Richard Griffiths

Richard Griffiths, who has died aged 65, was a popular actor famous for playing over-the-top, grotesque characters. He was Uncle Vernon in the Harry Potter films, but most famously he was the corpulent, lascivious Monty in the movie Withnail and I, a role that won him cult status (fans would endlessly shout out the dialogue to him in the street). He was also successful on television, in particular as the disillusioned policeman-come-chef Henry Crabbe in the 1990s detective series Pie In The Sky and on stage too, where he became well known for his short fuse with audience members who forgot to switch off their mobile phones.

Griffiths was born into poverty in North Yorkshire, poverty he described as Dickensian. His father Thomas, a steelworker, and his mother Jane were both deaf-mute which meant he learned sign language from an early age and would often act as an interpreter for them.

In many ways it was an unhappy childhood. Although he later became famous as an over-size actor, during his childhood he was treated for being too skinny. The treatment for a malfunctioning pituitary gland meant he rapidly put on weight.

He attempted to run away from home many times and dropped out of school when he was 15 and took up a job, unhappily, in a warehouse. His boss convinced him to go back to school where a teacher took him to a performance of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? It was his first experience of theatre and convinced him it was what he wanted to do with his life.

He applied to study drama in Manchester, a decision which was not popular with his father. "He raged at its poofery," said Griffiths. But quite quickly Griffiths found his niche in theatre as a colourful, character actor.

By the mid-1970s Griffiths had been asked to join the Royal Shakespeare Company, where he built up a reputation as a clown, playing Falstaff, Bottom and Trinculo among many other great roles. He was also starting to win parts in film: in 1976 he appeared in the James Herriot bio-movie It Shouldn't Happen To A Vet; three years later he was in Gandhi. He also appeared in Gorky Park, The Smell Of Fear, Guarding Tess and Sleepy Hollow.

There are two films for which Griffiths will be best remembered. Withnail and I was a flop when it was released in 1987 but over the years the story of two aspiring but feckless actors starring Richard E Grant and Paul McGann built up a loyal, cult audience. Griffiths played Uncle Monty, an outrageous old queen who has his eyes on McGann's character. As he chases McGann round a tiny bedroom, he uttered one of the film's most famous line. "I mean to have you," he said, "even if it must be burglary."

Griffiths always said the film was a cult because it spoke directly to young people. "There's an authenticity about the attitudes in Withnail and I with people of a certain age, 15 to 35," he said. "It's autodestructive, hedonistic indulgence and disregard for authority is exactly where they repose their trust."

Nearly 20 years later, Griffiths's other great film role was as Hector, the teacher in Alan Bennett's play The History Boys. He first played the part in the West End and on Broadway and won numerous awards for the performance, including the Laurence Olivier Award for best actor, the Drama Desk Award for outstanding actor in a play, the Outer Critics Circle Award for best featured actor in a play, and a Tony Award for best performance by a leading actor in a play.

In the theatre, he was also well-known as an actor who took a strong line against members of theatre audiences whose mobile telephones rang out during performances. At least twice he was known to have stopped a show to order people out of the theatre after their phones persistently rang.

In the 1990s he was perhaps best recognised for his portrayal of Inspector Henry Crabbe in Pie In The Sky but he was also seen as Uncle Vernon in the Harry Potter series. In 2006 he starred with Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter) in a stage revival of Peter Shaffer's Equus at the Gielgud Theatre in London.

Last year he starred with Hollywood actor Danny DeVito in The Sunshine Boys in the West End and was due to reprise the role in Los Angeles in September.

He was awarded an OBE for services to drama in 2008 and is survived by his wife, Heather.