golden age
Four years later, Kohl looked on as another CDU candidate, and great rival, the Bavarian Prime Minister Franz Josef Strauss, also went down to defeat by Schmidt.
A bear of a man, Kohl was often ridiculed for his love of food - one nickname being "Birne" or pear - and for his often clumsy provincial manner. Beyond this, Kohl's critics relentlessly mocked him for what they said was his lacklustre oratory and apparent lack of vision.
But many underestimated his ability to wield power, which he managed through a complex, but highly effective, network of patronage and political cronies.
Image copyrightPAImage captionHe clashed with Margaret Thatcher over greater European integration
In 1982, after the Free Democrats had left the ruling coalition, he took over as chancellor from Helmut Schmidt, and would go on to win the next four general elections, staying in power for 16 years.
The 1980s witnessed a golden age of German economic and political power. Together with his closest ally, France's President Mitterrand, Kohl shaped the federal ideal of the European Union and laid the groundwork for the creation of the single currency.
In 1987 there was a groundbreaking visit to West Germany by the East German leader, Erich Honecker. It was part of Kohl's policy of detente with the East, something his party had firmly rejected just 20 years before.
Two years later, the Berlin Wall came down and Kohl began the negotiations that would lead to reunification.
Economic dislocation
Having realised that Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev's attempts to reform communism would fail, Kohl persuaded him to withdraw from East Germany, while allowing a reunited Germany to remain a member of Nato.
The 350,000 Soviet troops based in the East were sent home, the costs borne by the West German government. On 3 October 1990, East Germany ceased to exist with its five historical states becoming part of the new federal republic.
Kohl's drive for reunification was not welcomed by everyone, with Israel's Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir publicly opposing it. While broadly welcomed by the West, there were concerns, notably in Britain and Poland, that a strong unified Germany would come to dominate the continent.
But Kohl was able to convince Gorbachev and US President George HW Bush that a united Germany would not destabilise or threaten Europe in the way Hitler's Germany had done.
"George Bush was for me the most important ally on the road to German unity," he said.
Kohl also made the political decision to grant East Germans immediate economic parity, even though his central bankers told him of the massive economic dislocation this would incur. They predicted correctly that Germany's economy would be badly affected for a decade.
Even so, Helmut Kohl had pulled off a remarkable political coup that might not have occurred had he dithered. But the huge economic repercussions of reunification robbed him of some of the popularity he might have expected, particularly in the former East where, during one visit, he was pelted with eggs.
Under his rule, the East suffered an economic collapse, with high rates of poverty and unemployment the norm. And the costs of reunification led to an economic downturn throughout Germany.
Strained relationship
He was slow to respond when neo-Nazis burned down the homes of immigrant Turkish families and hostels for refugees from Africa. He sometimes pushed aside the concerns of smaller nations to the east, like the Czechs and the Poles.
And he had a strained relationship with the UK and other countries that did not share his vision of a federal Europe.
Chief among Kohl's perceived antagonists was Margaret Thatcher. In a revealing volume of autobiography, published in 2005, he alleged that her anger boiled over in December 1989 after she was obliged to sign a communique supporting German reunification.
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionHe joined Angela Merkel at the 20th anniversary of German reunification in 2010
"I will never forget Margaret Thatcher's angry observation: 'We have beaten the Germans twice. Now they're back.'"
After he lost power in elections in 1998, it was revealed that Kohl had accepted, for his party, millions of dollars of secret political donations.
Despite refusing to name the donors, and despite his destroying much potentially incriminating evidence before he left the chancellery, he was spared possible corruption charges out of respect for his years of leadership.
But his reputation was badly damaged. To his opponents, Helmut Kohl could be insensitive and a bully. The suicide of his wife, Hannelore, in July 2001, seemed to exemplify his political and personal eclipse.
In 2010, an ailing Helmut Kohl joined Chancellor Angela Merkel in celebrations to mark the 20th anniversary of German reunification, something that will be seen as his greatest achievement.
"I have been underestimated for decades," he once said. "I have done very well that way."
