MIKE REID
(19.1.1940 – 29.7.2007)
I just found out about this from X-Y-Z Cosmonaunt's blog and it truly saddens me. Yes it might have been odd that a young teen boy was obsessed with and English night time soap opera (Eastenders) but dammit I found it to be an intriguing show and Frank Butcher was always one of my favorite characters
BBC Article on Reid's death
X-Y-Z has a copy of Reid's album posted to check out.
2 comments:
Mike Reid reminded me of Telly Savalas somehow. Though he was best known for Eastenders, he was a stand up comic for years as well as presenting a kids tv show called "Runaround" in the 1970's, plus he had a hit with his version of "The Ugly Duckling". I think we was friendly with alot of London criminal underworld characters, alot of London "hardmen" types ended up being stuntmen & actors in the 60s & 70s, men like Nosher Powell & John Bindon...Bindon was a well known London hardman who acted in a few films & bits of tv, he had also killed a man & been a minder for Led Zeppelin, I think he died of Aids whilst serving time in prison.
Xyz mentioned that Reid was a stunt driver on "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang"! He also was Roger Moore's stunt double on The Saint tv series. It's sad to see Reid die so young.
Hey thanks for all this great info. As I said I was just a teenager who had a weird intrest in the show and since there was no internet or anything like that at the time most of my info on anybody to do with the show at that time was 3rd maybe 2nd hand at best (the closest thing to a stateside refrence of Eastenders was the cover of GNR Lies). Reid did always seem a bit to comfortable in his ability to play a charater with a toe in the underworld that explains a lot :). Many of the toughs that appear in current english movies always kind of reminded me of Reid's charater so I guess that is where it all leads back to. Again thanks for sharing the knowledge it is much appriciated.
Post a Comment