Arthur Lowe (22 September 1915 — 15 April 1982) was a BAFTA Award winning English actor. He was best known for playing Captain George Mainwaring in the popular British sitcom Dad's Army from 1968 until 1977.
Arthur Lowe was born in Hayfield, Derbyshire, the only child of Arthur and Mary Annie (Nan) Lowe. His father worked for a railway company, in charge of shunting theatrical touring companies around Northern England and the Midlands in special trains. Lowe’s original intention was to join the Merchant Navy but this idea was thwarted due to his poor eyesight. Working at an aircraft factory he joined the army on the eve of World War II, but not before experiencing his first brush with the acting world by working as a stagehand at the Manchester Palace of Varieties. Lowe served in the Middle East, and began to take part in shows put on for the troops, which appears to have sparked his desire to act. He left the Army at the end of the war with the rank of Sergeant-Major.
Lowe made his debut at the Hulme Hippodrome repertory theatre, Manchester in 1945, where he was paid £5 per week for twice-nightly performances. He became known for his character roles including parts in Call Me Madam, Pal Joey and The Pajama Game and eventually featured in at least fifty films. He briefly appeared as a reporter at the end of the Ealing comedy film Kind Hearts and Coronets(1949).
By the 1960s Lowe had successfully made the transition to television and landed a regular role as draper/lay preacher Leonard Swindley in the Northern drama series Coronation Street (1960-65). So popular was his role with viewers that he was eventually given his own spin off series Pardon the Expression (1966) and its sequel Turn out the Lights (1967).
However, Leonard Swindley was not a role Lowe relished and he longed to move on to other parts. During the months he was not playing Swindley he was busy on stage or making guest roles in other TV series including Z-Cars and The Avengers. He also had a prominent parts in the Lindsay Anderson films This Sporting Life in 1963 and if.... in 1968. In 1978 he starred opposite Sir Laurence Olivier in the Laurence Olivier Presents television series, in the episode "Daphne Laureola".
Lowe married Joan Cooper on 10 January 1948. They had met in 1945 when she was his leading lady at Hulme Hippodrome and they remained together until his death. Their son Stephen Lowe was born in January 1953.
In 1968, Lowe was cast in his most famous role, Captain George Mainwaring. It has often been remarked by his former colleague Bill Pertwee that this was the role Lowe played which most resembled himself: pompous and bumbling, although he also successfully played the Captain's drunken brother Barry Mainwaring in the 1975 episode "My Brother and I". He went on to take the character into a radio series, stage play and feature length film. Following the success of Dad's Army, Lowe released several 45rpm 7" singles: My Little Girl, My Little Boy / How I Won The War on the Columbia label in 1972, "Making Whoopee / Windows & Doorways" on the Spiral label in 1974, "Sonny Boy / The Autumn Years" on Spiral in 1975 and the Flanagan and Allen song "Hometown" with John Le Mesurier in the Warner label in 1975. He also recorded the Dad's Army theme song, "Who Do You Think You're Kidding, Mr. Hitler?" although this was not released as a single.
When not involved in Dad's Army Lowe would frequently be making films such as Adolf Hitler: My Part in His Downfall; No Sex Please, We're British; and O Lucky Man!. He was in great demand for guest appearances on other TV shows such as The Morecambe and Wise Show (1971) and he played Dr. Maxwell in five episodes of the sitcom Doctor at Large (1971). He was never afraid to play oddities or surreal characters. In the film version of The Bed-Sitting Room, a surreal post-apocalyptic black comedy featuring a cross-section of British comic talent, he played a man on the verge of mutating into a parrot, while still maintaining the mannerisms of a lower middle-class British professional keen on marrying his daughter to an upper-class drone. His comic tics, squawking and scratching under his ear at just the right moment, almost stole the film. Unfortunately the script called for a real parrot to take over in the latter half, so he was unable to carry the role as far as he might have.
Between 1971 and 1973 Lowe joined Dad's Army castmate Ian Lavender on the BBC radio comedy Parsley Sidings. In 1974 he played Wilkins Micawber in the BBC serial David Copperfield. He employed a multitude of voices on the 1975 BBC animated television series Mr. Men, where he voiced all the characters as well as narrated.
When Dad's Army ended in 1977, Lowe was still very much in demand with starring roles in TV programmes such as Bless Me Father with Daniel Abineri (1978-81, as Father Charles Clement Duddleswell) and Potter (1979-80, as Redvers Potter). He also carried on working on the stage and films. An unusual role he had was in a silent film, 1979's 'The Plank', alongside Eric Sykes. He played Charters in the 1979 remake of A Lady Vanishes. He was the voice of Mr. Beaver in the 1979 animated version of The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe. Arthur Lowe reprised his role as George Mainwaring for the pilot episode of It Sticks Out Half a Mile, a radio sequel to Dad's Army. One of his last film roles was in 1982's Britannia Hospital.
While touring at coastal theatres, accompanied by his wife Joan, he used his distinctive 1885 former steam yacht Amazon as a floating base. He bought "Amazon" as a houseboat in 1968, but realised her potential and took her back to sea in 1971; this unique vessel is still operating in the Mediterranean today.
Lowe died of a stroke in his dressing room at the Alexandra Theatre, Birmingham before a performance of Home at Seven on 15 April 1982 aged 66, having given a live interview on the BBC 1 afternoon show Pebble Mill at One only a day earlier. His last sitcom, A J Wentworth, BA was shown posthumously from July to August 1982. His ashes were scattered at Sutton Coldfield crematorium.
In December 2007 plans were unveiled for a statue of Lowe to be erected in Thetford, where the outside scenes for Dad's Army were filmed.
Two biographies of Arthur Lowe have been published: Arthur Lowe - Dad's Memory by his son Stephen which was issued in 1997 and more recently Arthur Lowe by Graham Lord. In 2000 The Unforgettable Arthur Lowe was part of The Unforgettable… series of TV biographies of famous comedy performers.
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