John Howard Davies

Known for DirectingBorn 1939-03-09Died 2011-08-22London, England, UK

John Howard Davies (born Paddington, London; 9 March 1939 — 22 August 2011) was a British television director, producer and former child actor. Davies was the son of the scriptwriter Jack Davies. His credits as a child actor include the title role in David Lean's Oliver Twist (1948), The Rocking Horse Winner (1949), Tom Brown's Schooldays (1951) and a few episodes of the television series William Tell (1958). After school at Haileybury, further education at Grenoble and National Service in the Royal Navy, he started working in the City in a finance company. After that, he trained as a carpet salesman but quit after six months to travel the world. Ending up in Australia he returned to acting and met his wife Leonie when they both appeared in The Sound of Music. Back in Britain, he tried selling oil to industry in Wembley and then became a production assistant in the BBC at the end of 1968. Davies is best known for his adult career as director and producer of several highly successful British sitcoms, including All Gas and Gaiters, Fawlty Towers (series 1), The Goodies, The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin, The Good Life, No Job for a Lady and Mr. Bean. Davies was also the producer and director of the sketch show The World of Beachcomber and the earliest episodes of Monty Python's Flying Circus. He also directed several episodes of The Vicar of Dibley. He became the BBC's Head of Comedy from 1977-1982, then head of Light Entertainment and finally Controller Managing Director of EMI Television Productions and the Head of Light Entertainment at ITV broadcaster Thames Television. During the last role, he was cited by the popular press as the man who 'sacked' comedian Benny Hill when the station decided not to renew his contract after 20 years' service. Description above from the Wikipedia article John Howard Davies, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on WikipediaRead more

Movies & web series

The Paul McCartney Special

The World of Beachcomber

About Religion

Fawlty Towers: Re-Opened

Fawlty Towers

Raffles

Monty Python's Flying Circus

Mr. Bean

Kim

The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin

Steptoe and Son

The Good Life

Oliver Twist

The Other One

The Bill

Tales of the Unexpected

Tom Brown's Schooldays

The Ruth Rendell Mysteries

Mr. Bean: Torvill and Bean

The Adventures of William Tell

Hope It Rains

No Job for a Lady

After Henry

The Exciting Escapades of Mr. Bean

Not Again: Not the Nine O'Clock News

The Magic Box

The Rocking Horse Winner

All Gas and Gaiters

Andy Capp

Executive Stress

Whoops Baghdad

Comedy Playhouse

Mr. Palfrey of Westminster

Bloody New Year

A Married Man

All in Good Faith

The Good Life: Inside Out

All About The Good Life

What the Pythons Did Next...

Dors: The Other Diana

The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin

Tales of the Unexpected: Lamb to the Slaughter