David Markham

David Markham (3 April 1913 – 15 December 1983) was an English stage and film actor for over forty years.

Markham was born Peter Basil Harrison in Wick, Worcestershire and died in Hartfield, East Sussex.

In 1937 he married Olive Dehn (1914–2007), a BBC Radio dramatist. They had four daughters: Sonia, an illustrator; Kika (b. 1940), an actress, widow of actor Corin Redgrave; Petra (b. 1944), an actress; and Jehane, a poet and dramatist, widow of actor Roger Lloyd-Pack.

In World War II, he was imprisoned as a conscientious objector, before being allowed to do forestry work.

Markham appeared occasionally in cinema and often on television. He appeared in Carol Reed's film The Stars Look Down (1939) and in François Truffaut's films Two English Girls (1972), in which he plays a fortuneteller with his daughter Kika, and Day for Night (1973).

His first television appearance may have been with Peter Wyngarde in a BBC television play called "The Rope", broadcast on 12 January 1950. He played the father of Robin Phillips in two films, Two Gentlemen Sharing (1969) and Tales From The Crypt (1972).

Markham portrayed Prime Minister H. H. Asquith (a close look-alike) in the 1981 BBC Wales drama The Life and Times of David Lloyd George, alongside his daughter Kika Markham, who played Lloyd George's secretary, lover and later second wife – Frances Stevenson.

Selected filmography

Murder in the Family (1938) – Michael Osborne The Stars Look Down (1940) – Arthur Barras The Blakes Slept Here (1953) – Edward Nom-de-Plume: "The Man Who Made People" (1956) – Alexandre Electrode 93 (1957) TV series – David Williams The Dawn Killer (1959) – Mr. Hawkes Last of the Long-haired Boys (1968) – Brindle Two Gentlemen Sharing (1969) – Mr. Pater – Roddy's Father Family Life (1971) Blood from the Mummy's Tomb (1971) – Doctor Burgess Two English Girls (1972) – Palmist Tales From The Crypt (1972) – Father – Edward Elliot (segment 3 "Poetic Justice") Z.P.G. (1972) – Dr. Herrick Day for Night (1973) – Doctor Michael Nelson La guerre du pétrole n'aura pas lieu (1975) – Thomson Feelings (1975) – Professor Roland The Three Hostages (1977) – Greenslade La petite fille en velours bleu (1978) – Consul Off to Philadelphia in the Morning (1978) – William Sterndale Bennett Meetings with Remarkable Men (1979) – Dean Borsh Tess (1979) – Reverend Clare Richard's Things (1980) – Mr Morris The Life and Times of David Lloyd George (1981) TV series – Herbert Henry Asquith Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years (1981) (mini) TV series – Marlborough Gandhi (1982) – Older Englishman