As he appears in yet another TV series, actor Geoffrey Palmer reveals all to Sue Blackhall about Butterflies, fishing and the one that got away.

His jowls almost stretch into a smile, but the eyes still peer at you warily. Geoffrey Palmer is known for not looking happy. In fact, being grumpy — along with having no patience and not suffering fools — is his trademark.

If all this sounds like another television character, it will come as no surprise that Geoffrey got very close to becoming TV’s infamous sourpuss Victor Meldrew.

“Yes, I feel I missed out on that one,” says Geoffrey. “Unfortunately, I left Hot Metal after the first series to do other things and was replaced by Richard Wilson, who now plays Meldrew. Hot Metal producer David Renwick took Richard with him to One Foot In The Grave.

“That could have been me.”

It’s hard to tell if Geoffrey was really disappointed or not. His face gives little away. It’s this face that has had Geoffrey described as everything from a blood-hound to a sad spaniel. “My hatchet face has become my trademark,” he says. “And yes, I suppose I am a bit grumpy.”

Geoffrey was grumpy in the Seventies comedy Butterflies, dour in The Fall And Rise Of Reginald Perrin, and a less than ardent suitOr in As Time Goes By, which is back on BBC1 in May. A radio version of the series already runs on Radio 2.

“I’m not really miserable,” says Geoffrey. “But obviously, with these roles, a lot of what you see is the actor himself. So I suppose you’re getting 75 per cent of me.”

It is Geoffrey’s voice, rather than his face, that has recently been to the fore. You will hear him on as many as five TV commercials at the moment, extolling everything from tinned fruit to gas.

But now Geoffrey’s familiar morose looks are due to be seen again. As well as the new, series of As Time Goes By, he appears in Tales From The Riverbank, a new BBC2 natural history Unit series which starts on May 12.

Talking about this does bring a smile to Geoffrey’s stiff upper lip. Rivers, are his favourite subject — or, rather, fishing in them. He’s never happier than standing there, waiting for the fish to bite.

“I love it, absolutely, love it,” says nature-lover Geoffrey, who last year travelled to Angangueo, 10,000 ft up in the mountains of central Mexico, to watch the migration of 100 million butterflies. “I fish rivers for trout and, if I can afford it, for salmon. But, do you know, I don’t even have to catch fish to enjoy it. A lot of the pleasure is just being there.”

Tales Of The Riverbank is a gentle guide to life above and below water, which is in sharp contrast to his other television role this Easter. It’s a feature film called Her Majesty, Mrs Brown and tells of Queen Victoria’s close~relationship with her gillie, John Brown.

Geoffrey plays Victoria’s private secretary Henry Ponsonby. Judi Dench, his screen chum from As Time Goes By, plays the Queen. And Billy Connolly plays Brown. ‘Without giving too much away, the TV film is very touching. I think Victoria was attracted to Brown because he didn’t bow and scrape all the time. Husband Albert liked him, too.”

Geoffrey’s own researches have revealed that Victoria left instructions to be buried with a picture of Brown in her left hand — while a cast of her beloved Albert’s hand took second place at the bottom of her coffin.

But, he says, “before you get carried away, there’s no between-the-sheets stuff. People have already pondered if there’s going to be any hanky-panky. Really! I’ve researched the whole Queen Victoria and John Brown story, and I don’t believe they did have an affair. The only indiscretion between the Queen and her man was the exchange of Valentine cards.” .

It is probably not a good time to remind Geoffrey that he once had a rather risque television appearance. It was for a BBC arts programme way back in 1977. Geoffrey wore flesh-coloured briefs and a piece of chamois leather on his front. He wouldn’t do that nowadays. ‘Nude scenes? Heavens forbid!” he says. “There’s too much of it on the screen now. I don’t think it’s a great time for television, apart from possibly wildlife pro- grammes and historical dramas.

“I can’t watch vulgar television. But I think Men Behaving Badly is terrific and Caroline Quinten and Martin Clunes are absolutely brilliant. It’s quite refreshing that this sort of programme is allowed on.

The nearest Geoffrey has come to manic comedy was his part in Hot Metal. He also starred in Fairly Secret Army (playing a retired major planning a military coup) and the gently acidic sitcom Executive Stress.

But he is best remembered as the long-suffering. husband to Wendy Craig’s "depressed middle-aged woman” in Butterflies, which ran for four series between 1978 and 1982. “Yes, people still talk about Butterflies. It was cleverly worked out to appeal to everyone.

"Girls liked watching the boys in it. Most parents had bloody terrible children. And most children had similar boring parents who nagged them!”

Geoffrey, 69, plays a similarly unjolly soul in As Time Goes By, the continued story of Lionel’s romance and marriage with a long-lost love (Judi Dench).

"Judi is absolutely lovely. Before the series, I Was told that everybody loves her, so I thought I’m bound to find something wrong with her. But I couldn’t! She is such good fun to be with,” says Geoffrey.

The storyline of As Time Goes By has a strange parallel in Geoffrey’s own love life. He had drifted into acting after the war and managed to get some early TV appearances "in the sort of shows which starred the Lionel Blair Dancers”. Then he met Sally, his wife of 33 years. He was in Manchester working for Granada Television on a series titled Family Solicitor.

“I was lodging with a couple when the woman’s sister arrived,” says Geoffrey. “That was Sally — and I was dotty about her straight away. We went out for a couple of months, but when I asked her to marry me she said No. I’d never asked anyone to marry me before and I thought, if that’s the reaction, I won’t do it again!”

Geoffrey has an amusing explanation for his rejection: “The truth was that Sally thought that, as an actor, I must have two heads or something seriously wrong with me. She knew to give actors a wide berth.”

The two went their separate ways, but Geoffrey summoned up the courage to - contact her again (Sally was a nurse, coincidentally, in As Time Goes By — the screen couple originally met when she was a young student nurse and he was an army officer). This time, Sally agreed to be his wife, although Geoffrey jokes it was “because she was on the shelf".

The couple live in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, and have two children; Charles, 31, a cameraman, and Harriet, 29, a teacher. “I guess a happy marriage of 33 years is rare,” says Geoffrey.

That rarity could also be because Sally and Geoffrey understand each other. It was Sally who, 10 years ago, introduced him to fishing. “I guess she did it because she thought I was bored or getting boring. She got me a couple of lessons as a Christmas present. Now I love it, absotutely love it.”

Thanks to Maree Wilson for sending this article which appeared in The Express (UK) on March 22, 1997

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