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Tony Osoba is a
ScottishScotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
actor best known for his role as
Jim 'Jock' McClarenJim McClaren was a character in the popular BBC sitcom Porridge played by Tony Osoba.McClaren, who claims to have been adopted, is Black and also Scottish. This led to a string of racist abuse when he first arrived at Slade prison. Fletch also attacks him for being Scottish in a manner similar to...
in the popular 70s British sitcom
PorridgePorridge is a British situation comedy broadcast on BBC1 from 1974 to 1977, running for three series, two Christmas specials and a feature film. Written by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais, it stars Ronnie Barker and Richard Beckinsale as two inmates at the fictional HMP Slade in Cumberland...
, and appeared in its sequel
Going StraightGoing Straight is a BBC sitcom which was a direct spin-off from Porridge, starring Ronnie Barker as Norman Stanley Fletcher, newly released from the fictional Slade Prison where the earlier series had been set....
. Osoba was the first black Scottish actor to appear on primetime television when he appeared in the series.
His other roles include Det. Sgt. Charles 'Chas' Jarvis in
Dempsey & MakepeaceDempsey & Makepeace is a British television crime drama made by London Weekend Television for ITV, created and produced by Ranald Graham...
(1984-6) and Peter Ingram in
Coronation StreetCoronation Street is a British soap opera set in Weatherfield, a fictional town in Greater Manchester based on Salford. Created by Tony Warren, Coronation Street was first broadcast on 9 December 1960...
(1990). He has also appeared in
Space: 1999Space: 1999 is a British science-fiction television series that ran for two seasons and originally aired from 1975 to 1977. In the opening episode, nuclear waste from Earth stored on the Moon's far side explodes in a catastrophic accident on 13 September 1999, knocking the Moon out of orbit and...
(1976),
The ProfessionalsThe Professionals was a British crime-action television drama series produced by Avengers Mk1 Productions and London Weekend Television that aired on the ITV network from 1977 to 1983. In all, 57 episodes were produced, filmed between 1977 and 1981. It starred Martin Shaw, Lewis Collins and Gordon...
(1978),
Charles Endell Esq (1979),
The Flame Trees of ThikaThe Flame Trees of Thikais a British television mini-series of seven 50-minute episodes made by Euston Films for Thames Television in 1981. It was adapted by John Hawkesworth from the 1959 book of the same title by Elspeth Huxley, and is set in and around the town of Thika in Kenya's Central Province...
(1981),
BergeracBergerac was a British television show set on Jersey. Produced by the BBC in association with the Seven Network, and screened on BBC1, it starred John Nettles as the title character Detective Sergeant Jim Bergerac, a detective in "Le Bureau des Étrangers" Bergerac was a British television show...
(1983),
Between the Lines (1994) and
DinotopiaDinotopia is a fictional utopia created by author and illustrator James Gurney. It is the setting for the book series with which it shares its name. Dinotopia is an isolated island inhabited by shipwrecked humans and sentient dinosaurs who have learned to coexist peacefully as a single symbiotic...
(2002) as well as two appearances in
Doctor WhoDoctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
in the stories
Destiny of the DaleksDestiny of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 1 September to 22 September 1979. The story introduces Lalla Ward as the newly-regenerated Romana....
(1979) and
Dragonfire (1987).
In 2005, Osoba starred as the Kralahome in a UK touring production of the
The King and IThe King and I is a stage musical, the fifth by the team of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II. The work is based on the 1944 novel Anna and the King of Siam by Margaret Landon and derives from the memoirs of Anna Leonowens, who became governess to the children of King Mongkut of Siam in...
. Recent credits include the 2007 film Tanner, as Superintendent Smith in
HollyoaksHollyoaks is a long-running British television soap opera, first broadcast on Channel 4 on 23 October 1995. It was originally devised by Phil Redmond, who has also devised shows including Brookside and Grange Hill...
and Charlie Dokes in
The BillThe Bill is a police procedural television series that ran from October 1984 to August 2010. It focused on the lives and work of one shift of police officers, rather than on any particular aspect of police work...
. In 2011 Osoba made a brief appearance in an episode of
The Shadow LineThe Shadow Line is a seven-part British television drama serial produced by Company Pictures/Eight Rooks Ltd/Baby Cow/CinemaNX production for BBC Two...
.
Osoba has also appeared in one radio series,
Space ForceSpace Force was a BBC Radio science fiction serial, broadcast in the mid-1980s.Written by Charles Chilton, it was originally intended to be a sequel to his Journey into Space series , using the cast who'd just made a one-off revival of that series ; while this idea was dropped late in the day, the...
(1984–1985), as Loderick Sincere.
External links
- Official Website - http://www.tonyosoba.com