Actor and star of Z-Cars

Born: June 6, 1946;

Died: June 26, 2019

DOUGLAS Fielding, who has died aged 73, was so convincing in uniform during a decade he spent on the landmark police TV show Z-Cars that people would come up to him in the street and ask him to investigate crimes or in dodgier areas would simply come up and harangue him.

Z-Cars brought a new gritty realism to British police dramas when it launched in 1962 and marked a move away from the avuncular advice of Dixon of Dock Green. It was already well established when Fielding joined as the fresh-faced young recruit PC Quilley in 1969.

Initially Fielding was meant to be on the show for only two or three months. But it wound up as ten years. By the time Z-Cars finished in 1978 he had risen to the rank of sergeant and had been in 345 episodes.

Fielding relocated from Merseyside and Z-Cars to London E20, the fictional borough of Walford and a regular role on EastEnders as Detective Sergeant Quick, though that was a relatively short stint, with Fielding appearing on about 50 episodes in 1985-86.

Most of Fielding’s work after Z-Cars was in theatre and he appeared at the King’s Theatre in Glasgow in Suddenly at Home in 1978 and The Unvarnished Truth in 1980.

Born in London in 1946, he trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. He had not long graduated when his agent phoned to say the BBC were looking for a young actor for Z-Cars. He was already a fan of the show which was noted for its readiness to tackle tough social issues.

Fielding said it became very much like rep for him, with a core of regular actors and different guest actors and directors almost every week. “James Ellis (who played Sergeant Lynch) always used to refer to us as matadors, having fresh bulls thrown at us every single week, not just the directors, but many different types of actors,” he said.

Most episodes have been lost but Fielding recalled in an interview to accompany the release of surviving episodes on DVD that there was a steady stream of writers too and it was often up to the regular actors to keep them straight about their characters and avoid plotline inconsistencies.

He enjoyed the way Quilley developed and matured over time. “It was a total growth of the character through almost ten years,” he said.

Fielding recalled one occasion when he and Ellis were in the middle of shooting a scene. “A woman came running out of the supermarket claiming that she had had her bag stolen and grabbed the pair of us… There were a couple of cameras on the pavement, but to her we were the real thing.”

On other occasions someone would recognise Fielding, but were not quite sure where from. “We were always being stopped in the street by people,” he said. “Recognition was very high in those days. It was a very popular series. It affected our lives.”

Fielding’s stage work ranged from the farce Run for Your Wife to A Man for All Seasons and national tours in the lead roles of Macbeth and Henry IV. One of his most recent television appearances was on Silent Witness last year.

BRIAN PENDREIGH