Peter Egan

Watch Peter Egan listening. In Ever Decreasing Circles (1984–89) he plays Paul Ryman, the smooth neighbour of Richard Briers's Martin, and for most of the run he barely has to do anything but find Martin amusing. The smile does the work. Egan has said he did not like the part at first, that Paul seemed smarmy and he did not know how to play him, until he noticed he kept laughing at Briers. "Why shouldn't I find what he's doing amusing?" he asked the director, and that was the character. It still makes us laugh, and slightly cross, which is the right response to a man who is nicer than you and knows it.

That is the comic version of what he does. The dramatic version is quieter. As Magnus Pym in A Perfect Spy (1987) he carries the lead of a le Carré adaptation almost entirely by reaction, letting the conflict show in the face while the voice stays level. He had done the big title roles by then, Prince Regent (1979) and, before that, the lead in Big Breadwinner Hog (1969), and the stage voice from Chichester was always there for the period and literary parts. But the thing worth watching is the restraint: how much he can let through without appearing to do anything.

The later decades are ensemble work, and he is good at it. Downton Abbey (2012–15) gave him Shrimpie, the Marquess of Flintshire, and put him back alongside Penelope Wilton from the Briers days. After Life (2020–22) gave him Paul. Unforgotten (2015–2021) gave him Martin, father of Nicola Walker's detective, across several series. We scored Unforgotten a 64 and said the performances were the reason to stay through the crowded plotting; our review did not single Egan out, which tells you something about how he works. He is not there to be noticed. He is there so that Walker has someone to come home to who looks like family.

The criticism has always been the same, and he has made it himself: he set out not to become a type and ended up as one anyway, the tall, elegant, amusing man. It is a fair charge and an odd one, because the type is useful, and he has spent a career showing how much can be done inside it. Put him next to a more anxious lead, Briers or Walker, and the contrast gives the other actor somewhere to push against.

Start with Ever Decreasing Circles, with Sydney Lotterby directing the early series, and watch Paul watching Martin. Then try A Perfect Spy, where the same stillness is used for something sadder. If you only know him as the quiet father in Unforgotten, you have seen the technique but not the point.