Leslie Grantham

Leslie Grantham

Born: August 30, 1947
Died: June 15, 2018
in Camberwell, London, England, UK
British actor Leslie Grantham shot to fame in 1985 as Den Watts, the original landlord of the Queen Vic, in the BBC soap opera EastEnders. The character quickly became a national favourite and gained the nickname Dirty Den mostly because of the way he treated his wife Angie, played by Anita Dobson, and the several affairs and nefarious activities he conducted. At Grantham's request the character was killed off in 1988, gunned down by the gangsters he had betrayed. He returned to the soap in 2003 where it was revealed Den faked his own death to live in exile in Spain. It was widely speculated that Grantham was lured back with a £500,000-a-year contract and some 17 million viewers watched his return - an impressive figure, but not as impressive as the 30 million who tuned in to watch Den divorce Angie on Christmas Day, 1986. Two years later, in 2005, Den Watts was killed off once and for all in an episode that drew in 16.2 million viewers. The reason for Grantham's exit this time was an online sex scandal, revealed by a Sunday newspaper a year earlier. This was not the first time Grantham had courted controversy of course. Not long after finding fame in the soap Grantham's past became front page news; on 3 December 1966, when was serving as a young British soldier in West Germany, he attempted to rob a taxi driver, Felix Reese, in Osnabrück A struggle between Grantham and the driver followed, and Reese died from a gunshot wound to the head.In his statement to the police following his arrest, Grantham said that he did not know the gun was loaded and it had gone off during the struggle, which would have resulted in a conviction for manslaughter if a jury believed this version of events. However, at his trial in 1967 he was subsequently convicted of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. Although he had committed the murder in West Germany, he served the entirety of his imprisonment in various British prisons. This was because soldiers and officers convicted of any criminal offence that warrants a sentence of over two years are automatically transferred to Her Majesty's Prison Service, since they are also automatically dishonourably discharged. Grantham was released in 1977, having served 10 years. Whilst in prison, Grantham discovered acting and was encouraged by Labour politician T. Dan Smith and Doctor Who actress Louise Jameson to take up acting upon his release. Away from EastEnders, Grantham enjoyed a high profile career throughout much of the 1990s with the starring role of gangster Danny Kane in the BBC drama The Paradise Club, and maverick undercover cop Mick Raynor in 99-1. Other credits include the sci fi series The Uninvited (which he also produced), Fort Boyard, The Bill and The Stretch, which reunited him with Anita Dobson. He has also appeared in the films The Wedding Tackle, Charlie and Mob Handed, and starred in the titular role of The English Neighbour on Bulgarian TV in 2011. He died on the 15th June, 2018 in hospital following a short illness.

Movies for Leslie Grantham...

Vengeance
Title: Vengeance
Character: Ronnie
Released: November 1, 2020
Type: Movie
Eric Williams is a man who's been on the run for 27 years for a murder he didn't commit. When his estranged daughter is brutally attacked in London, the police are reluctant to act and so Eric must return to a city he no longer recognises to deal with the culprits himself, relying on help from his last remaining friends.
bee
Search and Destroy
Title: Search and Destroy
Character: Anderson
Released: June 19, 2020
Type: Movie
When American Ranger John Cutter fails to save a family being held hostage and loses his entire team in a confrontation with infamous Ukrainian arms dealer Igor Rodin, he is discharged from the army.
bee
The Krays: Dead Man Walking
Title: The Krays: Dead Man Walking
Character: Nipper Read
Released: September 10, 2018
Type: Movie
Inspired by true events, the shocking story of London's most feared and notorious brothers Reggie and Ronnie Kray as they break Frank 'The Mad Axeman' Mitchell from Dartmoor Prison in December 1966.
bee
Jack Southeast
Title: Jack Southeast
Character: The Boss
Released: August 26, 2018
Type: Movie
Jack comes out of prison and gets released early by his boss , but for that he has too do one more job and settle the score but with all this on his head, his wife/girlfriend wants him to stop, stay clean or he will lose her if he doesn't pack up his ideas. (SIC)
bee
Mob Handed
Title: Mob Handed
Character: The Detective
Released: May 9, 2016
Type: Movie
A beautiful journalist will stop at nothing to get revenge for her daughter's murder. With no help from corrupt cops she decides to take the law into her own hands and joins a vigilante gang of gangsters and football hooligans to track down the sick, sadistic killers and get her justice....
bee
Leslie
Title: Leslie
Character: Leslie
Released: January 26, 2013
Type: Movie
Leslie Grantham and Lucy-Jane Quinlan portray fictionalised versions of themselves in this road trip comedy that examines family, celebrity, friendship and love. When Leslie's ex wife reveals she's dying, Leslie and his estranged daughter must make the trip to the Lake District to visit her on her death bed. But with all the trains cancelled due to bad weather, Lucy is forced to join her dad as he makes the journey by car.
bee
The Factory
Title: The Factory
Character: Gene
Released: January 26, 2013
Type: Movie
Gene has the world - he's a successful entrepreneur, beautiful home, beautiful car, everything he could ask for except for one thing. Then he meets Gilda and the two fall in love and marry. They travel the world and live a life of pure happiness until tragedy strikes...
bee
DeadTime
Title: DeadTime
Released: January 1, 2012
Type: Movie
A Birmingham-based band are ordered by their unhappy record company to an old warehouse; the goal being to re-start their ailing careers with a kick-ass new promo video. Unfortunately the band and their entourage find themselves targets of a mysterious knife-wielding maniac, haunted by the voice of Satan, and out for revenge
bee
Title: The English Neighbour
Released: September 11, 2011
Type: TV
A middle-aged Englishman settled in a Bulgarian village, where he encounters the mentality and the tragicomic daily life of the local people.
bee
Charlie
Title: Charlie
Character: Richard Waldeck
Released: February 6, 2004
Type: Movie
Set in Post World War II Britain, chronicles the rise and fall of real life British crime lord Charlie Richardson.
bee
Title: Friday Night with Jonathan Ross
Character: Self
Released: November 2, 2001
Type: TV
Jonathan Ross's take on current topics of conversation, guest interviews and live music from both a guest music group and the house band.
bee
The Stretch
Title: The Stretch
Character: Terry Greene
Released: November 13, 2000
Type: Movie
When Terry (Grantham) is sentenced to a twenty-year stretch for a murder he did not commit, his wife Sam (Dobson) discovers that his apparently respectable business life has in fact been a cover for a vast criminal empire - drugs, protection, armed robbery, he was involved in it all. After the initial shock of the discovery has passed, Sam finds herself faced with a clear problem: should she leave it all behind, forget Terry and start her life afresh, or should she take charge of the business in her husband's absence?
bee
The Wedding Tackle
Title: The Wedding Tackle
Character: George
Released: August 11, 2000
Type: Movie
The sexual rivalries between a group of friends cause comic chaos during a stag night celebration.
bee
Title: It's Only TV But I Like It
Character: Self
Released: June 3, 1999
Type: TV
bee
Shadow Run
Title: Shadow Run
Character: Liney
Released: January 1, 1998
Type: Movie
Haskell is assigned a job by his boss, the aristocratic Landon-Higgins, to highjack a high security van in broad daylight while it's in the shadow run (out of radio contact with the main security firm). He assembles a team to carry out the heist, but things don't go according to plan and Haskell begins to think his boss might be double crossing him. Add to this, a teenage boarding school pupil has already witnessed some of the meetings of the team and Haskell's in real trouble.
bee
Title: The Uninvited
Released: September 25, 1997
Type: TV
The Uninvited is an ITV science fiction television mini-series first shown in 1997 as four fifty minute episodes. The series was made by Anglia Television. It was created by Leslie Grantham, who also features as a police officer with a secret. Steve Blake is a photographer who sees the head of British Nuclear Power killed in a horrific car crash, but then turning up alive and well. The village of Sweet Hope contains a mystery: it collapsed into the sea and the population was apparently saved by two police officers. Blake tries to investigate what has happened to the survivors who have all gone on to obtain positions of power within the British establishment. When Blake visits the submerged village he discovers a chilling secret...
bee
Hooligan '96
Title: Hooligan '96
Character: Narrator (voice)
Released: May 28, 1996
Type: Movie
A controversial study of the phenomenon of football hooliganism, looking at the social context and tribal instincts that lie behind it.
bee
Title: The Ant & Dec Show
Released: April 6, 1995
Type: TV
bee
It's Not Unusual
Title: It's Not Unusual
Character: Cabbie
Released: January 1, 1995
Type: Movie
A taxi driver is driven to distraction by her love of Tom Jones.
bee
Title: The Detectives
Character: Danny Kane
Released: January 27, 1993
Type: TV
The absurd adventures of two defective detectives, who - despite unbelievable incompetence - somehow manage to solve their cases (or be nearby when the cases are solved) and retain their jobs.
bee
Title: Heartbeat
Character: George East
Released: April 10, 1992
Type: TV
Set during the 1960s in the fictional North Yorkshire village of Aidensfield, this enduringly popular series interweaves crime and medical storylines.
bee
Title: Cluedo
Character: Himself - Special Guest
Released: July 25, 1990
Type: TV
Cluedo was a UK television game show based on the board game of the same name. Each week, a reenactment of the murder at the stately home Arlington Grange of a visiting guest was played and, through a combination of interrogating the suspects and deduction, celebrity guests had to discover who committed the murder, which of six weapons and in which room it was committed, whilst viewers were invited to play along at home.
bee
Title: Cluedo
Character: Colonel Mustard
Released: July 25, 1990
Type: TV
Cluedo was a UK television game show based on the board game of the same name. Each week, a reenactment of the murder at the stately home Arlington Grange of a visiting guest was played and, through a combination of interrogating the suspects and deduction, celebrity guests had to discover who committed the murder, which of six weapons and in which room it was committed, whilst viewers were invited to play along at home.
bee
The Nightwatch
Title: The Nightwatch
Character: David Smallman
Released: November 19, 1989
Type: Movie
Dark and brooding thriller. A group of mercenaries are assembled in Amsterdam by a British intelligence officer. Believing they are awaiting the details of a new mission, they decide to spend their free time in the sleazy bars and brothels. Over the course of the weekend it gradually becomes clear that all is not what it seems. Unknown to them their paths have all crossed before, and the deceit and violence of the past is about to become their own downfall.
bee
Title: The Paradise Club
Character: Danny Kane
Released: September 19, 1989
Type: TV
The Paradise Club is a BBC television drama starring Don Henderson and Leslie Grantham as Frank & Danny Kane. Two series were produced and were broadcast between 1989 and 1990. The show focuses upon two brothers, Frank & Danny Kane. Their mother, Ma Kane, is the matriarch of a criminal gang in South London, helped by her son Danny. Frank has become a priest but leaves the church; he inherits The Paradise Club on the death of their mother and returns to London to try and steer Danny away from crime.
bee
My Brother David
Title: My Brother David
Character: Den Watts (EastEnders - Archive footage) (Uncredited)
Released: March 2, 1989
Type: Movie
David Scarboro, who played Mark Fowler in EastEnders (1985), fell to his death at Beachy Head in 1988. Simon, his younger brother, presents this tribute, featuring David's achievements as a young actor as well as his problems.
bee
Morons from Outer Space
Title: Morons from Outer Space
Character: Motorway Policeman
Released: March 29, 1985
Type: Movie
The story begins on a small spaceship docking with a refueling station. On board are a group of four aliens, Bernard, Sandra, Desmond, and Julian. During a particularly tedious period of their stay at the station, the other three begin playing with the ship’s controls while Bernard is outside playing spaceball. They accidentally disconnect his part of the ship, leaving him stranded while they crash into a large blue planet close by...
bee
Title: EastEnders
Character: Den Watts
Released: February 19, 1985
Type: TV
The everyday lives of working-class residents of Albert Square, a traditional Victorian square of terrace houses surrounding a park in the East End of London's Walford borough.
bee
Knockback: 2
Title: Knockback: 2
Character: Peter
Released: February 3, 1985
Type: Movie
Alan and Sylvia fall in love and Alan gains a renewed sense of purpose. He begins to hope for an eventual release on licence. However both he and Sylvia have to face the fact that, for the foreseeable future, they cannot enjoy any physical intimacy. They decide to treat their affair as a long Victorian courtship.
bee
Knockback: 1
Title: Knockback: 1
Character: Peter
Released: January 27, 1985
Type: Movie
In 1965, at the age of 25, Alan Ackland is sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of a business associate. In 1971, Sylvia Barker, lonely and depressed after a failed marriage and with two young children to bring up alone, seeks a new direction in her life and applies to become a voluntary prison visitor. Several years later their paths cross.
bee
Title: The Bill
Released: October 16, 1984
Type: TV
The daily lives of the men and women at Sun Hill Police Station as they fight crime on the streets of London. From bomb threats to armed robbery and drug raids to the routine demands of policing this ground-breaking series focuses as much on crime as it does on the personal lives of its characters.
bee
Doctor Who: Resurrection of the Daleks
Title: Doctor Who: Resurrection of the Daleks
Character: Kiston
Released: February 15, 1984
Type: Movie
Captured in a time corridor, the Doctor and his companions are forced to land on 20th century Earth, diverted by the Doctor's oldest enemy - the Daleks. It is here the true purpose of the time corridor becomes apparent: after ninety years of imprisonment, Davros, the ruthless creator of the Daleks, is to be liberated to assist in the resurrection of his army. Not even the Daleks foresee the poisonous threat of their creator. Indeed, who would suspect Davros of wanting to destroy his own Daleks - and why? Only the Doctor knows the truth. Will he descend to Davros' level of evil to stop him?
bee
Title: Doctor Who
Character: Kiston
Released: November 23, 1963
Type: TV
The adventures of The Doctor, a time-traveling humanoid alien known as a Time Lord. He explores the universe in his TARDIS, a sentient time-traveling spaceship. Its exterior appears as a blue British police box, which was a common sight in Britain in 1963 when the series first aired. Along with a succession of companions, The Doctor faces a variety of foes while working to save civilizations, help ordinary people, and right many wrongs.