Richard Beckinsale Richard Beckinsale Richard Arthur Beckinsale (6 July 1947 – 19 March 1979) was an English actor, who played Lennie Godber in the BBC sitcom "Porridge" (along with its sequel series "Going Straight") and Alan Moore in the British ITV sitcom "Rising Damp". He is the father of actresses Samantha Beckinsale and Kate Beckinsale. Beckinsale was born in Carlton, Nottinghamshire, to an Anglo-Burmese father, Arthur John Beckinsale, and an English mother, Maggie Barlow. He left Alderman White Secondary Modern School at 15 with ambitions to become an actor, so while working in numerous manual jobs he enrolled at a Nottingham adult
Performance (UK TV series) Performance (UK TV series) Performance is a UK television anthology series produced by Simon Curtis for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). Twenty-six episodes aired on the BBC from 1991–98, almost all of which were productions of classic and contemporary plays, including "Uncle Vanya" by Anton Chekhov, "A Doll's House" and "Hedda Gabbler" by Henrik Ibsen, "Six Characters in Search of an Author" by Luigi Pirandello, "King Lear" by William Shakespeare, and "The Deep Blue Sea" by Terence Rattigan. Among its directors were Karel Reisz, Anthony Page, Richard Eyre, Simon Curtis, and Harold Pinter. Its high-profile cast included Colin Firth, Kenneth