Louis Mahoney

Louis Felix Danner Mahoney (; 8 September 1938 – 28 June 2020) was a Gambian-born British actor, based in Hampstead in London. He was an anti-racist activist and long-time campaigner for racial equality within the acting profession.

Early life Mahoney was born in Bathurst (now Banjul), the Gambia, in 1938, the eldest of six children to James Mahoney and Princess (née Danner). Mahoney attended the Methodist Boys' High School. He worked regularly on the stage throughout his career including shows at the National Theatre, Young Vic, Royal Court, Almeida and his final stage performances were in Alan Bennett's Allelujah! at the Bridge Theatre in 2018.

He helped found Performers Against Racism in the 1980s to campaign against apartheid in South Africa and was Joint Vice President of Equity between 1994 and 1996.

He was seen most frequently on television in series such as: Danger Man, Dixon of Dock Green, Z-Cars, Special Branch, The Troubleshooters, Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads?, Doctor Who (in the stories Frontier in Space, Planet of Evil and Blink), Quiller, Fawlty Towers (as Dr Finn in The Germans, 1975), The Professionals (as Dr Henry in the episode "Klansmen", never transmitted on terrestrial TV in the UK, and in "Black Out", again as a doctor), Miss Marple, Yes, Prime Minister, Bergerac, The Bill, Casualty, Holby City and Sea of Souls.

His films included The Plague of the Zombies (1966), Omen III: The Final Conflict (1981), Rise and Fall of Idi Amin (1981), White Mischief (1987), Cry Freedom (1987), Shooting Fish (1997), Wondrous Oblivion (2003) and Shooting Dogs (2005).

He featured in the Channel 4 documentary Random (2011), and in the BBC Three drama Being Human (2012) as Leo, an aged and dying werewolf.

Mahoney's last TV appearance was in the Tracy Beaker CBBC spin-off, The Dumping Ground, as Henry Lawrence, the grandfather of Charlie Morris (Emily Burnett).

Campaign work Mahoney was a long-standing campaigner for racial equality within the acting profession, as a member of the Equity Afro-Asian Committee (previously called the Coloured Actors Committee until he renamed it), founding Performers Against Racism to defend Equity policy on South Africa,

Personal life Mahoney was married in 1971 and later divorced, and had daughters. Mahoney lived on the corner of Gayton Road and Willow Road, and was a regular in local pubs. His funeral took place at Hampstead Parish, attended by his friends and community.

Legacy The Louis Mahoney Scholarships at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama were initiated in his memory to encourage applications from Black and global majority students, beginning from the academic year 2021/22, supporting one undergraduate and one postgraduate candidate in each of the following three years.

Filmography

Theatre