Neil Daglish, actor

In the next few weeks I hope to feature some Daglishes who have worked in the arts. I will start with Neil Daglish, an actor with an impressive career working in the theatre and in television.

Neil was born in in Hebburn, Co. Durham in December 1949, the son of Matthew Daglish and Mary Dobson. When he was ten, the family moved to the East End of London. After the death of his father, Neil left school at 15, working in a Magistrates Court as an assistant court clerk.

Neil writes: “After three years working in the Magistrates Court, I decided that I’d rather be an actor than a court clerk. I went to the Webber Douglas School of Acting in South Kensington and completed a 3 year course. I was employed (off and on) for the next 30 years as an actor in the theatre and television and thoroughly enjoyed it. I still work as an actor, but mostly in television and do very little theatre work”.

Among the highlights of his career, Neil lists:

• appearing in the West End production of Terence Rattigan’s last play “Cause Celebre”, with Glynis Johns;
• playing Ernest in “The Importance of Being Earnest”, with Penelope Keith;
• appearing as Sir Robert Chiltern in Sir Peter Hall’s production of “An Ideal Husband”;
• starring with Nicholas Lyndhurst in “Straight And Narrow” at the Wyndham’s Theatre;
• five plays at The National Theatre, including Arthur Miller’s “The American Clock”, William Congreve’s “Love For Love” and “The Beggar’s Opera” with Tim Curry;
• World tours with the Derek Nimmo British Airways Playhouse Company.

The programmes from two of these productions are shown here.

Neil’s many TV credits include everything from Dr. Who (with Peter Davison) to Rumpole of The Bailey, and his recent TV work has included appearance in popular favourites such as The Bill, Casualty and Eastenders.

My thanks to Neil for providing the information. I contacted Neil a couple of weeks ago to ask his permission and it has been a pleasure to find out more about his life and work.

Research shows that Neil's family tree goes back from Hebburn, where Neil was born, to Gateshead and then to Morpeth in the mid 19th century, back John Daglish who married Hannah Hall in Morpeth in 1768 - and we know that there were Daglishes living in Morpeth long before this date. This is a large and extensive family tree that we will visit again in coming weeks.

For anyone with connections to Hebburn, there are some interesting sites. The Hebburn Website has many old school photos - there are more on Norman Dunn's Hebburn on Tyne site.