My friend Jack Carr, who has died aged 78, was an actor who emerged in the mid-1960s, one of a crop of young, working-class graduates from Stephen Joseph’s drama department at Manchester University. Jack quickly established himself in television drama, usually playing villains, bent coppers or wayward boyfriends.
It was a career that came with some dangers: Jack would tell how he played a thug in the 1986 TV series Seal Morning. One day in a supermarket, a woman behind him in the checkout queue gave a shout of recognition. Jack turned, expecting an autograph request, but instead she battered him over the head with her umbrella, with the cry: “You seal-killing bastard!”
Jack was born in Kirby Cane, Norfolk, the son of Rosa (nee Buck), a secretary, and Wilfred Carr, a printer and union leader, and spent much of his childhood roaming wild, developing a passion for nature. A pupil at Bungay grammar school, in Suffolk, he first discovered drama and the joys of acting while studying history at Leeds University. There he also met Sue Goldie, whom he married in 1964.
After studying acting in Manchester, Jack went into rep, doing seasons in York, Edinburgh and Lincoln before landing a role in the gritty Yorkshire TV soap Castle Haven (1969), which launched other new talents including Kathy Staff, Roy Barraclough and Sally James. That soon led to regular appearances in Z Cars, plus several film roles.
It was the theatre, however, that Jack loved. He performed at Leeds Playhouse for two seasons in the early 70s and also at the Manchester Royal Exchange. He turned down a permanent role in Coronation Street, preferring to appear in a string of classic stage roles.
After a split with Sue in 1974, he took off for India, backpacking his way through Turkey, Iran and Afghanistan. On his return, he had long spells as the villainous Tom Merrick in Emmerdale and the historical series How We Used to Live. There was radio work, plus seasons at Crewe, Southampton and Sheffield. For Jack, the highlight was appearing in the English Shakespeare Company’s cycle of seven history plays, which toured throughout the world, as well as being filmed for television under the title The Wars of the Roses.
Wolfish good looks and a wicked smile kept Jack in work throughout the 90s, but a double hip replacement in his 50s, followed by heart surgery, ruled out the more energetic roles he preferred.
Jack was always drawn to the racier, more bohemian side of life, enjoying the company of poachers, wheeler-dealers and outcasts, a life often lived in pubs and drinking dens. Latterly, he largely retired to a canal boat in Essex, on the rivers Stort and Lea, where he entertained friends and family with his irrepressible good humour and vitality.
Jack is survived by his partner, Nicola Tipton, his daughter, Sophie, and granddaughter, Maddy.
