Frank Middlemass - wikipedia Frank Middlemass Frank Middlemass Francis George Middlemass ( 1919 - 05 - 28 ) 28 May 1919 Eaglescliffe, County Durham, England 8 September 2006 ( 2006 - 09 - 08 ) ( aged 87 ) Northwood, London, England Years active 1957 -- 2005 Parent ( s ) Thomas Middlemass Mary Elizabeth Hoggett Francis George `` Frank '' Middlemass ( 28 May 1919 -- 8 September 2006 ) was an English actor, who even in his early career played older roles. He is best remembered for his television roles as Rocky Hardcastle in As Time Goes By, Algy Herries in To Serve Them All My Days and Dr. Alex Ferrenby in Heartbeat. Middlemass was also active in the Royal Shakespeare Company and was the fourth and final actor to play Dan Archer in The Archers. Contents 1 Early life 2 Television 3 Other work 4 Later years 5 Filmography 6 References 7 External links Early life This personal - life paragraph immediately below needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. ( February 2012 ) Born to Thomas Middlemass and Mary Elizabeth Hoggett, Frank Middlemass was the youngest of four children after sisters Dorothy Mary ( born 1907 ), Margery Elizabeth ( born 1909 ) and Jean Theresa ( born 1916 ). Grandfather Thomas is shown in 1891 census to have been born in Whitsome, Berwickshire around 1835. Middlemass was born in Eaglescliffe, on the North Riding of Yorkshire - County Durham border, the son of a shipping company director. He was brought up in Newcastle upon Tyne, and educated in Stockton - on - Tees. He entered the army at the age of nineteen and was wounded in the Dunkirk retreat He left the army when he was thirty and was by then a lieutenant colonel. Middlemass started his acting career in rep in Penzance, Cornwall and then went on to join the Old Vic Company. While with them he toured North and South America, Australia, New Zealand, Israel, Lebanon, Russia, Poland and the Far East., and performed in Twelfth Night opposite Vivien Leigh. During the 1960s, he toured with Ian McKellen 's Actors ' Company and performed at the Nottingham Playhouse. He performed opposite Peter O'Toole in Waiting for Godot. His first television role was in 1958, in Dixon of Dock Green. His other early television appearances included Z - Cars, Softly, Softly, The Avengers and Jackanory. During the 1970s and 1980s he appeared in Doctor at Large, War and Peace ( a memorable performance as Mikhail Kutuzov ), Crown Court, Last of the Summer Wine, Ripping Yarns ( Murder at Moorstone 's Manor ), Upstairs, Downstairs, Poldark ( 1975 ), Fall of Eagles ( as Russian Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin ), The Sweeney and Emmerdale Farm. He played Sir Charles Lyndon in Stanley Kubrick 's Barry Lyndon ( 1975 ). Television Middlemass played the philandering butcher Mr. Lyon in the final episode of the third season of the British series Upstairs, Downstairs in 1973, but it was not until 1980, when he appeared in the post-World War I drama To Serve Them All My Days, that he first took a leading role in a British series. He followed this up with a notable performance as The Fool to Michael Hordern 's King Lear, and also played Brezhnev in Tom Stoppard 's Squaring the Circle. He went on to play minor characters in Yes Minister, Winston Churchill : The Wilderness Years ( as Lord Derby ), Juliet Bravo, Only When I Laugh, All in Good Faith, Yes, Prime Minister, Oliver Twist ( as Mr. Brownlow ), Sherlock Holmes and the Leading Lady, and Miss Marple, in the 1989 episode `` A Caribbean Mystery '' ( as Major Palgrave ). From 1992 to 1993, he appeared in twenty episodes of the police drama Heartbeat as Dr. Alex Ferrenby. Following that in 1993, Middlemass first appeared in the sitcom As Time Goes By as Rocky Hardcastle, a role that continued regularly until 2002, and then also in the 2005 two - part reunion specials, his final television appearance. He has appeared in both British TV adaptations of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, `` The Blue Carbuncle '' playing Peterson in the BBC adaptation and Henry Baker on the Granada TV series. Other work Middlemass also appeared on radio, most notably playing patriarch Dan Archer, the fourth actor to play the role, in the long - running radio soap opera The Archers. He played this role from 1982 until 1986, when the character was killed off. Other voice work includes the albums and radio plays : Carol and the Advent Calendar, The Hitchhiker 's Guide to the Galaxy and Hordes of the Things. Frank also made the BBC Radio appeal for Headway, the National Head Injuries Association, and raised a substantial amount of money. Letters from admirers came along with some of the cheques. He also appeared in films, including roles in Otley ( 1968 ), Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed ( 1969 ), Say Hello to Yesterday ( 1970 ), Madame Sin ( 1972 ), Barry Lyndon ( 1975 ), The Island ( 1980 ), as the voice of the Caterpillar in Dreamchild ( 1985 ), and Mrs Caldicot 's Cabbage War ( 2002 ). He joined the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1984 and his Shakespearean roles included Friar Lawrence in Romeo and Juliet, Quince in A Midsummer Night 's Dream and Holofernes in Love 's Labour 's Lost. Middlemass also appeared widely in classic plays such as Rosmersholm, Heartbreak House and You Never Can Tell. Later years Even in his eighties, Frank Middlemass was still performing on stage, notably in The Importance of Being Earnest and toured with a one - man show called Frankly Speaking. In his final years, he made appearances in Kavanagh QC, Casualty, The 10th Kingdom, Doctors and Midsomer Murders. In 2005, As Time Goes By returned for two reunion specials, aired in Christmas that year, and this was his final television appearance. Middlemass never married, and for forty years he had a room in the house of his friend, actor Geoffrey Toone, who died in 2005. Middlemass died, aged 87, in Northwood, London. Filmography Otley ( 1969 ) - Bruce Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed ( 1969 ) - Guest - Plumber Say Hello to Yesterday ( 1971 ) - Station Master Madame Sin ( 1972 ) - Dr. Henriques Barry Lyndon ( 1975 ) - Sir Charles Lyndon Say Hello to Yesterday ( 1980 ) - Windsor A Swarm in May ( 1983 ) - Dr. Sunderland Dreamchild ( 1985 ) - Caterpillar ( voice ) The Lost Language of Cranes ( 1991 ) - Alex Mrs Caldicot 's Cabbage War ( 2002 ) - Bernard References Jump up ^ Carole Woddis. `` Obituary : Frank Middlemass Film ''. The Guardian. Retrieved 2017 - 05 - 04. ^ Jump up to : `` Obituary - Frank Middlemass ''. London : The Daily Telegraph. 21 September 2006. Retrieved 2 May 2010. ^ Jump up to : Woddis, Carole ( 11 September 2006 ). `` Obituary - Frank Middlemass ''. London : The Guardian. Retrieved 2 May 2010. ^ Jump up to : `` Obituary - Frank Middlemass ''. London : The Times. 12 September 2006. Jump up ^ `` Douglas Adams - The Hitch - Hiker 's Guide To The Galaxy Part Two : The Restaurant At The End Of The Universe ( Vinyl, LP ) ''. Discogs.com. Retrieved 2017 - 05 - 04. Jump up ^ ( 1 ) Jump up ^ Hordes of the Things : Andrew Marshall, John Lloyd, Full Cast, Consultant in Anaesthesia Royal United Hospital Bath and Honorary Senior Lecturer Patrick Magee, Paul Eddington, Simon Callow. Bookdepository.com. ISBN 9781408426234. Retrieved 2017 - 05 - 04. External links Frank Middlemass on IMDb VIAF : 262680798 ISNI : 0000 0001 1438 3450 SUDOC : 06080436X BNF : cb14071205p ( data ) Retrieved from `` https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Frank_Middlemass&oldid=833675103 '' Categories : 1919 births 2006 deaths 20th - century English male actors 21st - century English male actors Actors from County Durham Male actors from London British Army personnel of World War II British Army officers English male film actors English male radio actors English male soap opera actors English male stage actors English male television actors Royal Shakespeare Company members People from Eaglescliffe People from Northwood, London Hidden categories : All articles with dead external links Articles with dead external links from May 2017 Use dmy dates from April 2012 Pages using infobox person with unknown parameters Articles with hCards Articles needing additional references from February 2012 All articles needing additional references Wikipedia articles with VIAF identifiers Wikipedia articles with ISNI identifiers Wikipedia articles with BNF identifiers Talk Contents About Wikipedia Français עברית Suomi Edit links This page was last edited on 1 April 2018, at 22 : 13. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution - ShareAlike License ; additional terms may apply. By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Wikipedia ® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization. About Wikipedia

Question: who played rocky on as time goes by
Answer: Francis George “Frank” Middlemass