John Normington

John Normington (28 January 1937 – 26 July 2007) was an English actor born in Dukinfield, Cheshire, where he grew up on Montrose Avenue with his parents and two younger sisters, Judith and Joan. His early education took him from Victoria Road Infants School to Globe Lane County Primary and then Crescent Road Boys School. He trained as an opera singer at the Northern School of Music before completing his national service, during which he was stationed in Aldershot and joined the Farnham repertory company.

Normington's professional stage career began at the Repertory Theatre in Oldham in 1950. Between 1959 and 1962 he was based at the Library Theatre in Manchester, after which a brief period at the Oxford Playhouse preceded his joining the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1963. He went on to appear in more than twenty RSC productions, taking on numerous Shakespearean roles throughout his association with the company. His stage work extended to the West End and the National Theatre, and in 1967 he brought his stage career to Broadway, appearing in Harold Pinter's The Homecoming.

Normington made his television debut in 1963, and over the following decades accumulated an extensive list of screen credits. During the 1960s and 1970s he appeared in Murder Most English, The Caesars, Softly Softly, Nearest and Dearest, Public Eye, The Edwardians, Crown Court, Upstairs Downstairs, and ITV Playhouse. His film work during this period included Inadmissible Evidence (1968), A Midsummer Night's Dream (1968), The Reckoning (1969), Stardust (1974), Rollerball (1975), The Medusa Touch (1978), and The Thirty Nine Steps (1978).

In the 1980s, Normington appeared in Play for Today, Yes Prime Minister, Inspector Morse, and Agatha Christie's Poirot. He portrayed Morgus in the 1984 Doctor Who serial The Caves of Androzani and Trevor Sigma in the 1988 serial The Happiness Patrol. His film appearances during this decade included A Private Function (1984), Hitler's S.S.: Portrait in Evil (1985), in which he played Heinrich Himmler, My Family and Other Animals (1987), Jack the Ripper (1988), and Wilt (1989). Through the 1990s he appeared in The New Statesman, Peak Practice, Hetty Wainthropp Investigates, Coronation Street, The Bill, and David Copperfield, and in 2001 he took a role in Love in a Cold Climate.

In 2004, Normington appeared in a production of King Lear in Stratford, but was required to withdraw before the show transferred to the West End after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. He subsequently recovered sufficiently to continue working, appearing in The Voysey Inheritance in 2006 and The Entertainer from March to April 2007, from which he withdrew due to declining health. His final screen appearances included a 2004 episode of Midsomer Murders, the Torchwood episode Ghost Machine, Trial and Retribution XIV, and a 2007 episode of Casualty. Normington was in a relationship with John Anderson. He died of pancreatic cancer on 26 July 2007 at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in London, aged 70.