Obituaries: Obituary: Warren Clarke

Warren Clarke as Winston Churchill in Three Days in May at London's Trafalgar Studios in 2011. Photo: Tristram Kenton

With a crumpled face, dyspeptic demeanour and gruffly disapproving scowl, Warren Clarke found unlikely fame as a politically incorrect Northern detective superintendent saddled with a liberally minded Southern university graduate sidekick in Dalziel and Pascoe.

Over the course of 12 series across 11 years from 1996, Clarke humanised the chauvinist copper in a performance of nuanced directness underpinned by winningly sly wit. The role showcased an unerring ability to imbue even the most unsympathetic characters with qualities that rendered them always watchable, if not always likeable.

The son of a stained-glass window maker and secretary, he left school at 15 to become a copy boy for the Manchester Evening News before involvement in amateur dramatics led him to the Liverpool Playhouse in 1966 to play Huckleberry Finn in Tom Sawyer.

Turning professional, early appearances in Liverpool over the next two years included Willis Halls The Long and the Short and the Tall, Ray Lawlers The Piccadilly Bushman and McCann in Pinters The Birthday Party.

At the Library Theatre, Manchester in 1967 he played Enobarbus in Antony and Cleopatra, and appeared in John McGraths Events While Guarding the Bofors Gun. He made his Royal Court debut in Tom Murphys Famine and Frank Normans prison drama Insideout (directed by Ken Campbell) in 1969.

The following year, Clarke was seen alongside John Gielgud and Ralph Richardson in David Storeys Home, transferring with it from the Royal Court to the Apollo Theatre.

Later Royal Court appearances included Sam Shepards The Unseen Hand (1973) and the Richard OBrien musical T.Zee (1976). In between, he appeared in the premiere of Anthony Shaffers Murderer at the Garrick Theatre (1975).

At the National Theatre in the late 1970s, Clarke appeared in Thomas Bernhards The Force of Habit (1976); Christopher Hamptons translation of Tales From the Vienna Woods; as Bonario to Paul Scofields Volpone (both 1977) and in Keith Dewhursts Lark Rise (1978).

Later stage work included Dennis in Ayckbourns Just Between Ourselves (Palace Theatre, Watford, 1986) and Winston Churchill (a role he also played in the 1974 television serial Jennie Lady Randolph Churchill) in Ben Browns Three Days in May at Londons Trafalgar Studios in 2011.

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Obituaries: Obituary: Warren Clarke